[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Outcast_Searcher', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'Y')ou have never argued a case well outcaste. Always angry. I almost have you on ignore, but I don't bother.

[vox_mundi]

pstarr

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')You fanboys present no evidence that a driverless car will ever navigate a city street, on a dark night, in the rain. Or even in daylight during a sudden thunderstorm. You guys/gals live in an echo chamber with Siri, Hal and a talking Cabbage Patch Doll. Not me lol

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Outcast_Searcher', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')You fanboys present no evidence that a driverless car will ever navigate a city street, on a dark night, in the rain. Or even in daylight during a sudden thunderstorm. You guys/gals live in an echo chamber with Siri, Hal and a talking Cabbage Patch Doll. Not me lol

[ralfy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Outcast_Searcher', '
')The entire EV and self-driving car industry is an epic fail - because pstarr thinks so. Just like the economy, BTW. Any evidence from actual experts, people in the industry, people actually building and, increasingly, driving the things are to be ignored because, pstarr doesn't like them.

And anyone who actually follows the mainstream news and all the evidence documenting how these things are progressing is delusional.

Well, the argument speaks for itself.

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ralfy', 's')omething called "peak oil" (as part of limits to growth) won't allow.

[Tanada]

I would like to know how these self driving cars will handle the zillions of pot holes in the road that are created every year. We can't seem to find funds to maintain the roads we have now, yet self driving car lane markers and such will be appearing any day now, as if by magic.

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I would like to know how these self driving cars will handle the zillions of pot holes in the road that are created every year.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ennui2', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I would like to know how these self driving cars will handle the zillions of pot holes in the road that are created every year.

[ennui2]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ennui2', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I would like to know how these self driving cars will handle the zillions of pot holes in the road that are created every year.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ennui2', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ennui2', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')I would like to know how these self driving cars will handle the zillions of pot holes in the road that are created every year.

[ennui2]

OK, back on topic, then.

Researchers Think We're Nearing Peak-Car

And no, not because of oil-scarcity.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')if it’s right — something that, to be sure, can be questioned — then we would be on the verge of an energy and technology transformation to rival the sudden decline of the coal industry.
...
as the trend becomes widespread — with fleets of autonomous vehicles, owned by companies or cities, on the road and not running on gas — our greenhouse gas emissions will plunge
...
The study suggests a major decrease in gasoline demand and, as a result, a major increase in electricity demand, and a plummeting of transportation-sector greenhouse-gas emissions. Walker said the reduction could be as large as 800 million tons per year in the U.S. by 2035, a huge contribution to fighting climate change.

[Tanada]

Longer article with many details at link below the quote.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')mericans prefer the option to drive, even in a world where cars can drive themselves.

A new study from Kelley Blue Book shows how Americans’ affinity for driving could slow the adoption of driverless vehicle technology in the United States. Rather than fully autonomous vehicles, Americans prefer cars equipped with self-driving capabilities, but with the capability to butt-in as desired.

That’s a striking conclusion for those preparing for a fully driverless future. Lyft recently expressed its belief that private vehicle ownership would be phased out in major cities by 2025, largely because of self-driving cars.

New research from Kelley Blue Book shows how dramatically self-driving cars could alter the landscape of car ownership by 2020. By then, 6 in 10 consumers will be interested in buying cars that are at least partially autonomous — ranging from “autopilot”-equipped Teslas that garner so much amazement today, to fully autonomous cars with no human drivers.

But the findings also show that people are wary of such technology. Among the conclusions: More than half of respondents preferred to have full control of their vehicles, even if it means roads are less safe. Respondents see full autonomy mostly as a service for mobility-limited drivers, such as senior citizens, and a mobility option for outings involving alcohol. And more than 6 in 10 consumers don’t think they’ll live to see a world where all vehicles are self-driving.

Experts said it’s possible developing countries could move toward full vehicle autonomy faster than the United States.

“When you think about the infrastructure that’s being created in places like China and India, they can actually plan and build for autonomous vehicles, where we are retrofitting everything here in the states,” said Rebecca Lindland, senior director of commercial insights for Kelley Blue Book. “In the U.S., we are a driving culture. Everybody has a car …whereas in some of these other places, if you only know ridesharing, if you never own a car and you only rideshare, that’s going to be perfectly normal for you.”

[vox_mundi]

US self-drive car guidelines backed at G7

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'U')S Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx says his counterparts in the Group of Seven nations welcomed US guidelines on regulating self-driving cars and have agreed to work together on creating such standards to maintain safety.

[vox_mundi]

HERE makes bold play to define common language for self-driving cars

Whoever Owns the Maps Owns the Future of Self-Driving Cars

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')img]http://pop.h-cdn.co/assets/16/26/980x490/landscape-1467305193-here-berlin-street.jpg[/img]

... For self-driving cars to gain real market acceptance, they need to have "anytime, anywhere capability" .

