Talking Cars

As we near the end of 2020, there are new innovations and ideas rising about how we travel and commute. As many of you know, Tesla Motors has designed and used a “Self Driving Car” and so far, only 4 people have lost their life in one way or another because of this invention.

Tesla’s goal was to have over 10 million cars on the road by 2020 that could drive themselves. There are many negatives and not too many positives about this idea. Just last March, on a highway down in Florida, a self driven car drove itself into the side of a white semi trailer. Killed the driver instantly. The problem was, the cars sensors couldn’t identify the color of the semi trailer with the sky background.

The other fatalities surrounding the “Self Driven” cars were innocent pedestrians who were hit by the self driven cars.

There is a car out there right now, called an ‘Audi AB” With the use of radars with lasers, a hoard of cameras and who knows how many sensors, the Audi AB will be the world’s first Level 3 self driven car. They claim it will be able to reach speeds of 85 MPH and they are testing these cars as I write.

There is a company out of Mountain View California called, “Waymo.” Which stands for Way More Mobility. This is the center of technology behind the self driven car. The company, “Waymo”is presently worth about 20 billion dollars, and that’s thanks to investors from around the world. Waymo is a direct affiliate with Google.com.

All self driven cars so far are electric. I have some thoughts and warnings about this electric self driven car reality and they go as such.

First off, why do we need this? The real downfall of selling a self driven car is most all of them so far costs over $100,000. Then there is the insurance for the vehicle. Have a person on both sides of you so when you fall down at the license branch you don’t get hurt when you see what the plates cost.

Let me ask you readers this. Let’s say you’re on US30 headed east or west. You go around a car and there in the driver’s seat the driver is sound asleep. Would you feel safe? What if you’re on a country road, and there is two way traffic. You see a car coming at you and it’s in its lane. But nobody is sitting behind the wheel. How does that make you feel?

What if you had a self driving car? Are you ready to trust all the technology that goes along with safe travel on the road? Have we finally gotten to the point of laziness that we actually NEED a car to drive by itself? Is it laziness, or spoiled-ness? Just think of the volume of trust you are putting into that vehicle that drives itself? Some people out there think this is great. Some people out there think they have to have one of these. Some people like ketchup on their breakfast cereal.

Let’s take this a little bit further. Let’s say, you hop into a driverless car. You sit behind the steering wheel and you start it up. First you have to set the navigation screen to the point of your destination. I know some people who can’t figure out the radio. Then you press “Self Drive” and you what? Read a book? Fall asleep? Is this self driven car going to find a parking spot for you? What about icy road conditions?

The number one thing that I do not like about self driven cars is we the people of the USA didn’t get to vote on it. We had no say. Shouldn’t the Auto Safety Board have taken a nationwide vote if we wanted such a thing? Self Driven cars. How lazy can we get? Drive safe everybody! joseywales2@gmail.com