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Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

fortune.com

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Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#251

Post by trothamel »

telchar wrote: post #95
trothamel wrote: post #72

When it comes to traffic, there's the concept of the right-of-way. I don't know about the rules in Tempe, but here's an excerpt from the rules in New York. > (a) Every pedestrian crossing a roadway at any point other than within a marked crosswalk or within an unmarked crosswalk at an intersection shall yield the right of way to all vehicles upon the roadway. And that kind of makes sense, because if pedestrians were…

True. But if there was no crosswalk within 100m (per the article) and it wasn't a highway (only 35mph limit) it's reasonable to cross without a crosswalk. Still a pedestrian shouldn't put themselves in harm's way, but I don't think crossing off the crosswalk should be help against someone in this circumstance.

It's not. But as the car has the right of way, it's the pedestrian's responsibility to make sure they're not hit.

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#253

Post by [deleted] »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #145
maxander wrote: post #85

There's going to be a bunch of these "OMG a robot car hit someone!!!" stories that then morph into "the robot actually had nothing to do with it." Perhaps it will finally cue people in to how intrinsically dangerous cars are. I mean, even if autonomous cars are x100 times safer to be around than human-driven cars, they're still orders of magnitude more of a risk factor for ordinary (U.S.) citizens than say, terrorist…

More like cue them into how dangerous walking out into traffic is. Cars don't stop on a dime. Everyone knows that. If there's ok visibility there's no excuse for getting hit by one that isn't going absurdly fast (assuming you don't use a circular definition for "absurdly fast") Sure, the car isn't supposed hit the pedestrian but the pedestrian also has an equal obligation not to just dart out into the road. And befor…

[deleted]

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#254

Post by portofcall »

viraptor wrote: post #153
blakesterz wrote: post #13

> “The driver said it was like a flash, the person walked out in front of them,” Moir said. “His first alert to the collision was the sound of the collision.” I don't know if that is supposed to make anyone feel better about this, if anything it makes it seem worse. I thought one of the big benefits of these systems was they were supposed to be better at exactly these kinds of situations? More like "autonomous cars a…

> More like "autonomous cars are better than people at stopping in a flash" rather than "just like people this car didn't stop in a flash". It's a single example. You can't extrapolate to better or worse from it. A self driving system better than people by 2 orders of magnitude will still kill people. But that's neither a comfortable thought, nor something media will get used to over the next decade or so. This speci…

3.2 fatalities per billion km driven by humans. So far 1 fatalities per 4 million miles by automated vehicles, which when you do the conversions... isn’t better. It’s not a lot to work with, but for the people speaking in stats, the actual stats don’t support them. A lot people in this thread seem to be cashing in a human life against future hypothetical gains which have in no way been demonstrated. I sincerely hope that I’m not the only one disturbed by that.

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#255

Post by brokenmachine »

IncRnd wrote: post #103
trothamel wrote: post #72

When it comes to traffic, there's the concept of the right-of-way. I don't know about the rules in Tempe, but here's an excerpt from the rules in New York. > (a) Every pedestrian crossing a roadway at any point other than within a marked crosswalk or within an unmarked crosswalk at an intersection shall yield the right of way to all vehicles upon the roadway. And that kind of makes sense, because if pedestrians were…

Legally, the driver may not have been at fault. Even so, I was taught as a child learning to drive that when I see a person in the median, watch them. They may walk out in front of you. They might even fall into the road. So, be prepared maybe even by changing lanes before that point in order to get out of harm's way. Apparently, this driver wasn't watching, choosing to let the car drive itself.

> Apparently, this driver wasn't watching, choosing to let the car drive itself.

And here I was, stupidly thinking that was the whole point of a self-driving car...

What's the benefit of a self-driving car that can't be trusted to drive itself again?

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#256

Post by googlemike »

r_klancer wrote: post #225

My takeaway from the comments in this thread: self-driving Ubers don't drive defensively, almost surely can't "read" pedestrian behavior, and even with lidar may never have seen Elaine Herzberg. Oh, and they speed. This sounds like straight out of the "hell" scenario for driverless cars: "we cannot accept responsibility for what happens to pedestrians and cyclists foolish enough to stray out of their designated safe…

The google maps streetview sign says 45, so the car was not speeding. The article most likely had a typo...

edit: https://www.reddit.com/r/SelfDrivingCars/comments/85ozqr/exc...

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#257

Post by prawn »

friedman23 wrote: post #21
benwilber0 wrote: post #14

> According to the Chronicle, the preliminary investigation found the Uber car was driving at 38 mph in a 35 mph zone and did not attempt to brake. Herzberg is said to have abruptly walked from a center median into a lane with traffic. The autonomous vehicle was speeding and made no attempt to decelerate given the sudden presence of an obstruction in its path? I would expect some kind of reaction from the car within…

3mph above the speed limit

Someone else has noted that the sign in the area indicates 45 mph, so it might've been a typo in the article.

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#258

Post by prawn »

benwilber0 wrote: post #33
friedman23 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

3mph above the speed limit

That is speeding and also the car was inattentive to potential hazards outside of its vision. Normal human drivers slow down when they see a wild lady on the median looking like she might dart into the road. Normal people slow down when there are kids playing with a ball on the sidewalk. Do these cars do that? Do they even drive the speed limit? edit: Also accidentally killing someone with your car because of minor s…

Sign in the area was actually 45 mph, so the car was 7 mph under the limit, it seems.

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#259

Post by oska »

I think it's worth referencing Sweden's Vision Zero [1] here, a project which aims to reduce all fatalities from automobiles to zero.

They have a system of maximum traffic speeds for different zones depending on what impact risks there are in those zones. For the zone where there are possible conflicts between pedestrians and cars the maximum speed is 19mph. The rationale for this is that below that speed the risk of a fatality from an impact between a car and a pedestrian is low but above that speed the risk of fatality rises very quickly.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero

Re: Police Say Uber Is Likely Not at Fault for Self-Driving Car Fatality in Arizona

#260

Post by omarforgotpwd »

naveen99 wrote: post #124
omarforgotpwd wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course a self driving car should be able to speed. My understanding is that speed limits are set by measuring the speed people are driving on the road and then determining a speed at which roughly 15% of the drivers are exceeding that limit. There is an expectation that people will speed, but by setting the speed limit a little bit lower almost all traffic will fall under safe bounds. Driving 38 in a 35 zone is co…

What speed would you drive if there was no speed limit ?

I would say they should be able to drive up to 15% higher than the speed limit at their discretion. So in a 35 zone they could go up to 40. But that's not a question for me to answer.I just know that the answer isn't that they follow the letter of the law all the time.
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