Google self-driving car

[Lazydonkey]

Great wee article on a trip in the google car

http://theoatmeal.com/blog/google_self_driving_car

I don't see this technology as a threat, i'm excited by it !

[j2 lot]

Anything which takes the non- enthusiast/ uninterested driver out of control is good as it leaves the enthusiasts to get on with driving while the rest of the world sits in 'public transport'

[graeme]

So, your perfect car would be a self-driving Evora...

[Shug]

It's a threat to motoring at the cost we have now. IMO within 20 years (maybe sooner) having the ability to insure yourself to drive unassisted will be prohibitively expensive. If the automated car becomes reliable and cheap, why on earth would an insurance industry/government/roads authorities want drivers to maintain control.

Personal freedoms aren't removed with jackboots any more, it's with the carrot of ease, convenience and financial incentive. Go back to the 1950s and tell a young chap just back from the war that in 2015 we'd be happily trundling round constantly monitored on camera and cheery about handing our location & speed data to the authorities via telematics and he'd think you were joking - and likely be horrified...

Agree, the tech is really clever and who wouldn't want to remove the drudgery of the commute whilst still staying in your personal car - it's the side effects that will hurt the lower funded enthusiast, sadly.

[BiggestNizzy]

I love the idea of a self driving car, you go to the pub and you email the car to pick you up. I take the car to work and Ann (the non driver) want to take the kids to the beach one email and 20 mins later it turns up.

If I want to drive I spend a week preparing the elise.

[Lazydonkey]

Absolutely Shug, there will be downsides, but the advances come with massive advantages too.

We're some way off being priced off the road.

[Shug]

We're some way off being priced off the road.

I think you're massively optimistic on that one...

[Lazydonkey]

If you look at the cost of motoring now compared to the 1970's or even the 80's if anything it's become cheaper, the cars are better and the overall experience is just better. Why would that change materially in 2020 or 2030?

I see autonomous cars as having a future but think of the cost of moving everyone from current cars to self driving cars, that's simply not going to happen for decades and decades even if the technology improves massively. If 75% of the cars on the road are self driving then, yes, i can see the costs for the 25% going up but that will take an awfully long time.

Look at how often electric cars, hybrids or the hydrogen car have been touted as the death or petrol and they are still here and getting better. Massive quantum leaps in technology take decades to take affect on such high value purchases.

[r055]

id love for one of these to take me to inverness, liverpool or hull... fcuked off with driving it now.

[flyingscot68]

Wish my car could've driven me to work this morning.
I like the idea but do worry how it'll all pan out.


Sent from somewhere using something

[Doc883]

id love for one of these to take me to inverness, liverpool or hull... fcuked off with driving it now.

There's always the train or dare I say even the bus

[tut]

I agree with Shug, you can not pick the parts of it that you would like, so quite happy that it is a situation that will not affect me.

tut

[Fluoxetine]

Electric cars of the future?!

Watch on YouTube

[r055]

id love for one of these to take me to inverness, liverpool or hull... fcuked off with driving it now.

There's always the train or dare I say even the bus

I love the train but unfortunately Public transport doesnt get me to the area in time for most meetings... Never mind the site i then need to get to by taxi.

[r055]

Electric cars of the future?!

Watch on YouTube

Haha! the revolution!! Has it already happened? Did i miss it?