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Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

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Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#361

Post by jacksmith21006 »

scarmig wrote: post #103
sliverstorm wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do we have a good signal that truly indicates Waymo has more advanced tech? Or could they simply have a bigger appetite for risk?

Just as a contrary response to everyone else pointing to Waymo's (real) historical tendency to be very risk-averse... Waymo has been feeling a lot of pressure from Uber and other companies, who have developed their autonomous car programs faster than Waymo did, even if Waymo is still momentarily ahead. Waymo's legal attempt to sidetrack Uber's program seems to have failed. So Waymo's executive may be at the point whe…

Who has developed a SDC faster than Google? DE reports it is not at all close. Google working longer and appears spending more and just wants it more. Plus Google has the prephereal systems like simulations to test. P!us Google is the only one with the cloud infrastructure that is in play.

https://www.wired.com/2017/02/california-dmv-autonomous-car-... The Numbers Don't Lie: Self-Driving Cars Are Getting Good - Wired

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#362

Post by rrhd »

vkou wrote: post #309
zjaffee wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Car pool lanes will likely be a big reason people choose to pool in autonomous cars. I imagine that self driving cars will make traffic much worse, and we will see a movement where cities create more and more HOV lanes to reduce traffic in such situations.

There's a radical idea that could be looked into - have a very large autonomous car, carrying 20-100 people. With enough of them, we could reduce traffic, save money (Compared to the cost of private vehicle ownership) - and the best part is, from the perspective of the riders, it will be self-driving. Why should we invest into self-driving carpools, when buses are cheaper, and more efficient?

I think you just invented the bus.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#363

Post by aey »

rrhd wrote: post #346
jedberg wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My car doubles as a "everything I need when I take the kid out" storage. We always have: - diapers - changing pad - strollers - extra clothes - kids movies for the tv in the van, queued up to where we left off Sure, people in places like NYC just carry all that stuff with them when they take the kid out, but they also take the kid out less often or move to the burbs because it's a huge pain in the butt. I'd much rath…

pfft, made up problems. You will submit to not owning anything. You don't need a house either, just go to an AirBnB every night. Everything must be a service. Ideally provided by google. Next thing your going to say is that waiting for 15 minutes in the rain with a crying baby while you get gouged for triple price because of nearby concert is a problem for you. Just suck it up and accept that car ownership is a outda…

we (people with families), will just create our own zones outside of cities with identical tacky housing that will make childless hipsters go blind. there will be no avocado toast, and the only music will be alternative rock from the mid 1990s

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#364

Post by jacksmith21006 »

ghaff wrote: post #331
djsumdog wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't have self-ownership. It's not remotely possible due to the safety considerations. Self driving cars need to have more oversight than FAA/aircraft. Even with self driving vehicles, America will still have terrible traffic. If anything, self driving vehicles will make things even worse, instead of America finally fixing its broken/non-existent mass transit system. I wrote about this a while back. Basically ev…

If you can't own (or lease, but that's just a financing variant) a self-driving car, the concept is going to be basically a non-starter. People who already take taxis/Uber/Lyft/etc. will appreciate a 50% cut or so in rates but anyone else who already drives a car daily will just pass for most of the same reasons they own a car today.

Do not agree. Habits will change as it will be cheap. My kids already are very, very comfortable using Uber where me and my wife are like let's take our car.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#365

Post by Symbiote »

mynameisvlad wrote: post #165
illirik wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There would be several bystanders in a typical Copenhagen rail car; they would be able to call for help. This wouldn't necessarily be the case in a driverless car; if the only passenger has a medical emergency, it would be up to the vehicle to detect that and take appropriate action.

Not necessarily in the scenario they presented. While I haven't been in Copenhagen specifically, I've been in plenty of train cars late at night (think last few trains before service closes) where I'm the only person in the car. Just like a random onlooker could see you from the platform, someone in another car could see you in your driverless one and call emergency services. The two scenarios are very similar in the…

The Copenhagen Metro runs all day and all night, so it's pretty easy to find an empty or almost empty train -- near the end of a line at 3am on Tuesday should work.

