Googles self-driving car could turn New Yorks taxis into an endangered species. Chalk up another possible job victim of the Internet age — the New York City cab. Without a driver at the wheel, these vehicles are able to to navigate anywhere, including trips down the eight tight hairpin turns on San Francisco’s Lombard Street. Commuters could be driven to work in vehicles with office equipment or face-to-face seating for meetings. Designated drivers would be redundant and party cars could ferry groups to football matches stocked with beer, snacks and big-screen televisions. Driverless cars could take your kids to soccer practice, take blind or disabled people anywhere, pick up groceries or fetch the dog from its groomer. Mercedes’ flagship S-Class already has some self driving features. Self-driving cars are safer than human-driven cars. In its two years of testing, only two Google cars were involved in minor accidents. In one case, its pilot was driving when the mishap occurred, and in another it was rear-ended while at a stop sign. The fact is humans are lousy drivers. Roughly 30,000 Americans die every year from traffic accidents, mostly due to intoxication, incompetence or inattention. The worldwide carnage is an estimated 1.2 million annually. But driverless cars could change the urban environment as well — and upend the tens of thousands of taxis, liveries and limos that prowl New York’s streets and collect up to 1 million fares daily. Converting these fleets gradually to driverless cars would reduce traffic, as these cars would not overcrowd the streets looking for fares. They would be parked or stored until summoned by cellphone or text to perform a task. Less than 24 hours after Google unveiled its autonomous prototype, the CEO of ride-sharing service Uber, Travis Kalanick, said driverless cars will make cars cheaper to rent than to own. “When there’s no other dude [driver] in the car, the cost of taking Uber anywhere becomes cheaper than owning a vehicle.” This month, Google took the next dramatic step by rolling out a fleet of 100 two-seaters without steering wheels, brakes or accelerators. Sensors, computers and lasers guide the vehicles to destinations specified on mobile phones by their passengers. An emergency stop button is on board and, if conditions confuse the system, the car will simply come to a halt. This generation of vehicles will be lightweight, with soft collapsible front ends, and limited to 25 mph. The next version will be larger and faster and aimed at driving anywhere on its own.
Posted on: Sun, 22 Jun 2014 19:34:26 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015