Google Says Its Self-Driving Cars Can Tackle City Streets Now

Google must be extremely confident because there will be such a public outcry the first time one of these things causes an accident. Same thing if word ever got out that the person in the car had to intervene to prevent one from happening.
 
Can't do worse than people who do their hair, nails, makeup, eat, text and god knows what else while they drive.
 
A self driving car would be great for vacations. No more need dealing with the TSA and cramped airplane seats. Just set the GPS and take a nap.

I just hope they are available by the time I get too old to drive.
 
I'm sorry, perhaps I don't understand, but why DO cyclists have total right of way?? I mean obviously your not just going to say fuck them and hit them with your car, but I get the impression that if a bike is in even a moderate proximity, the car just completely stops until there are no bikes around..? It would take hours just to go through any downtown streets...maybe I'm just being daft..LOL
 
Aside from being a gimmick to attract more attention to Google, I think it's a good idea. Most people totally suck at driving safely and should never be able to drive a car. I can't even count the number of times I've seen some HUGE pickup truck with a gun rack on the back window and gigantic tires weaving into the oncoming lane with some random angry man in bib overalls driving it while blah-blahing into his cell phone. Hopefully other some legitimate companies that aren't out to abuse the idea by tracking where people go will start doing it so don't have to worry about having our vacations data mined.
 
i can see a future where we give up driving to the computers on major roads and highways, but remain in control for smaller residential streets, parking lots, and tracks
 
if the car happens to run a red light and gets caught, can the driver still be fined? I'd mail my ticket to google.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
Aside from being a gimmick to attract more attention to Google, I think it's a good idea. Most people totally suck at driving safely and should never be able to drive a car. I can't even count the number of times I've seen some HUGE pickup truck with a gun rack on the back window and gigantic tires weaving into the oncoming lane with some random angry man in bib overalls driving it while blah-blahing into his cell phone. Hopefully other some legitimate companies that aren't out to abuse the idea by tracking where people go will start doing it so don't have to worry about having our vacations data mined.
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The US government is going to require black boxes to track your location, direction, speed and mileage in the near future. They want to tax people on the amount of mileage they travel since improving fuel economy is reducing gas tax revenues at a significant rate. The so-called Vehicle Mileage Tax (VMT) is already being tested in Oregon and Illinois, and is currently being considered for implementation in North Carolina.
 
Do Vegas strip. No fucking way. They are fucking idiots downtown. One wrong turn, and I hit the strip. Went down, turned around. Damn. Never again.

Good luck to Google. Early adopters, though. I'll wait for the tech to mature before getting into one of those cars.
 
Armenius said:
The US government is going to require black boxes to track your location, direction, speed and mileage in the near future. They want to tax people on the amount of mileage they travel since improving fuel economy is reducing gas tax revenues at a significant rate. The so-called Vehicle Mileage Tax (VMT) is already being tested in Oregon and Illinois, and is currently being considered for implementation in North Carolina.
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I'd love to see people have box thingies that measure how far they drive and also take into account how big/heavy their vehicle is so they have to pay more per mile than someone who doesn't drive as far and uses a more reasonable sized car. It's just Google creepy-collecting and mining it that is scary to me. For making jerks who drive all over the place pay for it in taxes or to figure out who is speeding and automatically give them fines, I'd be really happy to see that. It'll scare more people into not buying big stuff and into not driving insanely and unsafely.
 
Bone_Enterprise said:
Fuck the cyclist at 1:05.
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Cyclists are usually stupid and total douches, but even they aren't normally that bad. Based on the totality of the circumstances I am guessing that this particular example was an actual planned test, not a cyclist just being an a-hole to be an a-hole.


phawkins633 said:
I'm sorry, perhaps I don't understand, but why DO cyclists have total right of way?? I mean obviously your not just going to say fuck them and hit them with your car, but I get the impression that if a bike is in even a moderate proximity, the car just completely stops until there are no bikes around..? It would take hours just to go through any downtown streets...maybe I'm just being daft..LOL
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No. They car is cautious about them, but notice how it passes the first one in the two-biker example with only minimal normal caution, barely slowing at all and moving left just a teeny bit. The only reason it doesn't also zip by the other one is because it sees the riders arm is raised indicating a turn or lane change. It doesn't just stop entirely for bikes.
 
