Drivers fear letting go of the wheel with robots in control
michigan — Davy Andrews is so adept at technology that he’s become the de facto IT troubleshooter in his office. But there’s one bit of tech he won’t touch: self-driving cars.
“I wouldn’t want to be the first to jump into something with that kind of risk,” said Andrews, 33, an administrative assistant at a New York investment firm. “I would have to see enough evidence that it is safer, considerably safer. From where we are right now, it’s hard to imagine getting to that point.”
Autonomous autos are advancing so rapidly that companies like Uber Technologies and Alphabet’s Waymo are beginning to offer robot rides to everyday consumers. But it turns out the travelling public may not be ready. A recent survey by the American Automobile Association found that more than three-quarters of Americans are afraid to ride in a self-driving car. And it’s not just Baby Boomers growing increasingly fearful of giving up the wheel to a computer, a J.D. Power study shows — it’s almost every generation.
“One of the greatest deterrents to progress in this field is consumer acceptance,” US Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao told Bloomberg News last week at a departmentsponsored conference in Detroit. “If there’s public concern about safety, security and privacy, we will be limited in our ability to help advance this technology.”
Most commuters don’t have access to a self-driving car, so Chao has called on Silicon Valley to “step up” and explain how they work. She and other regulators advocate for autonomy as a solution for curbing the hundreds of horrific collisions that happen every day in regular automobiles. Among those that end up being fatal, 94 per cent are caused by human error, according to US authorities.
Consumers will only become comfortable with driverless cars after they ride in them, Mary Barra, the chief executive officer of General Motors Co, said last week. The largest US automaker is testing 180 self-driving Chevrolet Bolts and ultimately plans to put them in ride-hailing fleets, though it won’t say when.
“You can talk about it, but until you experience it,” self-driving cars are hard to comprehend, Barra told reporters at the GM factory building the Bolts north of Detroit. “Once you’re in the vehicle and you see the technology, you understand how it works.”
A Michigan test facility for autonomous autos is looking at opening its proving grounds to the public to promote acceptance of driverless technology, said John Maddox, president of the American Center for Mobility in Ypsilanti. — Bloomberg