15.5.2.8 Self driving cars will start to appear on our roadways
Even though self driving cars have been ‘just around the corner’ since at least the 1950’s (Fig. 15.16), I’m reasonably confident that over the next 10 to 15 years auto-driving options will become available on higher end personal vehicles. We probably won’t call these vehicles “self-driving cars” because they will continue to support manual driving as the default option. Instead we will probably say something like “intelligent cruise control” is available on this model. In addition to self driving cars, self-driving taxis, 18-wheelers, and other service vehicles will be common by 2030.
Figure 15.16 In fact as far back as the 1939 World’s Fair, General Motors claimed in their Futurama exhibit that on the motorways of 1960 “safe distance between cars is maintained by automatic radio control’ at 14:30-14:50
The introduction of “intelligent cruise control” will be gradual and is, in fact, already happening. Systems that prevent you from following too closely to a vehicle in front of you – applying the brakes if necessary – are standard on some higher end models today. Systems to assist with steering in emergency situations are appearing. Some cars can now parallel park themselves. Systems that can handle driving on Interstates and freeways – including dealing with stop and go traffic – will probably be the next part of the driving experience to be automated. Systems capable of handling construction zones, understanding the hand signals of traffic cops, and coping with various kinds of inclement weather, such as ice and snow, will probably prove the most complex to develop.