Armenius said:
Google must be extremely confident because there will be such a public outcry the first time one of these things causes an accident. Same thing if word ever got out that the person in the car had to intervene to prevent one from happening.
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Google has the lawyers, money and influence to stay on top of any problems but I bet simple manipulation of search results would accomplish most of that.
 
I saw two white Prius' sneak by my house a few days ago, the lead car had the spinning camera, and the chase car had a modified radio aerial with a wiffle ball sized ball on the end of it, development cars?
 
Even now, this system is already better than 90% of all drivers out there. This has 360 degree awareness, while most people can't even pay attention to the 30 degrees directly in front of their vehicle. The faster we get these systems in place the safer everyone will be.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
Felt this required quoting..I'll just add Fuck most cyclist. One of the major reason I moved out of the city was these entitled assholes who thought traffic laws didn't apply to them.
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The majority of cyclists I encounter on the road seem to expect special protection and consideration from everyone else on the road...but also seem to believe the same rules of the road do not apply to them. The combination of these two traits makes most cyclists incredibly unpredictable on the road which is where the real danger comes from. If they're predictable I can avoid them no problem. It's when they cut past a line of cars at a red light, then jump the light trying to make an illegal left turn (no signal of course) through 4 lanes of traffic at rush hour that all sympathy disappears (that guy didn't get hit, unfortunately).

About 6 months ago I was driving down one of our roads that had been newly repainted with a bike lane (now the cyclists have their own lane, nothing can go wrong!). Signal to make a right turn, start to turn, BLAM biker in the bike lane broadsides my car, because my turn signal didn't apply to him. Once he'd recovered his wits a bit the biker called the cops. Luckily it was busy enough there were 2 witnesses that verified to the cop that I had my turn signal on (I signal early, late/non-signalling for turns is a pet peeve of mine. If you're not signalling BEFORE you touch the brake pedal to slow down for the turn, you're not doing it right. Signal early, it gives the vehicles behind you time to change lanes and avoid slowing down themselves). Anyways cop cited the biker (yay!), biker obviously didn't have liability insurance and I still have a big dent in my passenger door.

There are some responsible cyclists around, but not nearly enough. The cyclists doing it to save the planet seem to be better than the ones on two-wheels for monetary reasons (too stupid and broke to afford a car/insurance/license reinstatement). But being green is by no means a guarantee of competent riding.
 
One thing people don't think about is the car can respond faster than a human. If someone jumps in front of the car it can react faster than a human could preventing a death.
 
Galvin said:
One thing people don't think about is the car can respond faster than a human. If someone jumps in front of the car it can react faster than a human could preventing a death.
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I do wonder a bit about this, and what forces it deems acceptable to the people internal to the system (in the car...) How fast WILL it stop in an emergency situation, while at the same time protecting the people IN the car? Interesting balance to be struck there computationally I think.
 
Kueller said:
There are some responsible cyclists around, but not nearly enough. The cyclists doing it to save the planet seem to be better than the ones on two-wheels for monetary reasons (too stupid and broke to afford a car/insurance/license reinstatement). But being green is by no means a guarantee of competent riding.
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Or lost their license/car due to drinking and driving. You can tell when the guy is 50 years old, beard, definitely not the active type, and going to or from the bar.

I've seen bikes just fly through intersections without stopping and barely looking. If someone was turning, they'd get hit. One time I was in Portland and saw a guy stop at a red light and the biker just ran right into the guys hood (coming from the side). Car stopped where he should have. I think the biker thought he was going to stop farther behind or something. Don't know, but it was the biker the just rammed the car. Some bikers are great, but like shitty drivers - it just takes a couple to ruin it for everyone else.
 
Kueller said:
The majority of cyclists I encounter on the road seem to expect special protection and consideration from everyone else on the road...but also seem to believe the same rules of the road do not apply to them. The combination of these two traits makes most cyclists incredibly unpredictable on the road which is where the real danger comes from. If they're predictable I can avoid them no problem. It's when they cut past a line of cars at a red light, then jump the light trying to make an illegal left turn (no signal of course) through 4 lanes of traffic at rush hour that all sympathy disappears (that guy didn't get hit, unfortunately).

