Addressing challenges is one of the most important factors for the self-driving vehicle. Automakers are facing the disruption of their driving due in large part to the technology sector, and rumor has it that many consumers expect their next car to be completely self-sufficient. However, a detailed study of the technologies needed to achieve an advanced level of autonomous driving suggests a much longer period. A self-driving vehicle can be in five or ten years. As cars reach the initial limits of autonomous driving, some advocates insist that fully autonomous cars are on our doorstep. But technology tells a different story.
However, the self-driving vehicle industry faces some challenges before autonomous driving can be practical. We have already seen that ADAS solutions make driving easier and safer. However, in some cases, technology has also caused problems. A problem: People have too much or too much confidence in these new systems. This is not a new phenomenon. When airbags entered the mainstream in the 1990s, some drivers and passengers interpreted this as a sign that they could no longer wear the seat belt, which they considered unnecessary. This illusion resulted in more injuries and deaths.
Similarly, ADAS allows motorists to rely on automation in situations that go beyond their capabilities. For example, Adaptive Cruise Control works well if one car follows another directly but often does not detect motionless objects. Unfortunately, real-life situations, as well as controlled experiments, show that motorists who rely too much on automation end up in parked vehicles or other objects. The current capabilities of ADAS are limited, which many early users do not understand.
This remains a security dilemma. In 2015, nearly 3,500 people lost their lives in broken driver accidents in the United States and 391,000 were injured in conventional cars, while drivers were actively controlling their vehicles. Unfortunately, experts predict that the number of road accidents will not initially decrease after the introduction of audiovisual vehicles offering a high degree of autonomous control, but that drivers are still fully engaged in a backup and test function errors.
When drivers reconnect, they must immediately assess their environment, determine the location of the vehicle inside, analyze the hazard and choose a safe approach. Safety experts are concerned that motorists of semi-autonomous vehicles may be engaged in activities such as reading or texting and are therefore unaware of the situation when they are asked to take control. At speeds of 65 miles per hour, cars take less than four seconds to cover the length of a football field. The longer the driver remains separated from the pilot, the longer the re-closing process can take. Car manufacturers need to develop a better human-machine interface for new technologies to save lives instead of contributing to more accidents.
Similar problems have arisen in other contexts: in 2009, a commercial aircraft overran its destination airport by 150 miles, as pilots were not occupied by the autopilot during the flight. In semi-autonomous vehicles, “airspace” (the ground) is much clogged and “pilots” (drivers) are less trained, which makes it even more dangerous for the drivers concerned to use the autopilot during long periods.