BALTIMORE — A nationwide network of millions of self-driving cars whisking suburban commuters to work is a pleasant utopian vision, but getting there would almost rival the Manhattan Project that created the first atomic bombs.
Self-driving cars have been in development for years, and their backers claim the vehicles will be ready to dominate the car market in the foreseeable future.
Having a nation of commuters use these vehicles, they claim, will reduce traffic congestion, improve highway safety and make even the far suburbs more convenient places to live.
Fully automated cars could make up nearly 10 percent of global vehicle sales a year, by 2035, the Boston Consulting Group has predicted.
But before those suburban dwellers can order their cars to "take me to work," some gargantuan problems with safety, technology, cost, acceptance, federal bureaucrats and other drivers must be overcome.
First, the technology used in those cars creates serious safety problems, and huge improvements must be made before they can safely handle streets.
Developing fail-safe software for completely driverless cars would require rethinking how software is designed, some experts say. They note that the software in phones, laptops and other devices is not designed to operate for extended periods without crashing or freezing — and those errors would be deadly in a car.
Also, driverless cars rely primarily on pre-programmed route data, so they don't obey things such as temporary traffic lights. They also have problems figuring out when objects, such as strewn papers are harmless, so they may swerve for no reason.
The vehicles simply can't deal with the unexpected adventures that fill everyday life, so until they are self-driving at all times, humans are going to have to resume control in extreme circumstances when a vehicle's computer runs into things it can't handle.
Meanwhile, as an article in The New York Times points out, Google's self-driving car has already run into another perplexing safety problem: human drivers.
The story recounts that when one of Google’s self-driving cars came to a crosswalk, it did what it was supposed to do when it slowed to allow a pedestrian to cross, but that prompted its human “safety driver” to apply the brakes. The pedestrian emerged unhurt, but Google’s car was hit from behind.
Meanwhile, developing a nationwide self-driving car system would require countless amounts of effort and money. Currently the maps for Google's self-driving cars have only been designed to handle a few thousand miles of road. To make a national system work, a company would have to maintain and update data on millions of miles of roads.
In another area, the development of these vehicles inevitably means more state and federal regulation, a process already underway by some state governments and at least one federal agency.
Regulation is the enemy of innovation, and regulators are notoriously risk averse. They surely will tie the cars up in miles of paralyzing red tape because government at all levels will do what government loves to do: regulate and overregulate; once again giving the motoring public the raised middle-finger.
The widespread use of driverless cars also raise issues of legal liability such as who's liable when one has a wreck, something that take years and many lawyers to sort out.
And there's a potential privacy problem: each car’s' computer would store massive amounts of highly personal data that the feds, with their penchant for spying on us, might well grab to use against drivers.
Of course, nobody knows the cost of totally self-driving cars. However, one report says cars with the ability to drive anywhere with no human input would add some $10,000 to the sticker price, at least in the first decade the technology’s on the market.
There's also the problem of getting people to accept them. Cars aren't just transportation; they reflect our personalities and tastes.
It'll be hard to get someone wanting to zoom down the highway in a fast open convertible to meekly accept riding as a passive passenger in a computer-controlled vehicle.
Whitt Flora, an independent journalist, covered the White House for The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch and was chief congressional correspondent for Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine. Readers may write him at 319 Shagbark Rd., Middle River, Md. 21220.
