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Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

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Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#121

Post by cfallin »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #28

I saw one of these a month ago when I was biking around the North Shore (downtown Pittsburgh). Its cameras on top were far more conspicuous than the renders in the article, though. This article said it would pick people up downtown, but how far would they go to drop off? The golden triangle is mostly grid-based, but go elsewhere in the city and the road topology gets jacked up fast (like Boston), especially in the so…

Not just topology, but visibility too... IMHO at least, Pittsburgh streets in the denser neighborhoods (east end mainly) have a real problem with blind intersections and driveways, especially because of street parking. If the car's sensor system handles this well then that's really impressive.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#122

Post by skywhopper »

ones_and_zeros wrote: post #103
meggar wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how it will handle the stop sign on the 376 on ramp in Squirrel Hill.

I'd imagine that'd be the easiest thing to automate. if (currentLocation == Squirrel Hill on ramp){ car.Stop(); } car.merge() and then it can communicate with the other autonomous vehicles anticipating a difficult merge in this location to allow the safest merge possible.

It's worth keeping in mind for the HN crowd that "communicating with other autonomous vehicles" will require a huge leap in secure networking including government control of the car's software, basically.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#123

Post by jonknee »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #22
uptown wrote: post #18

Are self-driving cars legal in the United States by law, or just due to the absence of law? Seems like vehicular traffic has always had fairly tight regulations around their operation, but I'm stunned by the speed at which cars that drive themselves are hitting the road. Sure, we've had cruise-control, and cars have been adding things like auto-braking and lane-assist. Have they just taken that feature-creep further…

Wikipedia covers the legal aspects reasonably well, with a map of state laws. "In 2016, 7 states (Nevada, California, Florida, Michigan, Hawaii, Washington, and Tennessee), along with the District of Columbia, have enacted laws for autonomous vehicles." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_car#Legislation

Interesting that Pennsylvania is not on this list considering Uber is doing this in Pittsburgh.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#124

Post by losteverything »

nkoren wrote: post #112
losteverything wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"As a person within the industry" has there been any talk about the paths driverless will take? New roadways? Attendant-less roadways? Change in existing designation of highways? How to accomodate 10-20 people (vehicles won't look like they do now)? I envision future photos-videos of driver and driver less "vehicles" at a busy intersection just like horses and early cars.

These are the right questions to be asking! Yes, there has been some talk -- but not remotely enough. At present, the vast majority of work in the vehicle-automation space is being done by, well, vehicle people. The assumption is that driverless vehicles will slot into the existing infrastructure with minimal modification. There's a fair amount of consideration being given to vehicle-to-infrastructure communications…

Ty. Love to follow this as it progresses

Government has to get involved. Sometime and somewhere. Public safety is one aspect

I suggested to one town councilman that our town introduces a bill (ordinance) banning driver less vehicles. Just like we can ban oversized vehicles and parking in the winter. Our government should ban then now while it is not yet happening.

He thought it would be a good idea not to ban them but to capture a licensing fee.

Hopefully this will get introduced at the next meeting

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#125

Post by ianlevesque »

794CD01 wrote: post #115
efuquen wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the car would drive to the pickup location empty. It would seem full driverless with nobody in the car is the big deal here. It doesn't really matter is someone will be behind the wheel later, you already had the thing driving around with no human to intervene in case it does something crazy. Don't see how that's an intermediary step.

A car driving around with no human inside poses less risk to human life than a car driving around with a human inside who is unable to control the car.

But...the other drivers on the road?

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#126

Post by 794CD01 »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #10
sbarre wrote: post #7

I wonder how Uber drivers feel about working for a company that is actively trying to make them obsolete. Not passing judgement or anything, just kind of a strange thing to contemplate.. Uber kept saying they were disrupting the taxi industry by letting more people participate when really in the end they're trying to remove the people from the equation altogether.

I always talk to the drivers about their feelings and so on when taking Uber. Maybe my data is skewed but most accept it as inevitable and are not worried much as they have other side jobs. The cab drivers are the ones who must be anxious. It will be really bad if they cannot be retrained for other jobs as it will add to the existing frustration around automation. We simply cannot afford to leave people out as we mov…

>Humanity cannot progress by leaving people behind.

Most historical evidence suggests the opposite.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#127

Post by jonknee »

jbb555 wrote: post #8

I can understand self driving cars eventually being practical on long simple roads. But I can't even imagine how one could get to my house. My road has cars parked on both sides. Sometimes vans. Sometimes they almost block the road. Sometimes there is a car coming the other way and you have to look for a space to pull into to so they can pass, or maybe back up 1/4 of a mile. Or hope the other car does. There are cone…

> My road has cars parked on both sides. Sometimes vans. Sometimes they almost block the road.

Somewhat ironically, once self driving cars figure out how to do this at scale there won't be cars parked on both sides of the road.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#128

Post by soundwave106 »

OpenDrapery wrote: post #72
sbarre wrote: post #7

I wonder how Uber drivers feel about working for a company that is actively trying to make them obsolete. Not passing judgement or anything, just kind of a strange thing to contemplate.. Uber kept saying they were disrupting the taxi industry by letting more people participate when really in the end they're trying to remove the people from the equation altogether.

Most all of us work for companies that would like to make us obsolete. Payroll is a necessary evil in the enterprise, as far as "the business" is concerned.

The irony here is that I would say most companies are, in one way or another, driven by consumption. Our present economic system, generally speaking, relies income earned in jobs to fuel this consumption.

If everyone is obsoleted, who will have the income to consume what the robots and fancy technology produce? I personally don't see the current business / economic system being very well prepared for the possibility of a post-consumer economy.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#129

Post by 794CD01 »

cgearhart wrote: post #47
rattray wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible that they don't rely on the minutiae of the maps, just use them for planning. For example, "don't take 5th street, it's full of potholes" or "we can't drop off the passenger on this block, there's a fire hydrant – will have to drop them off on the next block, so plan accordingly". On the other hand, if the cars won't drive properly without these maps, in which case I too would be extremely hesitant to t…

They definitely use the maps. In order to accurately localize the car, a detailed map can be used as part of the likelihood function for location to answer "how likely is it that the vehicle is at position (x,y) given the most recent measurements?" If you don't have an accurate map, it's very difficult to come up with a likelihood function that is accurate enough to keep the car in its own lane.

Keeping the car in its lane is overrated. Any human who drives in snow knows the rules. If there are other cars around, center yourself with respect to them. If there are not, lanes are irrelevant. Even many narrow side streets in snowless areas force you to improvise in a similar way to handle oncoming cars.

Re: Uber’s First Self-Driving Fleet Arrives in Pittsburgh This Month

#130

Post by 794CD01 »

n72 wrote: post #110

I wonder how this will affect crime. With a driverless car, if someone wanted to hold you up, all they have to do is walk in front of the car, which will then obediently stop.

As opposed to human-driven cars, which keep going and run you over?
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