Tuesday, June 30th 2015

Thoughts on self driving cars

How many of these would it take for self driving cars to be worth it to you?

What if…

• we didn’t need street signs anymore?
• there were no more traffic jams?
• speed limits could double? triple?
• cars could draft behind each other at these speeds?
• gas mileage could double? triple? (see above)
• there were no more bicyclist or motorcycle fatalities?
• the death rate of driving was cut in half? to zero?
• the cars could drive us to our road trip destination at night?
• they could auto-park themselves in busy cities?
• after driving us to work, they drove themselves to the shop for regular maintenance? automatically?
• cars could get our groceries from a drive through service?
• they could pick us up from the airport? anywhere? our friends? our family?
• we no longer purchased our cars, but paid a monthly service fee to a car operator?

Considering that most of the currently dominant car companies still struggle with building a useful and user friendly infotainment/navigation system, I would be surprised if any of them were major players regarding self driving cars.

All this being said, there are many older cars I would love to own.

Updated on Saturday, Feb. 15th 2020