Imagine, getting your commute time back via an autonomously driven cars or personal rapid transit systems. For anyone asking, what’chu talkin’ about, Willis?
Wikipedia defines the driverless car as:
A driverless car is a vehicle equipped with an autopilot system, and capable of driving from one point to another without aid from an operator. Driverless passenger car programs include the 800 million EC EUREKA Prometheus Project on autonomous vehicles, the 2getthere passenger vehicles from the Netherlands, the ARGO research project from Italy, the DARPA Grand Challenge from the USA, and Google driverless car.
And personal rapid transit (PRT) as:
Personal rapid transit (PRT), also called personal automated transport (PAT) or podcar, is a public transportation mode featuring small automated vehicles operating on a network of specially-built guide ways. PRT is a type of automated guideway transit (AGT), which also includes systems with larger vehicles, all the way to small subway systems.
That’s right in the near future K.I.T.T. could really possible! Of course the systems not only give you back some of your valuable time they could make driving a safer experience for all. According to the head of Vislab Professor Alberto Broggi, “Right now 93 percent (quoting European statistics) of all the road accidents are caused by human errors so if you can help the driver, or even remove the driver we might be able to solve this problem.”
Google recently made headlines and caused quite a stir when they piloted their driverless car on an California highway.
Google isn’t the only entity causing a stir this year though. Stanford, VisLab and 2getthere also made headlines with their driverless car projects. Read on to see examples of each in action… Read More »