Would you go driverless?

[stooz]

Im a car fan. I love driving, I love cars. And I love riding a motorbike.

But im a minority. There are plenty of pressure groups that feel its transportation only. and plenty use it for just that.

But I think driverless has its place - If people with a passion are left alone. but they won't be.

Trucks - 24 hour delivery, no restrictions on driver hours, reduced wages for companies. I don't get the job losses, Horsemen carriages moved on, truck drivers could - for a start a lot more trucks running alot more hours will need a lot more services and MOT's...
They will drive safer (they can't not) they will deliver more.

Taxis/ Mmm in 2 minds - I dont think they will survive. Why get a taxi when your own car can deliver you then scuttle off to a parking space and pick you up later?

Own cars. plenty will use them. work in the car, sleep in the car. get drunk and get to go out. If anything this will be great. Commercial venues will benefit from the extra customers.
You can go out, eat and drink and get a free ride home. No taxi costs. You will go to more restaurants and pubs if you not cut up £40+ for a cab.

But after max acceptance, driving in an advanced IAM style will be frowned upon. Insurance will sky rocket as you are a bigger risk.

I want them, but I want to be left to still do my own thing without public opinion staring at me like some sort of freak.

[Ashfordian]

Im a car fan. I love driving, I love cars. And I love riding a motorbike.

But im a minority. There are plenty of pressure groups that feel its transportation only. and plenty use it for just that.

But I think driverless has its place - If people with a passion are left alone. but they won't be.

Trucks - 24 hour delivery, no restrictions on driver hours, reduced wages for companies. I don't get the job losses, Horsemen carriages moved on, truck drivers could - for a start a lot more trucks running alot more hours will need a lot more services and MOT's...
They will drive safer (they can't not) they will deliver more.

Taxis/ Mmm in 2 minds - I dont think they will survive. Why get a taxi when your own car can deliver you then scuttle off to a parking space and pick you up later?

Own cars. plenty will use them. work in the car, sleep in the car. get drunk and get to go out. If anything this will be great. Commercial venues will benefit from the extra customers.
You can go out, eat and drink and get a free ride home. No taxi costs. You will go to more restaurants and pubs if you not cut up £40+ for a cab.

But after max acceptance, driving in an advanced IAM style will be frowned upon. Insurance will sky rocket as you are a bigger risk.

I want them, but I want to be left to still do my own thing without public opinion staring at me like some sort of freak.

I can't see how people who drive their own cars can be left alone. Firstly their risk level is 90% higher and will be priced accordingly. Second, you will be inefficient compared to driverless cars because you are taking up more road space (i.e. you will be driving a car that will not be able to be part of road trains, etc).

Thirdly, speeding will be almost eradicated. Driverless cars will stick to 20, 30 or whatever the road limit is so you will have to. How long will it be before your frustration means that you resign yourself to joining driverless cars?
Additionally, with all the sensors on these cars, how long will it be before they are used in assisting law enforcement e.g. speeding? This is controversial and very big brother (no more than automation of the home IMO) but it removes the requirement for traffic police bar a person sat at a computer reviewing the footage and confirming the prosecution. It would benefit those deploying driverless cars and government and free up policing resources for other areas. Speed camera's and other traffic calming measures will no longer be needed, etc.

You have outlined many benefits of driverless cars but will we own driverless cars or just call on them like a chauffeured taxi server via an App? Why own a car that sits around doing nothing for 94% of it life. The Google development approach does not look like an ownership model to me. Less cars will be needed as they will be utilised more efficiently. The only cars I see owned long term are classics and supercars, the latter mainly for track use. As per the recent car 'ownership' figures, 75% are on PCP which when simplified is in effect renting your car. It's not a huge leap to not owning a car.

I can't wait for them, it will be like having a personal chauffeur.

[swill453]

As per the recent car 'ownership' figures, 75% are on PCP which when simplified is in effect renting your car. It's not a huge leap to not owning a car.

Those were the new car purchase figures. The vast majority of cars on the road are not on PCP.

Scott.

[Ashfordian]

As per the recent car 'ownership' figures, 75% are on PCP which when simplified is in effect renting your car. It's not a huge leap to not owning a car.

Those were the new car purchase figures. The vast majority of cars on the road are not on PCP.

Scott.

Fair point, I did mean new car purchases as you pointed out.

With 2.69m new cars registered last year that means over 2m from last year alone are PCP. That is a lot of cars...

