Driverless cars could change everything

[loochy]

Originally Posted by Teak

I have a Y Tesla and Full Self Driving (FSD) beta. Like lots of cars today, I can get on the interstate and the car will drive itself as long as I stay on the interstate. This is not FSD beta. All Teslas are capable of doing this. It does make long drives a lot more comfortable. It will slow down and pass with whatever speed you want to set and if a Navigation point is set it will drive from entry on Interstates to off ramp from Interstates.
FSD beta tries to put this freedom on regular driving in town and country roads. I do use it on routes I know because I am aware of where it will have troubles. But in city driving it is nice because it stops at stop signs and proceeds with right of way, at stop lights and goes on green and slows or stops for cars in front of me turning or stopping at intersections. Stop and go driving is less stressful.
It does not do as well on country roads or highways with slightly skewed intersection meeting. It will not recognize entry roads to destinations as not part of highways. It has problems with stopped emergency vehicles and associated human directions at such scenes.
But I have seen lots of improvement over the year. I am concerned that my particular car may not have the resolution and cpu power to actually get to a practical level of self driving. It is not GPS dependent at all and the visual and processing power has to be on board for Tesla's implementation.

So is it trustworthy enough to sit back and really enjoy some road head instead of trying to focus on not crashing?

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by Teak

I have a Y Tesla and Full Self Driving (FSD) beta. Like lots of cars today, I can get on the interstate and the car will drive itself as long as I stay on the interstate. This is not FSD beta. All Teslas are capable of doing this. It does make long drives a lot more comfortable. It will slow down and pass with whatever speed you want to set and if a Navigation point is set it will drive from entry on Interstates to off ramp from Interstates.
FSD beta tries to put this freedom on regular driving in town and country roads. I do use it on routes I know because I am aware of where it will have troubles. But in city driving it is nice because it stops at stop signs and proceeds with right of way, at stop lights and goes on green and slows or stops for cars in front of me turning or stopping at intersections. Stop and go driving is less stressful.
It does not do as well on country roads or highways with slightly skewed intersection meeting. It will not recognize entry roads to destinations as not part of highways. It has problems with stopped emergency vehicles and associated human directions at such scenes.
But I have seen lots of improvement over the year. I am concerned that my particular car may not have the resolution and cpu power to actually get to a practical level of self driving. It is not GPS dependent at all and the visual and processing power has to be on board for Tesla's implementation.

Interesting post. Sounds like it still needs human supervision or at least an owner/rider that is paying attention.

[Teak]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Interesting post. Sounds like it still needs human supervision or at least an owner/rider that is paying attention.

Let's take one at a time. The skewed intersections sees FSD slow to make a left turn even with no on coming traffic. It fiddles looking for the entry onto the new road more so if the intersection has islands or acute angle. It finally gets these right but if you have traffic behind you they may see your hesitant motions as someone who needs a horn to encourage getting it done. One needs a "new driver" bumper sticker to explain this.

The failure to distinguish highway exits say into churches or malls with turn lanes would be helped greatly if mandated painted arrows on the road very early in the lane. I think with self driving cars you need mandates on highly visible lane markings on the roads to guide decisions.

Emergency flashing should be a case with the car expecting some kind of human intervention.

Except for the emergency vehicle incidents, in town these problems almost disappear.

Is it still early, yes but the success rate will increase exponentially with practice. You can't get rid of all accidents but you will see lower incidents and of lessor severity than with humans well within 2 years.

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by Teak

Let's take one at a time. The skewed intersections sees FSD slow to make a left turn even with no on coming traffic. It fiddles looking for the entry onto the new road more so if the intersection has islands or acute angle. It finally gets these right but if you have traffic behind you they may see your hesitant motions as someone who needs a horn to encourage getting it done. One needs a "new driver" bumper sticker to explain this.

The failure to distinguish highway exits say into churches or malls with turn lanes would be helped greatly if mandated painted arrows on the road very early in the lane. I think with self driving cars you need mandates on highly visible lane markings on the roads to guide decisions.

Emergency flashing should be a case with the car expecting some kind of human intervention.

Except for the emergency vehicle incidents, in town these problems almost disappear.

Is it still early, yes but the success rate will increase exponentially with practice. You can't get rid of all accidents but you will see lower incidents and of lessor severity than with humans well within 2 years.

Great post, thank you for the non-predjudiced information. Interesting indeed.

I had to drive from Branson West to Branson today, and the entire 7-8 miles was just recently paved/blacktopped. It normally has 3 lanes on most of it, but that was all indistinguishable, as they had not striped it yet.

I caught myself wondering what a driverless car would do, as everyone, including myself, was hesitant in trying to figure out where our lanes were.
Turn markings, nope, none of that. I am not aware of any accidents with all human drivers.

