The Autonomous Cars News, Development, and Discussion Thread

[Busy Bee]

Never underestimate how more stories of decapitated people will decrease enthusiasm.

[Hatman]

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[photoLith]

I for one cant wait for driverless cars. You can sleep on the way to work or drink and drive without getting a DUI.

[jmecklenborg]

They're nowhere close to getting this to work. The demo can't even get to the demo zone by itself. Then when it gets there, traffic is light and the weather is perfect. Ooh, and it's like 11am, not 11pm.

We're 50 years from being able to ride a self-driving car in the cold rain in Pittsburgh at 11pm in February.

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by photoLith

I for one cant wait for driverless cars. You can sleep on the way to work or drink and drive without getting a DUI.

I was in Phoenix in July and the Waymo vehicles are all over the place. I think it's getting close. Give it another 10 years or so.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Sun Belt

I was in Phoenix in July and the Waymo vehicles are all over the place. I think it's getting close. Give it another 10 years or so.

50. They're testing in the desert southwest because they have no hope of getting this stuff to work in foul weather until affordable sensory equipment exists that can function while covered in splattered mud and snow.

I mean, go up to one of those Waymo cars and wing some pizza sauce at it. They're done.

[SFBruin]

Originally Posted by photoLith

I for one cant wait for driverless cars. You can sleep on the way to work or drink and drive without getting a DUI.

Lol, this basically explains why Uber exists.

[twister244]

https://www.vox.com/2019/9/11/208508...bill-uber-lyft

I can't help but wonder what implications this may have for autonomous vehicles. If this begins to spread to other states, will leaders of Uber/Lyft see this as an incentive to invest more into making autonomous ride sharing happen sooner as it will eliminate the need to cover "employees"? Then again, maybe there is still enough of a gap between what we have now and a reality where driverless cars are everywhere.

[M II A II R II K]

Self-driving car only lanes? They're coming to an autonomous corridor in Michigan

https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/s...idor-michigan/

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- A future stretch of road between Detroit and Ann Arbor, Michigan, will be home to road lanes marked exclusively for self-driving cars in the future. The state and private partner Cavnue announced Thursday the creation of a new public-private duo to build the first kind of autonomous car corridor in Southeast Michigan to help accelerate testing. Eventually, the end goal is to close "long-standing gaps" to transportation access in the area.

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[M II A II R II K]

Why we’re still years away from having self-driving cars

https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/9/25...ill-years-away

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- Everything from programming vehicles to follow the rules of the road to getting them to communicate with human drivers and pedestrians forever ending, for instance, that infuriating indecisiveness we all encounter when trying to determine who should go first at a four-way stop is giving engineers fits. Even further in the weeds: developing sensors that can work flawlessly in all kinds of weather and visibility conditions, and teaching cars how to respond to all the so-called “edge cases” they’ll encounter on the road, such as comprehending the difference between a flock of birds dashing across the road or wind-blown leaves that are fine to run down. Also, cars don’t drive in a vacuum, the roads and infrastructure, as well as federal, state, and local regulations, have to accommodate fleets of robocars, and the public has to be on board, too. Many puzzle pieces must fall perfectly into place.

- The reality is that while roads themselves are generally orderly and well-known environments, what actually happens on them is anything but. Humans are proficient behind the wheel, but they’re also imprecise and occasionally wayward. So until 100 percent of the vehicles on the road are fully autonomous, something many analysts think is actually highly unlikely, every autonomous vehicle will have to be able to respond to the edge cases plus countless quirks and tics exhibited by human drivers on a daily basis. It’s the stuff we’re able to swat away without missing a beat while driving ourselves, but getting computers to try to manage it is a really big deal. — But don’t fret. Highly automated driving remains a very real proposition, one that’s being enabled not merely by fast-talking CEOs but by technology that’s indeed racing forward even if it’s not as fast as we’d hoped.

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[ssiguy]

I have always thought that self-driving cars are much ado about nothing.

