Driverless Cars: How Far Away are they?

Posted by Simon R 28/03/2022 0 Comment(s)

Driverless cars may sound futuristic, but prototypes are already being tested on pilot schemes in some parts of the world. However, due to the massive safety testing needed, experts believe it could be at least ten years before we see fully autonomous vehicles on our roads - possibly even longer.

There are several different types of self-driving cars being developed including the most complex, fully autonomous vehicles. Some cars on the road today are partially self-driving, particularly in China and the United States.

 

Driverless Cars

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Despite some positive advances, industry insiders admit we're nowhere near developing a totally driverless car that's safe enough to put passengers in by themselves and send them off to arbitrary locations.

The creation and development of self-driving cars have been beset by many challenges. This includes technological limitations, infrastructure, safety concerns, ethical considerations about responsibility when it comes to collisions and costs.
 

 

History of self-driving cars


Amazingly, the first driverless car was invented in the US in 1925 by electrical engineers at the Houdina Radio Control Co. They converted a Chandler, from Achen Motor Co of Milwaukee, by adding a transmitting antenna and operating it with a transmitter from a second car following behind.

The radio operator could start its engine, change gears and honk the horn. Known as the American Wonder and later as the Phantom Auto, the prototype amazed onlookers as it drove through New York, going along Broadway and Fifth Avenue, without anyone at the steering wheel.

Unfortunately, the operator lost control of the car during the ride, causing it to crash into another vehicle! Although the prototype didn't go into production, largely due to safety fears, it offered a glimpse of the future.

In 1939, General Motors unveiled its self-driving car at the World's Fair. The electric automobile was driven via radio-controlled electromagnetic fields, operated by magnetised metal spikes fitted into the road.

Driverless cars didn't progress any further until the 1960s, when researchers developing vehicles for the moon landings utilised cameras for the first time. They were able to detect and follow a line on the ground. Cameras have become a vital part of autonomous vehicles today.

In 1977, Japanese inventors developed a camera system that could relay data showing the road layout to a computer. The resulting self-driving vehicle reached speeds of up to 20 mph.

In 1990, Carnegie Mellon University, in Pittsburgh, started building driverless cars. Researchers took the resulting car, called the Nav Lab 5, on a 2,797-mile road trip to San Diego. A semi-autonomous vehicle, the developers controlled the braking and speed.
 

 

21st century innovations


The driverless car industry has grown in the 21st century, with major players such as the US Department of Defence conducting their own research. However, in 2004, none of the resulting cars successfully completed the challenge of self-navigating 150 miles of desert roads.

Subsequently, Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Ford have also begun developing self-driving cars, as well as ride-share companies such as Uber. It has proved more difficult than they anticipated and in 2020, Uber announced it was no longer proceeding with its development programme.

In 2021, Tesla's Full Self-Driving package boasted autonomous hands-free control for freeway and highway driving. However, the German government asked Tesla to stop using the term "autonomous" for its vehicles, claiming they weren't truly autonomous. Tesla enthusiasts debating on social media about whether the manufacturer's Autopilot system was truly "autonomous" largely agreed it wasn't.

Today, there aren't any fully autonomous vehicles commercially available for motorists to buy. There are several driverless vehicles used in industry, such as the Caterpillar autonomous trucks used in mining. They have hauled more than three billion tonnes of materials in the past seven years.

In the US and China, a few pilot schemes to operate "robotaxis" are underway, using an AI driver. However, these are few and far between. Since 2020, the Waymo One robotaxi app has offered driverless rides in the Phoenix Metro area. More recently, the service expanded to an area of San Francisco, California.
 

 

Although the vehicles are fully automated, they currently have a "safety driver" present until their safety is assured. Waymo says it will eventually remove the safety drivers but there isn’t a firm date yet.

In China, similar services are being offered in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai, courtesy of Apollo Go and Pony AI. In Wuhan, Deeproute and We Ride AI are offering free rides in their autonomous taxis.

 

 

What are the major hurdles?


In the 2010s, urban planners were already looking at future city designs to accommodate driverless cars. They envisaged traffic lights would no longer be needed and felt there would be less on-street parking. The cars could simply drop passengers off at their destination, go home and come back later when needed.

Drivers were told the new breed of cars could communicate with each other and with the roads themselves, modulating traffic flow and reducing accidents. They hoped this system would be operational by the 2020s. Of course, we now know this isn't the case.

The main problems centre on the complex technology needed to make self-driving cars work safely. Programming cars to follow the roads' rules, such as who has the right of way at a four-way junction, have been causing scientists headaches. There's also the question of how the cars will communicate with pedestrians and human drivers.

Sensors are required that will work perfectly in all kinds of weather. They must be able to differentiate between different hazards. This includes knowing when to stop if low-flying birds swoop down into the road, or a dog runs out, compared with sensing swirling, wind-blown leaves that they can safely run over.

In addition, there would have to be major changes in the roads' infrastructure to accommodate fleets of driverless cars. National, regional and local regulations would have to be changed. The general public would have to be consulted and be on board.

Safety concerns and ethical considerations about responsibility in the event of collisions would also take a lot of complex planning. Until the technology is deemed 100% safe, it's impossible to allow the cars to go into widescale development for public purchase.

This leads to perhaps the most important consideration - the costs involved in developing the cars further and changing the roads' infrastructure to accommodate them. Even the most successful manufacturers can't go on pouring money into new technology if there's no clear timeframe on when it might be safe to use.

Until the day when driverless cars are a reality, drive safely using Autologics' range of driving aids including sat nav, parking sensors, reversing cameras and more, which can be retro-fitted in many different vehicles.