That’s according to the results of a new study published today that aimed to assess public opinion on the subject. The survey commissioned by Kelley Blue Book showed that out of 2,264 U.S. residents polled, 64 percent said they need to be in control of their own vehicle and 62 percent said they enjoy driving.
Count me in the group that loves to drive. I’ve always loved to get out on the highway, play some music and feel the freedom. Not everyone is like me. In fact, the roads would be a lot safer if some drivers were never allowed to touch the wheel of a car. It’s going to take a while before the public comes around to fully autonomous vehicles.
I spent a year with Prime, Inc as an over the road truck driver, and am currently a local day cab driver with Venture Logistics. I’m of the same mind – I went into trucking because I absolutely love driving. I would venture to say that nearly 50% of drivers (certainly well over 35%) text and drive, and I’ve seen countless near-accidents as a result of texters. In one instance, there was an accident with stopped traffic about a mile ahead of me. I began slowing in advance, and a girl that had been tailgating me got impatient, switched to the hammer lane, and flew by me, phone in hand texting away. She got roughly 150 ft from the stopped traffic doing at least 70mph before she realized the traffic was stopped, and wound up spinning off into the median. If she hadn’t looked up from her stupid phone, it would have been a multiple fatality accident.
MANY people should not be on the road, but right now, self-driving cars are not the answer. For that to work, every single vehicle on the road would have to become self driving, all at the same time. A better approach for now would be proper driver safety training, which is currently a joke in the US, and better tools to keep mobile device distractions at a minimum. In the same way that the Watch was a health life changer for Jim, it’s been a mobile communication life changer for me. Between having Siri read me messages over a Bluetooth headset and being able to formulate complex replies (even some text emoji) via Siri on the watch, I am able to accomplish communications without having to take my eyes off the road, or even my hands off the steering wheel.
I used to love driving and still do when I am on a lonely country road but most of the time in traffic I am too wrapped up keeping an eye on the other drivers to enjoy the highway.
Other things the public has been skeptical of:
Electricity
Regular Cars
Speeds over 50mph
Airplanes
Television
Telephones
Computers
Medicine
Round Earth
I love to drive too, but I can see a few advantages to self-driving – out for dinner, have the extra glass of wine or after dinner drink and you’re still safe. Older people who aren’t as sharp as they used to be. Long trips that can be boring.
As for the public’s attitude… it’s just too early to ask people. They’re always indifferent to or skeptical of new tech that they’ve not seen or used. We’ll go through a period where every self-driving fatality is news… and then we’ll find that while not perfect, fewer people die in self driving car accidents. The tech will improve. The safety will be indisputable. And people will come around.
“MANY people should not be on the road, but right now, self-driving cars are not the answer.”
What is, then?
“For that to work, every single vehicle on the road would have to become self driving, all at the same time. “
Not at all. Why do you say this? Each self-driving car will be safer than the idiot who flew by you. If SHE’D been in a self driving car and NO ONE ELSE, would that incident have happened? No. So it would be a net safety gain right there.
If you read my comment, I gave the answer: proper driver safety education, for one.
And no. Recall the several accidents with Tesla’s autopilot system.
The semis I drive are loaded with safety features that will override driver control, such as Meritor’s OnGuard that’s used on Freightliner and Peterbilt, and Bendix collision avoidance systems used in Navistar International trucks. I’ve had serious safety issues with both these systems when they fall out of calibration and begin to “see” road signs, bridges, etc., and promptly slam on the brakes when there is no danger.
I made my statement about autonomous vehicles because of the time I’ve spent on the road. Take this scenario:
Vehicle in the right lane driven by a human is doing 63mph in a 70mph zone. Autonomous vehicle doing 70 comes up behind the 63mph vehicle, and once it comes in range of its “sight”, it gives proper signal to change to the left lane. Vehicle driven by a human in the left lane speeding at 78mph accelerates when the driver sees the vehicle signaling a lane change.
What happens? Does the autonomous vehicle have sensors to know that all of a sudden, a human flying like a bat out of hell has encroached its space? Does it swerve back into its original lane? Does the human tailgate the autonomous vehicle after it changes lanes in front of it? Mixing driverless vehicles with manned vehicles will cause more problems than it will solve problems.
Yeah proper education. That’s a pipe dream – you will never get the millions of licensed drivers to redo their education. You want humans to change and they don’t, not easily. This falls under “if wishes were fishes” thinking. Sure, if everyone always drove safely we’d be safer.
Several accidents with Tesla? Sure but 1) That’s a ‘perfect being the enemy of the good’ argument – if the new system isn’t perfect, why change? Well, let’s say self-driving cars have 15,000 fatal accidents a year. Horrible, right? Why move to such a dangerous technology… oh way, there are about 30,000 deaths a year now. I’d rather save those 15,000 people than worry about perfection. The other issues with this argument are a) we’re really talking about a much more sophisticated system than Tesla currently has and b) you have to normalize accidents per 100k miles etc.
I’m not even dealing with your example because you ignored the obvious response… the autonomous vehicle slows. And the short answer would be yes, it should have the sensors to see and evaluate the situation. Will it always be perfect? Silly question, see above.
Finally, you ignored the obvious counter example – if the girl who ended up in the median was the only one in your situation to have had a self-driving car her car would not have done that. QED and all that.
Better driver education, better testing are the answers, just as you said.
I look forward to someday trying out a self-driver but I love driving too much.
Young Drivers of Canada was a great driving course. Taught me defensive driving and saved my life more times than I can count.
Self-drivers would be good good for blue haired old ladies and dickheads who drive Beemers like they owned the road.
Indeed. Personally, I love to drive on twisty mountain roads with a view, but most of the time I’m on a packed freeway going—at well under the speed limit—to a packed parking lot for a meeting or shopping. I don’t love driving then. In fact, I’ll love it most of all when my car is allowed to drop me off at the door and go park itself.
Fully autonomous is corporation-centric.
The push toward driverless cars is mostly coming from businesses that employ drivers. They’d like to stop doing that. Drivers are expensive in their eyes. I’ve no doubt all driver-related businesses will move to fully autonomous asap. Should be a riot (maybe literally) to see what happens when 10-20 million jobs disappear nearly overnight and aren’t replaced by anything.
The consumer market though, not as clear.
If the argument was truly about safety, semi-autonomous driver-assist technologies would suffice. Semi-autonomous is driver-centric. It provides all of the safety benefits of full autonomous driving. It retains all of the benefits (to both driver and economy) of car ownership. It’s as inefficient as non-autonomous cars but that can be resolved other ways.
Drivers are right to be wary. It’s not being done for their benefit.
I think many are thinking about this the wrong way: all or nothing, completely self-driving vs completely human controlled.
I recently traded in my 12 year old Toyota Tacoma for a new one and I got it loaded with all the bells and whistles (I wish it had CarPlay but alas, it has the idiotic Entune). Just having a backup camera and corner sensors and mirror reminders about blind spots is extremely useful.
If we gradually folded things like this into all new cars and trucks and put a bit more collision avoidance in as well, that would go a long way toward making roads safer.
The problem with “traditional” cruise control is that many turn it on and take their attention down a few notches. A more sophisticated cruise control coupled with collision avoidance sensors would be a good way to transition toward completely self-driving cars, if in fact we ever go there.
You win 1 Internet!