About 6 months ago I was driving down one of our roads that had been newly repainted with a bike lane (now the cyclists have their own lane, nothing can go wrong!). Signal to make a right turn, start to turn, BLAM biker in the bike lane broadsides my car, because my turn signal didn't apply to him. Once he'd recovered his wits a bit the biker called the cops. Luckily it was busy enough there were 2 witnesses that verified to the cop that I had my turn signal on (I signal early, late/non-signalling for turns is a pet peeve of mine. If you're not signalling BEFORE you touch the brake pedal to slow down for the turn, you're not doing it right. Signal early, it gives the vehicles behind you time to change lanes and avoid slowing down themselves). Anyways cop cited the biker (yay!), biker obviously didn't have liability insurance and I still have a big dent in my passenger door.

There are some responsible cyclists around, but not nearly enough. The cyclists doing it to save the planet seem to be better than the ones on two-wheels for monetary reasons (too stupid and broke to afford a car/insurance/license reinstatement). But being green is by no means a guarantee of competent riding.
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Whoa Whoa Whoa. If I am reading this right, you were the one at fault in this incident.
You were going to make a right turn, pulled in front a biker who had right of way in the bike lane and he hit you. That's your fault. Your turn signal does NOTHING to give you right of way.
If there is a biker, or anything in a lane to your right thats traveling in the same direction you have to turn WELL ahead of them or you slow and let them pass.
 
okashira said:
Whoa Whoa Whoa. If I am reading this right, you were the one at fault in this incident.
You were going to make a right turn, pulled in front a biker who had right of way in the bike lane and he hit you. That's your fault. Your turn signal does NOTHING to give you right of way.
If there is a biker, or anything in a lane to your right thats traveling in the same direction you have to turn WELL ahead of them or you slow and let them pass.
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Cop cited the asshole, so obviously you either didn't understand how he put it or he phrased it badly.
 
Kueller said:
The majority of cyclists I encounter on the road seem to expect special protection and consideration from everyone else on the road...but also seem to believe the same rules of the road do not apply to them. The combination of these two traits makes most cyclists incredibly unpredictable on the road which is where the real danger comes from. If they're predictable I can avoid them no problem. It's when they cut past a line of cars at a red light, then jump the light trying to make an illegal left turn (no signal of course) through 4 lanes of traffic at rush hour that all sympathy disappears (that guy didn't get hit, unfortunately).

About 6 months ago I was driving down one of our roads that had been newly repainted with a bike lane (now the cyclists have their own lane, nothing can go wrong!). Signal to make a right turn, start to turn, BLAM biker in the bike lane broadsides my car, because my turn signal didn't apply to him. Once he'd recovered his wits a bit the biker called the cops. Luckily it was busy enough there were 2 witnesses that verified to the cop that I had my turn signal on (I signal early, late/non-signalling for turns is a pet peeve of mine. If you're not signalling BEFORE you touch the brake pedal to slow down for the turn, you're not doing it right. Signal early, it gives the vehicles behind you time to change lanes and avoid slowing down themselves). Anyways cop cited the biker (yay!), biker obviously didn't have liability insurance and I still have a big dent in my passenger door.

There are some responsible cyclists around, but not nearly enough. The cyclists doing it to save the planet seem to be better than the ones on two-wheels for monetary reasons (too stupid and broke to afford a car/insurance/license reinstatement). But being green is by no means a guarantee of competent riding.
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I've seen some bad cyclists, but I don't get the rage.

Bad cyclist - you might get a dent in your car
Bad driver - you might die or end up crippled for life

IMO, throwing around 3000+ lbs of steel at 50mph everywhere you go to carry your 150lb self carries much more responsibility. If I see a bad cyclist, I just shrug it off, because they can't hurt me.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
I'd love to see people have box thingies that measure how far they drive and also take into account how big/heavy their vehicle is so they have to pay more per mile than someone who doesn't drive as far and uses a more reasonable sized car. It's just Google creepy-collecting and mining it that is scary to me. For making jerks who drive all over the place pay for it in taxes or to figure out who is speeding and automatically give them fines, I'd be really happy to see that. It'll scare more people into not buying big stuff and into not driving insanely and unsafely.
Click to expand...

really? I mean really?

What about people who are required to drive for their jobs, will their employer compensate them extra for the extra fees they have to pay? Or people that live in suburbs to LA because they cant afford to live in the city, they have to pay extra now even though the reason they drive the extra miles is they cant afford the housing?

