Will cars ever have autopilot?

[stinkynuts]

Something that was once science fiction, is one step toward reality.

Adaptive cruise control lets drivers simply press a button the highway. The car has a radar that allows the car to keep a certain distance from the car in front of it. This means that the driver only needs to steer.

If there were automatic steering, something I understand is technically possible and may already exist, then theoretically, we can have cars drive on their own, with no help from the driver.

How soon will this be available? We already have cars with automatic lights, wipers (they sense rain), backview mirrors (that dim when it's dark). These were technologies that were not available until recently.

 

[EntertainmentMan2000]

they would have to sense people running/walking in front of cars...what if there's a huge pothole in the road? what happens if the "autopilot" has a bug? lawsuits? there would be too much liability for whoever creates it..airplanes don't have to deal with the amount of traffic that cars do.

 

[WoodPeckr]

They created vehicle autopilot systems back in the 60s.
Cables were buried in the highway lanes and vehicle sensors read and took direction from these buried cables. They worked fairly well but the technology never took off and yes there were still accidents when the system malfunctioned.....

 

[Thunderballs]

I can see it happening. After all now the landings that are the smoothest are when the plane, not the pilot, lands itself. Why couldn't cars eventually drive themselves? It may take another hundred years but it could happen. That is if we don't nuke ourselves into oblivion before then.

 

[fun-guy]

they would have to sense people running/walking in front of cars...

I just saw on CTV news that Volvo just introduced a car that can stop in front of a person going 35 km per hour. It senses a person in front of the car and it automatically stops, how cool is that, the technology can only get better.

 

[Why Not?]

Something that was once science fiction, is one step toward reality.

Adaptive cruise control lets drivers simply press a button the highway. The car has a radar that allows the car to keep a certain distance from the car in front of it. This means that the driver only needs to steer.

If there were automatic steering, something I understand is technically possible and may already exist, then theoretically, we can have cars drive on their own, with no help from the driver.

How soon will this be available? We already have cars with automatic lights, wipers (they sense rain), backview mirrors (that dim when it's dark). These were technologies that were not available until recently.

GM had a working prototype of this years ago. It would allow automated cars to hook up in trains with very little space between them and travel at high speed. I've seen a film of it operating on a closed course. The system needed a whole buch of transponders or similar devices put into the road for the cars to follow. This was its achilles heel as no one was going to pay to install these things until a lot of cars could use it and no one was going to pay for such a car until they had had the roads built. Also you had to keep non-equipped cars out of the lane. Any practical system would need to work on a conventional road around real non-automated cars.

This turns out to be really difficult. The US military through its DARPA organization has been holding an annual contest for years for driverless vehicles to cover a distance of something like 100 km with no driver in the car and the vehicle under its own control. There is film available of this as well. It took a couple of years before any vehicle even finished the course. The US wants it for autonomous armoured fighting vehcles. Just Google "DARPA robot vehicles" and you'll get lots of film clips.

 

[HetroGuy]

It would be nice to snooze on the way to work, grab a quicky, watch a movie. I'm guessing it isn't the computer programming (a lot of human tasks have been duplicated/exceeded by computer driven machines) but the amount of sensors and interpretation of the I/O into the computer.

While a computer would make mathematical/ logical decisions - imagine all the information that human driver has coming in as they drive. Both sights and sounds are observed and those not associated with driving are ignored. Sounds have direction, (sirens, squeals, yelling, horns) and sight gives not only location of objects but their speed, direction and possible collision avoidance (e.g. a kid running off a sidewalk onto the road).

Just think of the programming a car to enter traffic from a city parking lot, looking for cars, avoiding bikes, pedestrians, etc. Are there people crossing the sidewalk?, is the space you see between cars going to be the adequate when the car behind is accelerating ?, what happens if the car across the street goes for the same space ?, etc.

Hmm. Maybe not in my life time

 

[OddSox]

Hmm. Maybe not in my life time

Depends on how old you are I think - http://www.dpccars.com/car-videos/06-15-07page-Self-driving-Golf-GTI.htm

 

[69Shooter]

Maybe to a limited extent. For example, I could envision specially construected highways that could be built for auto-piloted cars. However, I doubt we'll ever see it for all types of everyday driving. As many have already stated there are just too many variables and complexities involved... not the least of which is how do non-auto-piloted cars fit into the equation?