[Slarti]

You've missed another advantage, people like my son who can not drive, for whatever reason, can now have their own transport and not rely on others for their transport. Or on the joke that is public transport.

This would mean that I wouldn't have to sacrifice 3 hours to take him for his MRI on Thursday, or he use public transport and take getting on for 6 hours if ll of the connections work.

For me, I will stick with my petrol car until either it or I become no longer fit for the roads, at which point I will happily switch to electric self drive, because by then they will hopefully work properly. I'm talking getting on for 10 years here.



There will always be those who want to drive themselves, but unfortunately many of them should not be allowed to, such as the scrotes who gather to race a circuit round Maldon on Friday and Saturday nights and to do doughnuts in whichever car park they have congregated in. Perhaps the age of getting a driving licence will be increased one self drive is truly a thing.

Slarti

[bungeejumper]

Fair point, I did mean new car purchases as you pointed out.

With 2.69m new cars registered last year that means over 2m from last year alone are PCP. That is a lot of cars...

Yes, but by the time those cars reach their third birthday, many or most of them will have been resold into the non-PCP marketplace and will have changed hands for cash (or cash from bank loans). The overall proportion of cars within the PCP bracket will always be quite small.

Living out in the sticks, as I do, I suspect that it'll be a long while yet before driverless cars on demand find it worth their financial while to travel out of the towns just to pick me up. And where will I find one that's happy to put my bales of straw and muddy bicycles and stinking great sacks of garden waste into the boot?

BJ

[swill453]

For me, I will stick with my petrol car until either it or I become no longer fit for the roads, at which point I will happily switch to electric self drive, because by then they will hopefully work properly. I'm talking getting on for 10 years here.

Yes, I'd think that's a reasonable estimate for when we'll start to see many driverless cars on (some of) our roads.

Add another couple of decades before they become anything like the majority, and we start to see some of the significant social changes people are talking about here.

Scott.

[redsturgeon]

I've just had to leave my warm cosy sofa, in my warm cosy house to get in my car to pick up my son from the golf club (he's 15) how much easier if I'd just sent the driverless car.

John

[bungeejumper]

I've just had to leave my warm cosy sofa, in my warm cosy house to get in my car to pick up my son from the golf club (he's 15) how much easier if I'd just sent the driverless car.

Harrumph, when I were a lad, if the golf clubs (or fishing tackle) wouldn't fit on my trusty pushbike then I'd have to opt for carrying less stuff. Not that I'd have been allowed anywhere near a golf course at 15, of course. My hair was too long, and they wouldn't have liked my T shirt.

BJ

[PrincessB]

Im a car fan. I love driving, I love cars. And I love riding a motorbike.

But im a minority. There are plenty of pressure groups that feel its transportation only. and plenty use it for just that.

But I think driverless has its place - If people with a passion are left alone. but they won't be.

I think we're all guilty of assuming driverless cars will work first time. I have my doubts about this.

On a technology front, there are times when a mania makes people take leave of their senses and when they realise the product is awful everything collapses. I would cite those ghastly home game consoles from the early 80s (Atari anyone), the early VR headsets from a few years later, start stop engines (which I saw on Tomorrow's world when I was a kid) etc.

Most of these things are over hyped, fail to work properly and after they crash are ignored for a decade until technology catches up and they finally work without fuss.

With that in mind, I envisage that driverless will gravitate towards the simplest environment first and over the next few decades become accepted in the more challenging urban areas. The simplest driving environment I can think of is motorways in the bigger less crowded countries such as the US, Canada and Australia - I'd trust a computer to drive a truck down a completely empty straight road for a few hundred miles, whether a machine could navigate the drive through McDonalds on the A40 by Polish War Memorial would be a sterner test as nobody has any idea where they are going in there.

These things come in iterations and as the average car lives for 11 years, we are a long way from mostly driverless - Perhaps in 20 years time things will be different though my fudge factor would say 30 years for urban stuff.

Regards,

B.

[Ashfordian]

Im a car fan. I love driving, I love cars. And I love riding a motorbike.

But im a minority. There are plenty of pressure groups that feel its transportation only. and plenty use it for just that.

But I think driverless has its place - If people with a passion are left alone. but they won't be.

I think we're all guilty of assuming driverless cars will work first time. I have my doubts about this.

On a technology front, there are times when a mania makes people take leave of their senses and when they realise the product is awful everything collapses. I would cite those ghastly home game consoles from the early 80s (Atari anyone), the early VR headsets from a few years later, start stop engines (which I saw on Tomorrow's world when I was a kid) etc.