The scenario certainly also works for trains in general -- perhaps even more so, since an older, manually driven train is less likely to be filled with CCTV cameras linked to a control room. (The metro has this, but it seems they're only monitored once someone presses the emergency button.)

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#366

Post by jacksmith21006 »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #65
koolba wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cell service dead zones aside, is the latency and jitter for remote operation over a wireless link low enough to be feasible?

I think this whole thing is hilariously premature for a bunch of other reasons, but I assume a remote piloted car is gonna go REALLY slow until the car is confident again, and Google's cars are ridiculously limited in their geographic area. My guess is that they have sent a Verizon guy ("Can you hear me now? Good.") down each and every road they whitelist the cars to drive on.

Limited geographic area initially is solved through ride sharing as you know the origin and dest and only send robot car if can be supported.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#367

Post by jacksmith21006 »

rayiner wrote: post #67
joshuamorton wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After one or two get backed up, they alert the others that traffic is stopped and to go another way? In general the answer to all of these whacky what ifs is "whatever a human driver, or group would do, but with more efficient communication".

These aren't "wacky what ifs." I don't know what things are like in the Valley, but here on the east coast something unexpected changes my commuting route a couple of times a month (multiply that by tens of thousands of drivers). "Do whatever the human would do, but more efficient" isn't an answer. These cars can't get on WTOP the day before and listen to the warning that the Pope is visiting and X, Y, Z streets will…

The thing is these edge cases being given have relatively easy solutions and when consider in the context of Google has cars driving themselves they do not seem like a huge issue.

But the sooner we get to the next phase so sooner they can be better understood and solved. I want this to get rolling. It is time.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#368

Post by jacksmith21006 »

giacaglia wrote: post #73
dabeeeenster wrote: post #70

There's a positive feedback loop that will happen: As they get more cars on to the road, the log more real world miles, which makes the cars better, which gets more cars onto the road which log more miles... I wonder how valuable this is?

Tesla logs more miles per day than Waymo recorded in its history, but Waymo has better software just because of their simulations of the real world. See https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/08/insid...

Waymo also has far better hardware than Tesla and that is the bigger difference. Google is getting 1500x Tesla also in performance.

https://www.wired.com/2017/02/california-dmv-autonomous-car-... The Numbers Don't Lie: Self-Driving Cars Are Getting Good - Wired

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#369

Post by jedberg »

glangdale wrote: post #279
jedberg wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My car doubles as a "everything I need when I take the kid out" storage. We always have: - diapers - changing pad - strollers - extra clothes - kids movies for the tv in the van, queued up to where we left off Sure, people in places like NYC just carry all that stuff with them when they take the kid out, but they also take the kid out less often or move to the burbs because it's a huge pain in the butt. I'd much rath…

... and someone else mentioned the car seat, too. Always fun! However: unless you are planning a very large family, this is a transitory phase. I noted as my kids matured the amount of crap you have to lug around drops precipitously. I can't see that many people needing to carry the stuff on the bulky end of this for years and years. I carried my kids sequentially in a back-pack (3 years separation, so #1 was walking…

Yeah I know it goes down over time and then won't be an issue anymore. We did in fact get a van that I plan to keep for Peak Kid.

I fully expect to be using at least one driverless vehicle before they leave to college. I'm just not sure if it will be exclusively a rented driverless car or something else.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#370

Post by jacksmith21006 »

aroman wrote: post #35
jpm_sd wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can read street signs, even hand-held STOP signs in the hands of construction workers. And the cars are continuously mapping their surroundings. But they ALSO use a shared, extremely high quality map database for first-level path planning. edit: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/08/insid...

And it can even see and understand the hand gestures (e.g. turn signs) of cyclists.

Plus can even understand cyclist that can keep their bike stopped but no feet on the ground.
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