About time.
I build autonomous/ADAS testbed cars in Detroit and it's astonishing the stuff that the California cars get flustered by. LIDAR is baffled by snow, RADAR sensors get packed with slush if they're mounted too low, etc.
I build autonomous/ADAS testbed cars in Detroit and it's astonishing the stuff that the California cars get flustered by. LIDAR is baffled by snow, RADAR sensors get packed with slush if they're mounted too low, etc.
There's a lot of challenges, and I'm glad they're finally getting to it.
One particularly problematic variable that will undermine weather calculations and traction will be the complications of road de-icer. In high-altitude inland regions, de-icer is not used, with a few exceptions after storms are long gone and the temperature has warmed. These regions should be a piece of cake for autonomous vehicles. Detroit in mid-winter probably resembles this for a few months due to low temps but humidity will destabilize de-icer during early and later winter. And, temp fluctuations resulting from humidity, coupled with high snowfall, necessitates the use of de-icer to prevent the city from getting buried in. In coastal regions like CA, de-icer more predictably melts and cleans the roads. In regions like Chicago, de-icer will hve every effect imaginable, both creating ice and melting it multiple times a day. But if a road is not de-iced the traction will follow a different pattern. I can’t imagine how a self-driving car could determine this. To further complicat things, de-icer can often create ice and be counterintuitive in only shaded parts of the road. De-icer is used so differently, an so often foolishly in different regions.
Michigan also tends to just salt the shit out of roads. Probably enough to impact the chemistry of the Flint River. Not so much way up North where it stays colder. Sand there.
As far as the cars, they just measure the available traction several thousand times a second. Electronic stability control is mandatory for new cars in many jurisdictions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_stability_control#R...
As for traction on ice, if the vehicle is already on the ice, it’s too late to slow down. I wonder how the cars could know when they are coming up to ice. Humans can rarely know, but have some complicated ways of identifying, I think from glossiness? And ice is much more rare than snow/slush but both can be present side by side. Either way, I think they will figure it out. Sand can be awful to clean up in urban areas when too muh is used.
It doesn’t sound like you’re describing the Detroit I grew up in, where dozen+ car pileups are a regular occurrence, particularly the big hundred+ ones on 94 out your way. That’s even discounting the wide-area ice storms that knock out power from everything getting coated in three to four inches of pure ice, which I can remember happening at least four or five times when I was younger. The last couple winters have been relatively light. We are due for a whopper.
Seriously, Michigan winter is accelerated natural selection for drivers. You learn quick or you die.
The article even says it: "But it won’t be Waymo’s first foray on dangerously snowy streets: the company has previously tested its vehicles in winter conditions outside Lake Tahoe."
The challenge is as roads get narrower (<2 cars), rougher, etc. to the point where you really need high-clearance 4WD and may even have to deal with washouts, etc. I don't expect you'll see autonomous driving systems get here for many decades if only because it's not worthwhile to do so and so much is dependent on evaluating the current conditions on the ground.
Detroit is a great step, but I'd really like to see some more challenging areas handled before I'm convinced.
In an ideal world, I trust autonomous cars over human-operated cars. So if the conditions are too dire for autonomous cars, I really don't want to be out there with humans driving.
In the U.S. I'm not even sure what such a mechanism would look like? How could you enforce this?
> In an ideal world, I trust autonomous cars over human-operated cars.
I don't understand this mentality out-of-hand, especially because I've been in cars that have had mechanical failures. There is no mechanical system that is perfectly reliable, and I'm not sure we're considering the emergent effects of this properly.
Finally, unless you outright _force_ all drivers to use the autonomous mode, then users can still take control of their cars as they see fit and we're really not improving anything. Case in point, the video says that driving deaths disproportionately affects young _people_. Which is garbage.. it affects young _men_ who are 8 times more likely to die in a vehicle that they're driving than a female of the same age. I don't know how autonomous modes being available are really going to help this group.
Some entity produces the data that finds roads unfit for driving based on weather and publishes it, local governments consume that data and institute a driving ban, non-essential personnel cannot drive or they'll get a citation.
> I don't understand this mentality out-of-hand, especially because I've been in cars that have had mechanical failures. There is no mechanical system that is perfectly reliable, and I'm not sure we're considering the emergent effects of this properly.
Correct, but I believe that a well-conceived autonomous car has a much higher standard of proper operation than a human, so even if there were mechanical problems, I'd trust the autonomous car to halt operation before the human.