Even if they perfect the technology it crosses too many legal barriers. One of the primary ones is insurance. When there is an accident and the car is completely self-driving, how can the individual not driving it be held responsible? Isn't that a akin to causing an accident and holding the passengers equally liable?

Of course what about the drivers test? Are they even necessary anymore and should anyone who can push a button be able to drive regardless of the ability or even age?

[M II A II R II K]

China’s cities will soon be crawling with self-driving robotaxis

https://www.fastcompany.com/90553995...ving-robotaxis

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- As the taxi drove itself through Shenzhen’s bustling streets, Bill Russo marveled from the passenger seat. Be it a scooter making a U-turn in front of the robotaxi, or a nearby driver who decided to go straight instead of following the legal left or right turns marked on the road, there was no shortage of obstacles for the self-driving car. Granted, there was a flesh-and-blood driver behind the wheel of the vehicle, which is part of startup AutoX’s autonomous car pilot program that publicly launched in China mid-August, but he would only take control in an emergency. --- However, Russo, who is the chairman of the Automotive Committee at the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, says AutoX’s AI was so effective that the emergency driver “never had to intervene” during the 70-minute ride. That level of sophistication is needed for companies such as AutoX and Didi, the latter being the ride-hailing company that recently launched a competing AV pilot program in China. That’s because, according to Russo, “Companies in China . . . are trying to do the black diamond, to use a skiing metaphor, and not a bunny hill.”

- Such companies could gather even more momentum thanks to a slew of infrastructure investment that the Chinese government announced earlier this year. That includes a 62-mile expressway connecting Beijing and neighboring Xiong’an that has several lanes dedicated to autonomous cars and was built by driverless construction vehicles. The paving was completed in mid-August, and the road will officially open in 2021. --- Russo, who is also the founder and CEO of the consulting company Automobility, says government funding is also focused on boosting China’s 5G infrastructure. The goal is to “allow for high-speed communication between autonomous vehicles and the network, which has eyes in the sky and helps the car see all around itself,” he says. --- Russo, who is also the founder and CEO of the consulting company Automobility, says government funding is also focused on boosting China’s 5G infrastructure. The goal is to “allow for high-speed communication between autonomous vehicles and the network, which has eyes in the sky and helps the car see all around itself,” he says.

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[M II A II R II K]

Futuristic All-Electric Autonomous Delivery Pods Now Available Worldwide

https://interestingengineering.com/f...able-worldwide

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- Swedish freight mobility company, Einride, unveiled its next-gen autonomous electric Pod on a commercial and global level. With updates and new features, the futuristic Pod is quite a sight. As of 2019, Einride became the first company to create a completely autonomous and electric heavy transport vehicle for the road. Now, with its updates and new Pod features, it's still way ahead of its competition. --- As the Einride Pod has no driver's compartment, the company had to "develop a proprietary methodology for describing the use cases for Autonomous Electric Transport (AET)," as per its press release.

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[M II A II R II K]

Driverless shuttle launches in downtown Tampa

https://www.tampabay.com/news/transp...owntown-tampa/

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- A 16-foot shuttle that cruised down N Marion Street at 15 mph Friday morning lacked two common things: a steering wheel and a driver. Instead, GPS, radar and light sensors guided the shuttle through intersections and past cars. When needed, an onboard shuttle specialist picked up an X-box controller and helped navigate around traffic cones and construction crews. --- “For the most part, we’re about 93-percent autonomous,” said Beep junior support engineer Rhys Reid, 19, as he paused the shuttle at a Kennedy Boulevard traffic light Friday. “In certain cases, the shuttle’s not smart enough to make a decision on its own yet. In that case, the shuttle specialist on board will have to decide, ‘I don’t think it’s safe to do this, let me engage manual mode.’”

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[Hatman]

Yes, and progress is still happening.
Here's something I hadn't considered: Covid safety!

