It feels there's a mountain of hype around autonomous vehicles. I think the core challenges to a fully autonomous vehicle (with no human backup), are still far from solved. They need to reliably deal with an almost infinite number of edge and corner cases, each quite different from the last. For example:
- communication with other human drivers. In London, this is required all the time, like when parked cars block the road, allowing just one car through. Or traffic light out of action, so you negotiate with other cars using hand gestures, light flashes etc
- endless roadworks, that change what lane you're allowed to go on, turn a two way road to one way road.
- random debris on road. Plastic bag - safe to drive through, wooden plank - safe, plank with nail - not safe.
- loss of GPS, mobile data, or both (again, surprisingly frequent)
- making way for emergency vehicles (sometimes need to drive into lane you're not normally allowed to go, I.e. Bus lane, pavement)
- policeman coordinating traffic
So far, I haven't found any evidence of autonomous cars dealing with the above. If anyone has, please post.
- communication with other human drivers. In London, this is required all the time, like when parked cars block the road, allowing just one car through. Or traffic light out of action, so you negotiate with other cars using hand gestures, light flashes etc
- endless roadworks, that change what lane you're allowed to go on, turn a two way road to one way road.
- random debris on road. Plastic bag - safe to drive through, wooden plank - safe, plank with nail - not safe.
- loss of GPS, mobile data, or both (again, surprisingly frequent)
- making way for emergency vehicles (sometimes need to drive into lane you're not normally allowed to go, I.e. Bus lane, pavement)
- policeman coordinating traffic
So far, I haven't found any evidence of autonomous cars dealing with the above. If anyone has, please post.