Leggat Cadillac and Chevrolet innovation on DISPLAY

Perhaps I’m too trusting, but it only took me about three minutes to go from hands hovering over the steering wheel to leaning back in the driver’s seat with my arms crossed.

Cadillac’s Super Cruise system is so good that it

Autonomous cars are the modern automotive industry’s Holy Grail, with practically every manufacturer and supply house feverishly developing the technology needed to build them. But while rivals are still in the laboratory, Cadillac has leapt ahead.

In broad terms, Super Cruise is a self-driving technology that allows a vehicle to essentially control itself without requiring the driver’s hands to be on the wheel or feet on the pedals. It enables a car to accelerate, steer and stop all on its own in certain situations - emphasis on certain situations. No, you can’t put a destination into the navigation system and then take a nap, at least not yet.

“That hands-off feature is what really separates us,” said Daryl Wilson, lead development engineer of Cadillac Super Cruise. “And I

Testing it in the real world, 12 CT6 sedans were driven from the company’s headquarters in New York all the way to Los Angeles.

I participated in two legs of this journey, travelling roughly 1,931 kilometres from Memphis, Tenn., to Santa Fe, N.M. I had plenty of time in the driver’s seat during this trip, which proved to be the perfect place to test it.

Separating Super Cruise from rival systems on the market are four key technologies. Perhaps most importantly, it’s geo-fenced, only operating on limited-access, divided highways: basically roads with

medians as well as on- and off-ramps. and even Wilson admitted to being skeptical when he joined the program. “I thought that was going to be a big constraint for us,” he said.

But Cadillac was wise to limit it like they did. “I think for this type of feature, that is, by far, the

tomer,” noted Wilson, since long-haul interstate trips or slogging through rush-hour congestion are hardly ever enjoyable. Yes, Cadillac Super Cruise

Beyond being geo-fenced, Cadillac has plotted every inch of limited-access, divided roadway in the U.S. and Canada, some 338,000 kilometres in total. The system is aware of curves, barriers, elevation changes and interchanges ahead. “It took us three years to map all those roads,” Wilson. said.

Ensuring a car that’s equipped with this system knows exactly where it is, improved GPS is also utilized. It’s eight times more precise than what’s commonly available today, accurate to less than two metres, meaning the vehicle can even identify which lane it’s travelling in.

puzzle is an attention monitor. Fixed on the steering column is an infrared camera that tracks the driver’s face; it can even identify where they’re looking. Distract yourself for too long and the car will politely remind you to be pay attention. Since this infrared camera operates in the nonvisible spectrum, it works perfectly well at night or while wearing most sunglasses. This is to ensure drivers are ready to take control quickly, if needed.