Google had shut down their Waymo testing in March, but now they're back to operating their test program. (You need to live within a certain geo-fenced area of phoenix, AZ, and be invited to join their program to ride.)
Due to Covid, they are taking extra precautions. The most obvious is that they are removing the test driver from the vehicles that passengers will be riding in! I think that's really cool:

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[Hatman]

FYI, last week Tesla released its FSD (Full Self Driving) Beta software to some of its customer-test drivers, and the videos have been extremely promising:

Example
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As a reminder, Tesla likes to release Beta software to its customer fleet. Through feedback from the customers, Tesla is able to refine its software from awkward to usable to excellent.

FSD is slated for a wide release (to all Tesla customers who bought the FSD option) by the end of the year. I am one of those customers, and I super, SUPER stoked for this!

[M II A II R II K]

Lyft’s 2023 target for a driverless taxi launch looks overly-optimistic

https://thenextweb.com/shift/2020/12...ly-optimistic/

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- Lyft has completed more than 100,000 safety-driver-equipped robotaxi journeys in Las Vegas, where it has been testing its fleet. The ride-hailing company, which is developing driverless taxis in collaboration with self-driving car developers Motional, got the go ahead to test its fleet without drivers back in November. It plans to begin driverless tests in the coming months, with the hope that it can launch to the public in the next few years. --- Lyft says that it will offer its self-driving taxi service in multiple cities across the US. However, it hasn’t said, or even hinted at, where. Lyft has said that it will take care of the ride-hailing side of things, whilst Motional will take care of managing the fleet of robotaxis. Chances are that it will be in cities where driving conditions are highly controlled and predictable.

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[M II A II R II K]

Amazon’s New Robotaxi Has No Steering Wheel, But It Can Drive for 16 Hours Straight

https://singularityhub.com/2020/12/2...tor-or-brakes/

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- In June the company bought self-driving car startup Zoox in a deal that was estimated to be worth over $1 billion. And last week, Zoox unveiled its first prototype of a four-seater taxi with no driver nor steering wheel, brakes, or accelerator. Here’s what the car does have, though. Two bench-style seats face each other, flanked by tall transparent doors that slide open to deposit riders at their destinations. Each seat has a touchscreen next to it where passengers can adjust the climate and monitor their route and arrival time. — A 133-kilowatt-hour battery powers the car, and its makers say that one full charge gives the vehicle enough power to drive for 16 hours; there aren’t details about how this would vary based on how fast the car is going, how many stops it makes, and how many passengers are inside, but we can assume the 16 hours would take place under average city driving conditions a lot of stops and turns, and average speeds around 30-45 miles per hour.

- For now, though, Zoox vehicles won’t be looking to go super fast. Their max speed is 75 miles per hour, but their initial use will be limited to city driving, avoiding highways altogether. The company plans to work on hybrid city-highway vehicles in later iterations. — Riding around in a robotic taxi may take some time to become commonplace, and many potential passengers will likely wonder about safety. The vehicles are outfitted with all kinds of tech to avoid collisions and other accidents; the top of the taxis have six LIDARs distributed over the surface, along with multiple cameras and radars on the outer body. The sensor fields overlap so that the car’s “eyes” don’t have any blind spots, and Zoox says they can see objects that are almost 500 feet away. The inside of the cars also have airbags that, according the Zoox’s website, “cushion your head, neck, and chest in a totally new way.”

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[M II A II R II K]

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[M II A II R II K]

North America's first autonomous bus with ZERO human interference is set to transport over 40 passengers along rapid-transit corridor in Connecticut

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...nnecticut.html

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- A Minnesota-based transit manufacturer has just unveiled what it's billing as 'North America’s first heavy-duty automated transit bus.' The 41-foot Xcelsior AV from New Flyer can seat 40, with additional room for standing passengers and two spots for wheelchairs. The electric vehicle uses AutoDrive technology to construct a 360-degree 3-D model of its surroundings via LIDAR, radar, and cameras. and detect pedestrians, vehicles and other obstacles. New Flyer has already launched a pilot program with the Connecticut Department of Transportation, with a fleet of Xcelsior buses shuttling passengers along a dedicated transit route between New Britain and Hartfort.

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