I also don't really understand your last point so sorry for not addressing it.
Unless there was a problem with the halt override.
Are you more likely to get food poisoning from a person prepared meal or a snickers prepared by machines? Now, why assume driving is different?
> Are you more likely to get food poisoning from a person prepared meal or a snickers prepared by machines? Now, why assume driving is different?
Both are so slim who really cares?
Really, you must compare failure rates and severity on both sides. Looking at say aircraft, autopilot cause fewer crashes than pilots and spend vastly more time flying aircraft.
> autopilot cause fewer crashes than pilots
How often do pilots really cause crashes, though? In the sense that it's the pilots fault-more often than not, it isn't. Most crashes are not the result of pilot failure in normal operation-but pilot failure in situations out of their control.
It's hard to blame a pilot when an engine cuts out (a mechanical failure).
my point is not that automated cars are never going to work. But it's just a utopia on here, about how all of our problems will be solved. Computers can't beat physics.
PS: Roads do get closed in the US on a regular basis, generally they have cops direct traffic to other areas or just set up signs.
I mean, Google has prototypes with no steering wheels, and has as an explicit goal the ability to transport children, blind people, the elderly, etc. Eventually they absolutely do want to force drivers to use autonomous mode (at least "force" in the sense that users will need to opt in when they choose a vehicle or service, rather than minute by minute during a trip).
What this looks like is generally highway patrol blocking off the road and the news of the road closures or advisories is broadcast on the radio and television (and now the Internet, I suppose.)
Even down in sunny Austin Texas we have road closures when heavy rains inundate low-water crossings, though it seems every few years someone tries to make it through one and ends up drowning.
Chains are illegal on Minnesota roadways.
So all those young men can still do all the things they need a car for, they just don't get to legally operate one until they have demonstrated a higher level of proficiency.
And all the ones that aren't just total assholes can let the car drive when they have been drinking.
You realize that most states already do this, right?
IMO it's a dumb, inefficient drag net because being black and driving 5-over is not a strong predictor of whether or not someone will drunkenly drive off a cliff on their way to prom.
To paraphrase an acquaintance who drives a tow truck:
Basically all deadly crashes are a result of an inability to drive properly (either via distraction or impairment). Actual "people being bad at driving" rarely causes deadly crashes by comparison. People make bad decisions that make them bad at driving.
When a drunk couple goes off a cliff it's always a dude driving. Dumb things involving cell phones are less deadly but skew more female.
The best way to drive in the snow is to get out and do it at a time when there is light traffic. Go find an empty parking lot. Learn how your car handles, learn to rock your car to get unstuck. Learn about gearing, learn what no traction feels like. Learn what a skid feels like. One day, you might not have a choice but to drive in the snow, so you might as well spend an hour or so working on your driving skills. Not to mention all these skills translate to making you a better driver all the time, and could help you some day avoid an accident.
In Sweden, before you can get your driving license you have to take a course where you spend an hour on a skid pan, taking corners too fast and emergency braking (a "moose" shows up out of nowhere) so you know how it feels and what kinds of distances and reaction periods are involved.
Also in winter, snow tires are legally required between december and march (and this is enforced with random DUI-checkpoint-style stops)
Allow me to add the obvious implication
>anyone who can afford what I consider to be the minimum car worth buying should be able to afford one
Plenty of people drive cheap junk they bought with their tax return and pay insurance month to month. Those people deserve to get to work and the grocery store without having to violate any laws. The damage to our society from not requiring people to use snow tires is far less than the damage to our society that would be done by a huge chunk of people in violation of a law for a good chunk of the year.
Laws are how we quickly and easily categorize what a society finds acceptable and unacceptable.
Laws are not how you determine what is and isn't acceptable.
Our society does not require snow tires for part of the year. If this is so abhorrent then write whatever elected official represents you or move to northern Europe.
Good luck with that if you live in a northern climate. Modern life would essentially stop functioning here in Minnesota during the middle of winter if no one drove because of snow or ice.
Between the efforts of the DOT (plowing, deicing) and following some common sense (slow down, increase your following distance, avoid sudden changes in direction, anticipate stops, ensure your lights are not obscured by snow etc) there are only a handful of days when travel is not advised (usually due to blowing snow).
Source: New Englander
Going 35 on a road that's marked 45 but usually driven at 60 in good weather isn't going to give you time to stop short for something so you might as well go 45 if that's reasonable and piss off an order of magnitude less people.
Source: New Englander sick of being stuck behind people like you.