With one huge exception: self parallel-parking.
I don't understand why this innovation doesn't get more love. Tesla's not the only manufacturer to offer this, of course, but this particular innovation has increased m enjoyment of city driving more than ... well, more than anything I can think of.
Even if they never get anything else to work, it would have been worth it just for self parallel-parking. lol
From an engineering perspective, of course there are serious problems that need attention, but sometimes it also good to celebrate the wins.
I agree. It's really nice to have the radar say "Yes, that space is big enough." and then put the car into it.
It's been in the Prius since 2003.
I'll still take that over the ones that beep proudly to tell you that they are about to fail to maintain their lane (hi ProPilot).
Not anymore, since they removed the radar. Rain seems to really interfere with the vision based system, and apparently auto high beams are required at night, and they flash constantly.
I think it was on the way out by maybe 2022
Short term: Global chip shortage made supply tight, and it was either remove it and rush out with the no radar code branch, or stop shipping cars.
Long term I think it's a fine decision, but short term it's kind of a big thing to rush.
That said, i want a cool fast BEV that makes highway driving easier. Right now, Tesla is the only option. A few others are close. If someone else beats Tesla to FSD with another system, I will be happy to go that way on my next car. Working FSD is worth a lot to me.
(Admittedly the reasons why the Subaru impressed me was more for its programming rather than absolute precision. I liked how smoothly it transitioned between following and open road ahead. Much less jerky.)
The high beams are a different story. I only like to use auto-high-beam on rural roads as they tend to be problematic on busy highways in Tesla and my non-Tesla. But requiring them even on highways would be a big problem that I don't foresee them solving soon. I'm worried that this is going to take a long time to fix.
IMO, they actually work pretty well on rural roads.
LKA is just that, an assist, because if you let it drive it’ll bounce back and forth between the lane markers, not keep you seemingly centered.
Hyundais have exceptionally-good lane-following.
Edit: You can also accelerate without disabling it.
Or maybe I'm just salty that my cruise control has never worked.
Eh? Yes they do. Bizarre lie.
It was lost due to Tesla's decision to remove MobilEye as a supplier.
Mobileye generally focuses on highly optimized HW/SW that does individual things very well, in a manner similar to how factory automation works (e.g., they basically built a "lane keeping + auto-braking + sign reading" appliance).
Tesla decided that 1) It was bad to outsource automation 2) Starting from scratch and 'learning' how to drive using ML was better than iteratively teaching a car how to do discrete tasks very very well (this is why Autopilot regressed a bunch in 2016).
In general, it's another symptom of Elon's 'I have an extremely specific idea, let's figure out' mentality that sometimes works and sometimes results in useless tunnels under Las Vegas.
Personally I see bumper to bumper traffic maybe 3 or 4 times a year (when driving home from a vacation or being forced to a doctor’s appointment during rush hour). And I honestly don’t get why anyone would subjugate them self to this kind of traffic as part of their daily commute.
I used to live in LA where Santa Monica Blvd was always backed up. I doubt LA traffic has gotten better either.
I'm surprised by your insolence with regard to how shitty traffic circumstances are in big cities. Simply changing one's commuting times doesn't failsafe the issue.
Also, transit lines tend to connect well to mid-Manhattan but poorly between other locations. So if you live in Queens and work in Brooklyn, good luck getting to work reliably by public transportation. (Before you object to that arrangement, consider: If you own a house and have kids in school, you're not necessarily going to uproot your family and move just because your new job is further from home.)
Thus, many ordinary New Yorkers rely on cars to commute to work.
If you need to drive to the supermarket you should have the option of choosing a time and route with minimal risk of traffic jams. I find it hard to belief that many people are frequently hitting bumper to bumper traffics on their way to or from the supermarket. Occupationally yes, but frequently no.
1: https://www.google.com/maps/dir/84-25+168th+Pl,+Jamaica,+NY+...
The population of the tristate is nearly 20 million. Even a tenth of that is a lot of cars on the road.
In fact I’ve often heard people from that area complain more often about lack of parking near their commuter rail station. Which indicates that people do rather tolerate circling the parking lot in their park-and-ride rather then risking stop-and-go traffic jams.
In the NYC area, bumper to bumper traffic is common. It can be caused by an accident or construction that blocks one or more lanes, cars merging on to an already congested highway, etc. These conditions frequently happen even outside of rush hour.
You may have trouble understanding it, but empirically a huge number of people see this extremely regularly, if not daily.
It's not even necessarily a feature of horrifically long commutes. For one example, lots of places that have basically ok traffic have bottlenecks at bridges, you may be stop and go for a little while every day getting across that.