People with bigger vehicles already pay more, even pay more taxes, and its called gas. Gas has a huge amount of taxes associated with it already, which means the person in the giant SUV is already paying additional money in taxes when they use more gas. Lets use common sense here
 
J3RK said:
I do wonder a bit about this, and what forces it deems acceptable to the people internal to the system (in the car...) How fast WILL it stop in an emergency situation, while at the same time protecting the people IN the car? Interesting balance to be struck there computationally I think.
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Exactly. One thing a person can do when something happens is do their best to brace themselves for what is to happen next. If you're not driving the car then there is no way you can properly prepare yourself for the avoidance or impact. This would in all likelihood result in greater instances of trauma resulting from extreme g-forces (whiplash, et al).

Beyond that, what will the car decide to do if avoiding one object will result in impact with another? There are some situations that are unavoidable. I just think back to the thing in the I, Robot movie where the robot would not attempt to save the girl in the sinking car because the probablility of success was too low (spoiler alert :p).
 
Armenius said:
Exactly. One thing a person can do when something happens is do their best to brace themselves for what is to happen next. If you're not driving the car then there is no way you can properly prepare yourself for the avoidance or impact. This would in all likelihood result in greater instances of trauma resulting from extreme g-forces (whiplash, et al).

Beyond that, what will the car decide to do if avoiding one object will result in impact with another? There are some situations that are unavoidable. I just think back to the thing in the I, Robot movie where the robot would not attempt to save the girl in the sinking car because the probablility of success was too low (spoiler alert :p).
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I thought being all flaccid and limp (like a lot of guys I know :p) helped drunk people survive accidents with less injuries than sober people who are all like "OMG!" and brace themselves when they hit something. Also...how would a car stop with any more force regardless of who or what is driving? That kinda more or less depends on like brakes and tires and junk like that.
 
okashira said:
Whoa Whoa Whoa. If I am reading this right, you were the one at fault in this incident.
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This. Turn signals don't guarantee right-of-way. (Funnily enough, in some places, neither do lights/sirens) This is no different than if you put on your turn signal on the highway and merged into another car.

...But the cop cited the other guy, so I must be misreading the post.
 
VladDracule said:
really? I mean really?

What about people who are required to drive for their jobs, will their employer compensate them extra for the extra fees they have to pay? Or people that live in suburbs to LA because they cant afford to live in the city, they have to pay extra now even though the reason they drive the extra miles is they cant afford the housing?

People with bigger vehicles already pay more, even pay more taxes, and its called gas. Gas has a huge amount of taxes associated with it already, which means the person in the giant SUV is already paying additional money in taxes when they use more gas. Lets use common sense here
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No one forces someone to drive a bigger vehicle, live somewhere far from where they work, get a job that doesn't pay enough for them to live in a house they want, or be unable to afford something that has enough of whatever for them. Those are all personal choices that someone makes knowing the consequences so, like, I have noooo sympathy for someone that owns and SUV, complains about the price of fuel, and then complains about their mortgage. They asked for it by living and buying beyond their means AND their hugenormous land yachts are putting everyone else who is smarter than them in danger making the population of the US stupider and more full of their mindless kind that we can do without. :(
 
okashira said:
Whoa Whoa Whoa. If I am reading this right, you were the one at fault in this incident.
You were going to make a right turn, pulled in front a biker who had right of way in the bike lane and he hit you. That's your fault. Your turn signal does NOTHING to give you right of way.
If there is a biker, or anything in a lane to your right thats traveling in the same direction you have to turn WELL ahead of them or you slow and let them pass.
Click to expand...

That's more a symptom of bad road design than anything. For instance if you're turning right in a car, you're usually in a turn right only lane or in the right lane on the road. Do you ever have to watch out for cars hitting you while you're turning? Usually only from the road you're turning onto. You can't also have to be watching out for some random biker broadsiding you at the same time you're turning. You simultaneously have to be watching two sides (technically 3 because you have to have eyes forward too). That's stupid. The only way to reliably handle the situation at this intersection is to force bikers to stop and also yield to any turning traffic. They obviously didn't have said signs, and I think it's the biker's responsibility to watch out in this case.

okashira said:
I've seen some bad cyclists, but I don't get the rage.