Most of these things are over hyped, fail to work properly and after they crash are ignored for a decade until technology catches up and they finally work without fuss.

With that in mind, I envisage that driverless will gravitate towards the simplest environment first and over the next few decades become accepted in the more challenging urban areas. The simplest driving environment I can think of is motorways in the bigger less crowded countries such as the US, Canada and Australia - I'd trust a computer to drive a truck down a completely empty straight road for a few hundred miles, whether a machine could navigate the drive through McDonalds on the A40 by Polish War Memorial would be a sterner test as nobody has any idea where they are going in there.

These things come in iterations and as the average car lives for 11 years, we are a long way from mostly driverless - Perhaps in 20 years time things will be different though my fudge factor would say 30 years for urban stuff.

Regards,

B.

This is Wikipedia on Google's driverless car - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waymo

To me they are way past the technology front you list. That IMO would have been the 2000's. In the month of August 2016, Google cars travelled 126k miles autonomously. As technology improves (Moore's law) this is only going to speed up their development.

To me, these cars only have to drive a road once before they can remember it as start using it in combination with all the other technology. They can then share this knowledge with every other Google car. Look how quickly Google streetview mapped UK roads which is very similar. This may have been some of the preparation work for Google cars.

[swill453]

I'm no expert (and I'm thinking aloud here*), but you'd think driverless cars that stick to the speed limits, don't overtake, travel in line etc would work better if they (the authorities) built data points / transponders / whetever they're called, into the roads / signs / other road furniture etc?

I don't think they'd be much help. Knowing the road, avoiding hitting stationary objects etc. is by far the easiest bit.

It's the other factors that they'll encounter that will ensure (IMO) that we're still decades away from major change.

Scott.

[bungeejumper]

To me, these cars only have to drive a road once before they can remember it as start using it in combination with all the other technology. They can then share this knowledge with every other Google car.

Well, I know they've all got the satnav info, and I expect they could improve on that a bit, but generally I'd rather they all took their own decisions. Just because a car's driven down the road past the school at 2 pm, I wouldn't reckon its chances at 4 pm when the school run cars are double and sometimes treble parked, and when we start to find out how many people don't know how to work reverse gear.

More seriously, there are other dangers in assuming that street knowledge can be passed from one self-driving car to another. Temporary road works are a fine example. One of our local councils made the most incredible extended shambles about building a new roundabout - for two months it was running anticlockwise for a week, then clockwise for another week, then anticlockwise again. No road signage apart from a temporary set of lights during rush hours, and everything left to the discretion and survival skills of each motorist.

So you've learned that the roundabout goes anticlockwise, and you've passed this valuable information on to every other self-driving car on the road? Could get tricky.

BJ

[jfgw]

You have outlined many benefits of driverless cars but will we own driverless cars or just call on them like a chauffeured taxi server via an App? Why own a car that sits around doing nothing for 94% of it life. The Google development approach does not look like an ownership model to me. Less cars will be needed as they will be utilised more efficiently. The only cars I see owned long term are classics and supercars, the latter mainly for track use. As per the recent car 'ownership' figures, 75% are on PCP which when simplified is in effect renting your car. It's not a huge leap to not owning a car.

I can't wait for them, it will be like having a personal chauffeur.

Ok for small, one-stop shopping trips. Ok to and from work for most people. Probably ok for most trips to visit friends or go out somewhere. Other than that, I suspect that most people would want to leave things in their car. Would you want to carry your coat around all day because it was cold when you left home? Would you want to stop off at a shop on your way to a friend's and be able to leave your shopping in the boot? Do you have to carry business-related materials? Is the child seat suitable? Do you have more than one child?

I can see a place for driverless taxis but it would be difficult for them to be a complete substitute for private ownership.

Julian F. G. W.

[Ashfordian]

To me, these cars only have to drive a road once before they can remember it as start using it in combination with all the other technology. They can then share this knowledge with every other Google car.

Well, I know they've all got the satnav info, and I expect they could improve on that a bit, but generally I'd rather they all took their own decisions. Just because a car's driven down the road past the school at 2 pm, I wouldn't reckon its chances at 4 pm when the school run cars are double and sometimes treble parked, and when we start to find out how many people don't know how to work reverse gear.

