I CAN’T WAIT…!!!
Although I have only recently been diagnosed with MS, I have had major mobility issues with a ‘bad leg’ for over 10 years. As we all know, there are sooooo many disabling issues related with MS, but what I miss the most is not being able to jump in my car and… go shopping… see a friend… go to GP’s… buy a pint of milk… etc… ‘What a boring life’, you might think, but so important to me!!!
And how to resolve it…??? A self-drive car… 
It’s a great idea, I’m all into things “techy”, but personally I think the day when we can just jump into a car sitting on the drive and just cruise up the road leaving everything up to the car is a long way off.
Can you imagine how much insurance premiums will be, even though the machines will probably be better at driving than humans !
What about driving tests, learner drivers, then there’s the infrastructure to allow driverless vehicles to find their way around.
Vehicle security these days is unfortunately a major issue, look how many terrorist attacks there has have been using vehicles.
Can you imagine the outcry if a driverless car was packed with explosives and programmed to drive into a city centre !
There would also be a huge amount of work to be done behind the scenes regarding the law & insurance ect before we could just go buy one of these cars and then just plod along without a care in the world.
At the moment some test models use satellite and others electronic sensors built into the roads, who’s going to pay to dig up all the roads around our towns and cities.
Most towns these days are going pedestrianised, so the last thing any council will pay out for is to dig up roads and lay sensors down when it could take years and years to see benefits.
Christ it’s hard enough to get Swansea council to repair a few pot holes !
Personally I think we’ll keep seeing this sort of technology growing, which is great, but it will be a long time before the everyday Mr & Mrs Bloggs can be whizzed around town in a driverless car whilst they read a book or have a nap on their way to the shops ect.
Great idea, but some way off I fear.
Sorry Anne for sounding like the Grinch.
Self drive cars ?
NAH !!!
Too true, it’s going to be years, if not decades, before self driving cars are commonplace. As you say, roads will have to be adapted to be used. The problem is, people do not just live in major towns and cities. They also live in rural areas, or are they not going to be allowed to use this technology.
Something else I never see mentioned by the media is how these cars handle things at the end of a journey. In manual cars, the driver has to drive around until they can find a parking space. How do these new cars handle this - it’s fair enough the car driving itself from A to B but it needs to park somewhere when it gets there.
Yep, the invisible driver in those cars has spotted a single parking space, it will be mayhem out there
hiya
i am a dinosaur but have recently taken a very basic interest in robots/what the future may be like.
tho i need to look back to look forward-when i was at school i designed a house of the future-my efforts allowed me to meet the queen mum and the school got a new computer… but i never continued with the interest.
‘they’ recently road tested 3 driverless lorries near me on the motorway.
robots-i saw the robots on daytime tv and last week the ones who were helping a wee boy with school and female with ms.
i do believe it will all happen but not in my lifetime!
i have mentioned to my carers that i would happily test a ‘care robot’!
can see some potential issues but life is changing quicker than we realise and goodness knows what lies ahead!
ellie
Thing is, governments have to be seen to be taking an interest in such technology, even investing a few million here and there, but it would be a very very brave government that fully endorsed such schemes.
Think of the backlash when unemployment rises when delivery drivers, taxi drivers ect all started to get laid off, insurance claims go through the roof and insurance costs rise, money to be found to dig up roads to lay sensors ect, all at a time when things like the NHS is on its knees, schools are bursting at the seams, not enough houses to home people, the list is endless.
It all makes good TV, but I think thats as far as it will go for many years yet.
jactac i concur but give it 100 years…who knows?! ellie
That day is not far off at all with road sighn recognition smart cruise control gps off various types have you seen a car self park no its not far away .
Our car can park itself. Sometimes it does it quite well, but occasionally it’s embarrassingly bad. For example, one day my husband decided to let the car reverse itself into our driveway. Talk about the car showing us up in front of the neighbours!! It took about 12 goes to straighten itself up! Eventually man got fed up with machine and took control.
Sue
Anyone who can trust a driverless car has never owned a wireless printer.