A new era of vehicles
Google’s driverless car is a reality. The company has been testing self-driving cars for more than a decade, and now it’s built its own vehicle from scratch to test on roads in Silicon Valley.
The two-seater is called the Firefly, and it’s only going up to 25 mph. For safety reasons, Google engineers will be riding along in them until the testing phase is over.
The cars are expected to be on the road by 2020.
How driverless cars work
You might think that the driverless car is a sci-fi fantasy, and that it will never be a reality. But in fact, Google’s self-driving car project has been taking to the roads of California and Nevada since 2009, and its fleet of vehicles has already clocked up more than 200 000 miles.
Driverless cars use a combination of radar, laser light detectors (LIDAR), cameras and GPS navigation to detect objects around them. These sensors work together to build up a detailed map of the road ahead so that the car can drive safely at any speed. The systems determine what is important on the roads, such as other vehicles or pedestrians, and it uses information from these sensors to navigate your destination.
The LIDAR system emits laser light in all directions to create a 3D map of the area around your vehicle. This technology can detect things well beyond human reaction time—it often sees things as far away as 200m (656ft). As you drive down the road LIDAR constantly sweeps light around 360 degrees to generate a real-time view of nearby surroundings. It can also sense objects below its line of sight by bouncing pulses off reflective surfaces like cars and pedestrians hundreds of feet away from your vehicle’s current position (this is called ‘scanning’). You may have seen this technology used for mapping purposes on top of Google Street View cars or aeroplanes!
Driver oversight is required
- Driver oversight is required.
You’re not expected to drive the car, but you need to be ready to take over in case something goes wrong. Autonomous cars can make mistakes, or get into situations that are too difficult for them to handle (imagine a construction zone with no road markings, or a person stepping off the curb when you’re in his blind spot). This means you should always pay close attention while riding in an autonomous car.
Keeping cars safe on the road
Imagine if you could go to sleep in the back seat during your morning commute and wake up at work. Imagine if you could eat breakfast, play with your kids or check email on your way to school or the office, completely unencumbered by the task of driving.
What was once just a dream is now a reality. Self-driving cars are coming to our roads within a decade, and when they get here, they’ll transform our lives for the better. Not only will these cars free up people’s time, they’ll also make travel safer for all road users and bring greater mobility to those who can’t drive now like young children, older adults and the disabled.
Let’s take a closer look at how self-driving cars keep us safe on the road. These vehicles use state-of-the-art technology to detect other vehicles and roadway hazards as far away as two football fields away in all directions. Through this technology—including radar sensors under its bumpers, cameras that can spot objects more than 100 meters away and lasers located on top of its roof—the car identifies pedestrians and cyclists around it in real time. The car can also detect objects as small as a bicycle from hundreds of meters away in any direction, even in direct sunlight or harsh weather conditions such as fog or rain.
Self-driving cars also have an advanced software system that processes all of this information every 1/20th of a second so that it knows what’s happening around it at any given moment—and even predicts what might happen several seconds down the road! This allows our self-driving car to quickly react if there is an emergency or obstacle ahead (for example, if another vehicle cuts off our car) while keeping passengers safely inside.
Answering the age-old question: What happens if the car gets a flat tire?
You may be thinking, What happens if the car gets a flat tire? Good question. The sensors on the car can detect a flat and it will come to a safe stop. It will also have a spare tire, so you’re not stranded on the side of the road. You can drive it to a repair shop (like you would your normal car) or if you’re in manual mode, you can take care of it yourself (like you would…your normal car).
The bottom line is that this is still very much an experiment. And while some critics say Google’s driving car will never work, I’m betting that’s exactly right. It has to work because we want it to and we’re going to make it happen!
The driverless cars that Google has developed are going to change how all of us get around.
The driverless car that Google has developed is going to change how all of us get around. It will benefit the average person, who can enjoy being free to do other things while being driven by a machine. The average person will also have access to more choices and opportunities, because they won’t be limited by the time it takes to drive a car themselves. Since they won’t have to be concerned with driving anymore, those people who formerly drove themselves around will now be able to go anywhere in the world.
Why are we now able to achieve this? Before, engineers had been limited by having a human driver operating their vehicle; however, this new technology removes that barrier entirely. As such, drivers won’t need special training for these vehicles, so it becomes easier for everyone else on the road. A self-driving car allows everyone else on the road (those not in control of their own vehicle) more freedom and mobility without suffering any safety issues or any other negative consequences because there is no longer an operator present anymore than there would normally be one inside your home or office building when you’re using electricity! It’s really quite amazing — if only everyone could see what Google has done here!A new era of vehicles
Google’s driverless car is a reality. The company has been testing self-driving cars for more than a decade, and now it’s built its own vehicle from scratch to test on roads in Silicon Valley.