More seriously, there are other dangers in assuming that street knowledge can be passed from one self-driving car to another. Temporary road works are a fine example. One of our local councils made the most incredible extended shambles about building a new roundabout - for two months it was running anticlockwise for a week, then clockwise for another week, then anticlockwise again. No road signage apart from a temporary set of lights during rush hours, and everything left to the discretion and survival skills of each motorist.

So you've learned that the roundabout goes anticlockwise, and you've passed this valuable information on to every other self-driving car on the road? Could get tricky.

BJ

Your last point is where driverless cars are better than humans. It will have a general memory but the driverless car will not take the last time as what to do this time. Its technology will be constantly re-evaluating the situation e.g where are the other car, pedestrians, cyclists, cones, etc, etc. It has to do this as this is what it's technology and sensors are designed to do.

On the schools point, Google maps already knows where all the schools are. How long would it take to build a database of school times and route around this if it was causing traffic issues(Google traffic)? Or maybe it would be programmed to travel slower around the school at those times if it had to travel past them.

You are thinking of these scenarios as a human would, not from a computers view which is purely logic based.

The only issue around driverless cars is the moral one of if it cannot avoid an accident, should it endanger the occupants or others?

My view is it should endanger the occupants as they have additional safety devices. It's similar to the question of how much safer you would drive if there was a 6 inch metal spike facing you on the steering wheel.

[Slarti]

This is Wikipedia on Google's driverless car - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waymo

To me they are way past the technology front you list. That IMO would have been the 2000's. In the month of August 2016, Google cars travelled 126k miles autonomously. As technology improves (Moore's law) this is only going to speed up their development.

To me, these cars only have to drive a road once before they can remember it as start using it in combination with all the other technology. They can then share this knowledge with every other Google car. Look how quickly Google streetview mapped UK roads which is very similar. This may have been some of the preparation work for Google cars.

From your link
"As of August 28, 2014, according to Computer World Google's self-driving cars were in fact unable to use about 99% of US roads.[54] As of the same date, the latest prototype had not been tested in heavy rain or snow due to safety concerns.[55] Because the cars rely primarily on pre-programmed route data, they do not obey temporary traffic lights"

As for Streetview, it is always out of date and takes no account for roadworks for example.

Slarti

[jfgw]

On the schools point, Google maps already knows where all the schools are. How long would it take to build a database of school times and route around this if it was causing traffic issues(Google traffic)? Or maybe it would be programmed to travel slower around the school at those times if it had to travel past them.

Google already knows everything. It tracks where people are, where they go and when. It guesses where people live from where their phones spend the night, it knows people's favourite pubs ("15 minutes to The Woolpack, no. 44 bus) and shows a crude histogram of when it is most busy. Inside leg? It has probably calculated that from how one walks. The technology is already in use. If lots of parents' 'phones are being tracked leaving home at the usual time, Google can work out that it is a school day.

With a mobile 'phone, it is up to the user to decide whether or not to share data and benefit from Google's helpful service or to say no to Big Brother snooping. Even if sharing one's car location and route is optional, there will still probably be more than enough data to make well-informed decisions.

As for driving past a school (rather than detouring around it), the car would not have to "know" when the busy times were. It is quite simple really: If there are lots of cars and there are children running around, slow down; If there are not, drive at a normal speed.

The only way that I can envisage country-wide mass carnage due to driverless vehicles is if the software development is taken over by a government department.

Julian F. G. W.

[DrFfybes]

For me, I will stick with my petrol car until either it or I become no longer fit for the roads, at which point I will happily switch to electric self drive, because by then they will hopefully work properly. I'm talking getting on for 10 years here.

Yes, I'd think that's a reasonable estimate for when we'll start to see many driverless cars on (some of) our roads.

Add another couple of decades before they become anything like the majority, and we start to see some of the significant social changes people are talking about here.

Scott.

For me this is perfect.

If we are looking at 30 years for driverless cars to become the norm and an everyday occurance, that takes me to about 80 years old, will probably be about the time everyone except me thinks I should be giving up driving.

Paul

[Slarti]

The only way that I can envisage country-wide mass carnage due to driverless vehicles is if the software development is taken over by a government department.

Julian F. G. W.

Hacking.

"Unless you transfer 100 bitcoins into this account the car will crash through the next bus queue."

Or you'll be left going round and round the M25 until the power fails.


Slarti

[bungeejumper]

Or you'll be left going round and round the M25 until the power fails.

You evil fiend. Don't you know that cruel and unusual punishment has been internationally outlawed?

BJ