 

[needinit]

It would be nice to snooze on the way to work, grab a quicky, watch a movie. I'm guessing it isn't the computer programming (a lot of human tasks have been duplicated/exceeded by computer driven machines) but the amount of sensors and interpretation of the I/O into the computer.

While a computer would make mathematical/ logical decisions - imagine all the information that human driver has coming in as they drive. Both sights and sounds are observed and those not associated with driving are ignored. Sounds have direction, (sirens, squeals, yelling, horns) and sight gives not only location of objects but their speed, direction and possible collision avoidance (e.g. a kid running off a sidewalk onto the road).

Just think of the programming a car to enter traffic from a city parking lot, looking for cars, avoiding bikes, pedestrians, etc. Are there people crossing the sidewalk?, is the space you see between cars going to be the adequate when the car behind is accelerating ?, what happens if the car across the street goes for the same space ?, etc.

Hmm. Maybe not in my life time

The difference would be being able to enable autopilot in specific situations (ie enter 407 and it becomes enabled), not for all driving such as mentioned in this example. When you exit the 407 it becomes disabled (this could be applied to specific stretches of highways)

Imagine the smooth merging of traffic if the cars took control and aligned everyone up properly without morons trying to cut in front etc - much better.

If as I put it, then it is easily possible, except the only issue then is one of liability if an accident does occur - insurance company (ie. car owner) or car manufacturer!

 

[Brill]

I bet it wouldn't be too difficult to have a driverless streetcar or subway, it would save a bundle on labour.

You could say the same for most jobs though.

 

[Why Not?]

I bet it wouldn't be too difficult to have a driverless streetcar or subway, it would save a bundle on labour.

You could say the same for most jobs though.

Vancouver's new LRT line to the airport is apparently driverless. Doing it on a streetcar is far more complex. The LRT has a dedicated track, no cross streets, no pedestrians stepping off of curbs, no traffic lights, no bicyclists weaving in and out, no fire engines, no dogs etc.

 

[Mister K]

I heard that NYC considered this about 10 years ago after they did some major upgrades to the automation and command & control functions for the subway system, however the union that represents the driver/conductors successfully lobbied to have the project killed. Of course they used system safety as an excuse, but the reality is that it would have meant major job losses.

 

[Bif_Butkiss]

Didn't California have some dedicated highway lanes for the testing of automated vehicles a while ago? I remember seeing something on TV where all you did was to program the car as to your destination. With a GPS locator on board it could figure out your location and your desired route based on your requirements inputed into the on board computer and get you there. It had all kinds of sensors for vehicular and pedestrian traffic, got info on traffic lights and driving conditions through the GPS. They showed one guy in this car sleeping in the driver`s seat while zipping along at 40 mph.
Sure it`s possible but not very probable in the forseeable future. I thiink this was done more or less as an experiment to see if they could make it work.

 

[Perry Mason]

About 35 years ago I had a client whose business was to find good inventions at their very early stages and finance and market them.

He had an invention for a system for highways: cars with built in radar and computers running on a dedicated outside lane and reflecting signals off other cars and sensors strategically placed along the sides of the highway; any driver could opt in or out at any time. He had GM interested but, bottom line, the computer technology was too expensive, too bulky, too heavy... and too slow for instant, real time communications.

We now have the technology to overcome that problem, but there is a much greater problem: it is not good enough to control a single unit of a dynamic traffic system, you have to manage and control the whole system, and that means every part of it.

One would think that because it is possible to fly and land a plane, it should be possible to drive and control a car... but an airplane operates in a highly controlled traffic system with one plane landing on one runway at any given time.

What you are talking about is robotics... a fascinating subject and lots of information on the web.

Perry

 

[blueman]

BMW has it for you . . . almost

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/cliff-kuang/design-innovation/bmws-new-invention-one-step-closer-auto-pilot

 

[slowandeasy]

Maybe to a limited extent. For example, I could envision specially construected highways that could be built for auto-piloted cars. However, I doubt we'll ever see it for all types of everyday driving. As many have already stated there are just too many variables and complexities involved... not the least of which is how do non-auto-piloted cars fit into the equation?

It would make amazing sense to be able to have the car auto piloted on specially constructed highways. So if you are going on a long drive (say to NYC) you could cruise for 6 hours of that time without having to drive the car. Not a bad way to travel.