[HemiEd]

DMV shuts down Cruise robotaxis in San Francisco over safety concerns

The California Department of Motor Vehicles on Tuesday shut down problem-plagued Cruise autonomous taxis in San Francisco, saying the vehicles, involved in several troubling incidents, presented an “unreasonable risk to the public.”

“This is a wake-up call to Cruise to pay closer attention to road safety,” said Carnegie Mellon University engineering professor Phil Koopman, who likened the company’s robotaxis to “teenage drivers not displaying good judgment.”

San Francisco has become a proving ground for driverless taxi technology, with Cruise and Google spinoff Waymo testing out their vehicles on public roads. But Cruise’s robotaxis in particular have come under fire from city officials over their propensity to stop and snarl traffic and obstruct emergency vehicles.

Removal of Cruise’s driverless taxis from San Francisco’s roads comes as officials in other Bay Area cities closely watch the technology’s roll-out. Decisions on where the vehicles are ultimately deployed remains under the authority of state regulators. San Jose has said all it can do is hope to build positive relationships with robotaxi companies, and Oakland officials have told the utilities commission they know their city “may be next” for deployment.

To get its permits back for testing and deploying driverless taxis with no human backup, Cruise would have to provide the DMV with information about “how it has addressed the deficiencies that led to the suspensions,” the agency said.

Since August, when the state Public Utilities Commission gave General Motors’ Cruise a green light to take paid fares, there have been numerous reports of the cars’ obstructing emergency vehicles and bottlenecking traffic. San Francisco Board of Supervisors president Aaron Peskin at the time described the autonomous technology on public roads as “a recipe for death” and said the vehicles were “not ready for prime time.”

https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/10/...led-on-safety/

[Teak]

To be fair I've seen head being given for years before Auto Pilot.
I don't try and avoid having to answer to the need to let AP know I am there. But I do get to see a lot more scenery.

[Katipan]

Is it really road head if there's no danger of crashing? You're just in your mobile lazy boy.

[Clyde Frog]

I’m glad they got blocked, even if it was temporary. Those cars became a nuisance. They were everywhere and with how congested SF streets are w Hipster Lance Armstrongs and double parked delivery trucks/ dashers /Ubers etc. they would block streets for minutes at a time trying to figure out safe passage through minor hazards.

It was ok when there were a few of them here and there but that shit got out of hand.


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[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by Clyde Frog

I’m glad they got blocked, even if it was temporary. Those cars became a nuisance. They were everywhere and with how congested SF streets are w Hipster Lance Armstrongs and double parked delivery trucks/ dashers /Ubers etc. they would block streets for minutes at a time trying to figure out safe passage through minor hazards.

It was ok when there were a few of them here and there but that shit got out of hand.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Sounds like first hand experience, thank you for sharing.

Hopefully they will get this problem figured out soon before they release too many more of these vehicles.

I wonder if these vehicles stop and gawk at homeless people shitting in the streets?

[Clyde Frog]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Sounds like first hand experience, thank you for sharing.

Hopefully they will get this problem figured out soon before they release too many more of these vehicles.

I wonder if these vehicles stop and gawk at homeless people shitting in the streets?

Unfortunately for me it is first hand experience.

The problem for Cruise is the only way for them to get it figured out is running them “in the wild”.

Lol. Shit, used needles, tranq zombies, sidewalk tent suburbs with full on living room set ups including a couch and lamps on night tables all plugged into the city grid. The homeless rule entire swaths of the city now. It’s going to take something major to ever stop this place from being a extreme, far left liberal shithole. It’s so far gone.


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[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by Clyde Frog

Unfortunately for me it is first hand experience.

The problem for Cruise is the only way for them to get it figured out is running them “in the wild”.

Lol. Shit, used needles, tranq zombies, sidewalk tent suburbs with full on living room set ups including a couch and lamps on night tables all plugged into the city grid. The homeless rule entire swaths of the city now. It’s going to take something major to ever stop this place from being a extreme, far left liberal shithole. It’s so far gone.


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Such a sad deal, I was shocked at walking up on a guy shitting between two cars when I was there at a convention a long time ago, sounds like it has just gotten worse.

[DaFace]

Well, I'm excited to give Waymo a try when I visit Phoenix in a month or so.

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by DaFace

Well, I'm excited to give Waymo a try when I visit Phoenix in a month or so.

Hopefully it will be an experience you look back on with nothing but joy.

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by DaFace

Well, I'm excited to give Waymo a try when I visit Phoenix in a month or so.

Forgot about this thread until it was bumped, but here's my video of my Waymo ride in Phoenix. It had a little trouble figuring out how to get out of a one-way parking lot that dead ended into a valet stand, but once it got on the road, I was surprised with how fluid it seemed. Zippy acceleration, no issues changing lanes, even made a right turn on red.


(this video will expire in 2 days, so you're not crazy if it's not working)

I still wouldn't predict they'll be common any time soon, but it was a much smoother ride than I was expecting, especially compared to videos of Tesla drivers trying out FSD mode.