The two-seater is called the Firefly, and it’s only going up to 25 mph. For safety reasons, Google engineers will be riding along in them until the testing phase is over.
The cars are expected to be on the road by 2020.
How driverless cars work
You might think that the driverless car is a sci-fi fantasy, and that it will never be a reality. But in fact, Google’s self-driving car project has been taking to the roads of California and Nevada since 2009, and its fleet of vehicles has already clocked up more than 200 000 miles.
Driverless cars use a combination of radar, laser light detectors (LIDAR), cameras and GPS navigation to detect objects around them. These sensors work together to build up a detailed map of the road ahead so that the car can drive safely at any speed. The systems determine what is important on the roads, such as other vehicles or pedestrians, and it uses information from these sensors to navigate your destination.
The LIDAR system emits laser light in all directions to create a 3D map of the area around your vehicle. This technology can detect things well beyond human reaction time—it often sees things as far away as 200m (656ft). As you drive down the road LIDAR constantly sweeps light around 360 degrees to generate a real-time view of nearby surroundings. It can also sense objects below its line of sight by bouncing pulses off reflective surfaces like cars and pedestrians hundreds of feet away from your vehicle’s current position (this is called ‘scanning’). You may have seen this technology used for mapping purposes on top of Google Street View cars or aeroplanes!
Driver oversight is required
Driver oversight is required.
You’re not expected to drive the car, but you need to be ready to take over in case something goes wrong. Autonomous cars can make mistakes, or get into situations that are too difficult for them to handle (imagine a construction zone with no road markings, or a person stepping off the curb when you’re in his blind spot). This means you should always pay close attention while riding in an autonomous car.
Keeping cars safe on the road
Imagine if you could go to sleep in the back seat during your morning commute and wake up at work. Imagine if you could eat breakfast, play with your kids or check email on your way to school or the office, completely unencumbered by the task of driving.
What was once just a dream is now a reality. Self-driving cars are coming to our roads within a decade, and when they get here, they’ll transform our lives for the better. Not only will these cars free up people’s time, they’ll also make travel safer for all road users and bring greater mobility to those who can’t drive now like young children, older adults and the disabled.
Let’s take a closer look at how self-driving cars keep us safe on the road. These vehicles use state-of-the-art technology to detect other vehicles and roadway hazards as far away as two football fields away in all directions. Through this technology—including radar sensors under its bumpers, cameras that can spot objects more than 100 meters away and lasers located on top of its roof—the car identifies pedestrians and cyclists around it in real time. The car can also detect objects as small as a bicycle from hundreds of meters away in any direction, even in direct sunlight or harsh weather conditions such as fog or rain.
Self-driving cars also have an advanced software system that processes all of this information every 1/20th of a second so that it knows what’s happening around it at any given moment—and even predicts what might happen several seconds down the road! This allows our self-driving car to quickly react if there is an emergency or obstacle ahead (for example, if another vehicle cuts off our car) while keeping passengers safely inside.
Answering the age-old question: What happens if the car gets a flat tire?
You may be thinking, What happens if the car gets a flat tire? Good question. The sensors on the car can detect a flat and it will come to a safe stop. It will also have a spare tire, so you’re not stranded on the side of the road. You can drive it to a repair shop (like you would your normal car) or if you’re in manual mode, you can take care of it yourself (like you would…your normal car).
The bottom line is that this is still very much an experiment. And while some critics say Google’s driving car will never work, I’m betting that’s exactly right. It has to work because we want it to and we’re going to make it happen!
The driverless cars that Google has developed are going to change how all of us get around.
The driverless car that Google has developed is going to change how all of us get around. It will benefit the average person, who can enjoy being free to do other things while being driven by a machine. The average person will also have access to more choices and opportunities, because they won’t be limited by the time it takes to drive a car themselves. Since they won’t have to be concerned with driving anymore, those people who formerly drove themselves around will now be able to go anywhere in the world.
Why are we now able to achieve this? Before, engineers had been limited by having a human driver operating their vehicle; however, this new technology removes that barrier entirely. As such, drivers won’t need special training for these vehicles, so it becomes easier for everyone else on the road. A self-driving car allows everyone else on the road (those not in control of their own vehicle) more freedom and mobility without suffering any safety issues or any other negative consequences because there is no longer an operator present anymore than there would normally be one inside your home or office building when you’re using electricity! It’s really quite amazing — if only everyone could see what Google has done here!