There are those who would say that the most dangerous part of any car is the driver. If that's true then cars may be on the verge of getting much safer. The state of Nevada has just passed a law that allows cars to cruise the streets without human drivers. That's right, without human drivers.
While it might seem as though the day when your car handles the driving while you relax in the backseat with the latest issue of Motor Trend Magazine is far in the future, it's actually closer than you think. Already we've seen the first precursors of true self-driving cars that can take over one of the more difficult driving tasks, parallel parking. Ford, Toyota and Lexus all have self-parking options. These cars use an array of sensors to judge the distance between their bumpers and the cars between which they must park.
Hands-free parking though, is just the beginning. As we learned this week from Volkswagen Group Research Executive Director Jurgen Leohold, Volkswagen is introducing an autopilot for cars. The new TAP (Temporary Auto Pilot) system will maintain a safe following distance from cars ahead of you, keep your car centered between the lane markers, and even slow down when approaching a turn. Volkswagen is quick to add, though that the driver still remains responsible for driving the car and can override TAP control at any time.
Nevada's new rule allows cars without any driver present at all. It was passed after lobbying efforts by Google says PCWorld. In fact, says Google in their official blog, they already have cars that can drive themselves. Google autonomous vehicles have already test driven 140,000 miles on test tracks and real city streets.
Google's experimental vehicles won't be production ready for some time though since they currently require the enormous computing power of Google's data center computers. The next time you think their search engine is running a little slow, it just might be because a robot car is trying to fight its way through rush hour traffic on the Vegas Strip.
Even with all that electronic brain-power, Google says every robotic vehicle still gets a qualified driver sitting behind the wheel, just in case. Furthermore, a software engineer rides shotgun and monitors software performance in real-time, presumably to prevent the car from going rogue.
Before any driverless cars are allowed to take the road in Nevada, the Department of Transportation needs to establish rules and a licensing system that ensures that any such vehicles have been fully tested for safety and reliability. Even then, Nevada will only allow driverless vehicles in designated areas.
Nevertheless, Google's experimental cars and Volkswagen's TAP system prove that it is possible for a car to drive itself. From that proof-of-concept, it's only a matter of time before the technology makes its way into the mainstream.
In the same way we tell our kids that we used to have to get up and walk over to the TV to change the channels, they may be telling their disbelieving kids that they used to have to climb behind the wheel and steer the car.