Bad cyclist - you might get a dent in your car
Bad driver - you might die or end up crippled for life

IMO, throwing around 3000+ lbs of steel at 50mph everywhere you go to carry your 150lb self carries much more responsibility. If I see a bad cyclist, I just shrug it off, because they can't hurt me.
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You don't? Seriously? Do you not see how easily you can murder a cyclist? Cars have plenty of safety features. Bikers? Nope. You can kill a biker using a car as easily as you swat a fly or step on an ant (just a lot more bloody). And it's a heck of a lot easier than murdering pedestrians because you have to generally go out of your way to do that. Meanwhile some cyclists seem to go out of their way to try to get killed by you. It's not about dying to them. It's about them dying to you.

I hate the everloving crap out of cyclists (at least the ones on the road). Seriously. I hate them. Hate. I think they need to get the hell off the road. I'm tired of driving through legal mine fields. I think they should have to use sidewalks or what have you. Either way they don't need to be on the road. They're not using vehicles in the modern sense. They can't go anywhere near a modern car's speed, so they're naturally in the way. They also seem to think that they're both a car and a pedestrian at the same time, so they can ignore some traffic laws and obey others. And they have this stupid victimization complex.

End rant. Sorry, I've driven through areas with cyclists and they just really piss me off every time.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
I thought being all flaccid and limp (like a lot of guys I know :p) helped drunk people survive accidents with less injuries than sober people who are all like "OMG!" and brace themselves when they hit something. Also...how would a car stop with any more force regardless of who or what is driving? That kinda more or less depends on like brakes and tires and junk like that.
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I wasn't saying that the force would be any higher with a computer in control. Also, there is a reason they use a neck restraining device and 5-point safety belt in professional racing.
 
Galvin said:
One thing people don't think about is the car can respond faster than a human. If someone jumps in front of the car it can react faster than a human could preventing a death.
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Say a child goes chasing after a cat into the street and on the lawn to one side is a huge hedge and to the other side a 2' diameter tree.

Will it know to take the hedge. What is the hedge isn't an option. Will is know to take out the cat over the driver, the driver over the child?
 
I wonder how these cars do in ice or spotty ice conditions... Snow... What about with obstacles in the same thing. Or hydroplaning. Probably not too great, and I know they aren't road ready for that yet, but I'm curious as to how it would fare.
 
jpm100 said:
Say a child goes chasing after a cat into the street and on the lawn to one side is a huge hedge and to the other side a 2' diameter tree.

Will it know to take the hedge. What is the hedge isn't an option. Will is know to take out the cat over the driver, the driver over the child?
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Easily actually. people keep putting up scenarios where it would have to decide, are these people new to computers and neural networks? Yes it can be done it just will need taught that.

Heck, I know several people that have put their car into a tree or ditch to avoid a cat. Do I think the google car will be perfect? No, not by a long shot. But consider this remote possibility, a whole road full of cars that are paying attention to whats going on, wouldn't that be a sight to see.
 
jpm100 said:
Will it know to take the hedge. What is the hedge isn't an option. Will is know to take out the cat over the driver, the driver over the child?
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Shoot the hostage.

I don't think it would judge those obstacles by the mass. It's just judge them as an obstacle. As far as child vs. cat... Possible. But, then you have to think of size differences. What if there was a mother and child crossing the street and it had to decide. Would it take out the smaller one?

So many variables that a human could figure out quickly (if they don't freeze with shock). A computer could probably do it, but it'd need to be done via a program. It'd need to know the difference between the hedge and a tree and a bike and a rock and .. .. .. If it got to that level, we'd have robots able to do a lot more, too. Processing power to scan the visuals and label each object, then decide on which would yield the easiest impact.
 
Ur_Mom said:
I wonder how these cars do in ice or spotty ice conditions... Snow... What about with obstacles in the same thing. Or hydroplaning. Probably not too great, and I know they aren't road ready for that yet, but I'm curious as to how it would fare.
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I would put money on computers over people any day in this scenario. Most people have no idea their car is hydroplaning or sliding. The number of accidents that unfavorable elements and inexperienced drivers cause should really make the safety of the driver-less car shine.

The next gripe will be 'is it too safe'? will they travel too slow or be too cautious?
 
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