That's why the technology to map our world—not just on Google Maps, but in full 3D—is such a hot commodity. In December 2015, for example, BMW, Daimler, and Volkswagen's Audi acquired the digital mapping company HERE for $3.1 billion. Last week I met with HERE chief executive Edzard Overbeek in the company's Berlin office, his first interview with outsiders since taking the company's reins nearly four months ago. It's no coincidence that Overbeek, a 30-year IT veteran, was hired based on his experience in the last 15 years as a top executive at Cisco, the world's largest networking company. Overbeek envisions the three-dimensional rendering of the real world as the world's next great digital network. He calls it the "location index."

What Overbeek wants to dominate is the index for locations: how self-driving cars derive meaning from lane markings, traffic signs, and the entire built environment. It's something that goes way beyond the street names, intersections, and points of interest in today's navigation systems. It becomes the essential platform for getting around. "If you think about cars, drones, or advanced robotics, all these things that need to move from A to B, you need navigation technology" Overbeek says.

Crowdsourcing real-time data picked up by BMW, Mercedes, and Audi cars will help advance HERE's digital maps in a way that can't be done when only one automaker is contributing the data. HERE plans to eventually pull data from other automakers aside from just BMW, Mercedes, and Audi.

HERE has a three-decade head start in mapping roadways and points of interest, with that data served up to the cloud and licensed to automakers. If you've used a car's onboard navigation system in recent years—to find a destination, or locate the closest gas station or coffee shop—then HERE is probably the company that tracked down that information, made sure it's accurate, and put it into a form that your car can use. Nearly 30 brands of vehicles, representing about 80 percent of the market, access HERE's data for use inside navigation systems designed by the auto manufacturer. In 2015, Jaguar Land Rover became the first car company to have HERE design the user interface for its navigation system in addition to supplying the data.



HERE deploys about 400 vehicles equipped with a tower of spinning sensors to map the roadways of the world. These vehicles use lidar (laser-based radar), GPS locaters, and cameras capturing 16.8-megapixel images to produce data point clouds with uncanny two-centimeter precision. Altogether, HERE says, it collects 700,000 data points per second. A team of nearly 3,000 specialists, based mostly in Mumbai, India, cull and correct the data used in HERE maps, which the company shares with third-party tools and sells to companies like Garmin, Yahoo, Facebook, and Amazon. There engineers process lidar data into three-dimensional renderings of the road with the centimeter-level accuracy needed for a car to confidently drive itself.

... Overbeek said that HERE's automotive shareholders are willing to reach into their deep pockets to invest in these location technologies. "They realize this is a disruption," he says. The human-piloted car in your driveway today will give way to tomorrow's network of connected, automated, and electrified vehicles that will rely on maps. "It will come their way whether they like it or not."

[vox_mundi]

Forget Self-Driving Cars. Self-Driving Chairs Have Arrived

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')img]http://www.npr.org/assets/news/2016/09/selfdrivingchair.gif[/img]

Video - Nissan, the Japanese automaker unveiled a high-tech, battery-powered autonomous chair it says is designed to make waiting in line "easy and fun." The ProPilot chair transports passengers along fixed paths without any instruction from the user.

The ProPilot chair "drives" on a predetermined path. The chair's embedded cameras detect distance to the chair ahead of it. When one chair moves, the next one follows, maintaining a fixed distance. When the passenger reaches the front of the line and stands up, a weight sensor notices and the chair automatically navigates to the back of the line, Nissan says.

Nissan first ventured into the world of autonomous chairs earlier this year by adapting its intelligent park assist technology into an "Intelligent Parking Chair." Designed to eliminate the tedious task of arranging office chairs, these clever chairs roll themselves to predetermined positions in response to hand clapping.

[vox_mundi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('C8', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vox_mundi', '
')So how does this differ from exploding airbags or gas tanks. Or airplanes falling out of the sky.

The car companies and airlines seem to have weathered those catastrophes fairly profitably. They're all still in business.

[vox_mundi]

California approves unmanned self-driving car trials

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Almost four years to the day since driverless trials on public streets were first approved, a new bill, AB1592, has been signed off by Governor Jerry Brown that permits autonomous car tests without a human passenger overseeing proceedings.

Rather than applying throughout the Golden State, the bill is specific to a pilot project headed by the Contra Costa Transportation Authority. At San Ramon's Bishop Ranch business park, EasyMile's 12-seater shuttles will ferry workers around the site, which will include travelling on some public roads. The approval also covers GoMentum Station: A ghost town within the Concord Naval Weapons Station where Honda has been testing its driverless car technologies. Recently, Uber-owned Otto also signed up to test self-driving trucks on the site.

Google and Apple have also expressed interest in the naval base testbed, according to the transport authority. Apple's autonomous plans are still the subject of much speculation, but in the immediate future, Google seems like a natural partner. Manual controls including a steering wheel and pedals are not required in test vehicles under the new bill (since there won't be anyone on hand to use them), but for safety's sake cars must not exceed 35MPH during trials.