Visit Landing Page for details. http://summit.smartdrivingcar.com/ Alain
A. Niezgoda, Mar 24, "When it comes to requesting a ride in Boston, there is no shortage of services out there, but a new Boston-based start-up aims to appeal to passengers who would feel more comfortable with a female driver...." Read more Hmmmm... This is a REALLY good idea! Alain
N. Scheiber, Apr 2, "...And yet even as Uber talks up
its determination to treat drivers more humanely, it is
engaged in an extraordinary behind-the-scenes experiment
in behavioral science to manipulate them in the service
of its corporate growth — an effort whose dimensions
became evident in interviews with several dozen current
and former Uber officials, drivers and social
scientists, as well as a review of behavioral research.
Uber’s innovations reflect the changing ways companies
are managing workers amid the rise of the
freelance-based “gig economy.” Its drivers are
officially independent business owners rather than
traditional employees with set schedules. This allows
Uber to minimize labor costs, but means it cannot compel
drivers to show up at a specific place and time. And
this lack of control can wreak havoc on a service whose
goal is to seamlessly transport passengers whenever and
wherever they want.
Uber helps solve this fundamental problem by using
psychological inducements and other techniques unearthed
by social science to influence when, where and how long
drivers work. It’s a quest for a perfectly efficient
system: a balance between rider demand and driver supply
at the lowest cost to passengers and the company..." Read
more Hmmmm... This
is really interesting. Read it all. However, with
Driverless cars, this headache goes away. Can you
imagine how much Uber wants Driverless cars.
(Although, Uber's fundamental IP may well be in its
ability to efficiently and effectively manage
part-time workers in the gig economy. That IP is
worthless in a Driverless world. So, Uber may need
to be careful what it wishes for.) Alain
Vol 11, No. 4, April 2017, Read
more Hmmmm... Nice
to have Thinking Highways focus an
issue on Automated Vehicles.
David Pickeral has a nice Opinion piece on Room for Improvement (p 4) "... As I have said again and again in numerous contexts across both conventional and social media: We as a species do not need self-driving car technology that eliminates drivers nearly as immediately as we need ADAS technology that eliminates accidents...."
Mike McGurrin has a nice piece
on The magic behind
self-driving cars
(p 8) "... One of the strengths of machine learning
techniques, including deep neural networks, is that
they can generalize, applying the trained and tuned
algorithm to handle cases that they have never seen
before, just as humans do. This is invaluable in
handling a task with the nearly infinite variations
encountered in driving. In addition, they provide an
estimate of their confidence in the result, which
could, for example, be used to trigger a need to
return control to a human driver. A significant
short-coming of neural networks in particular is
that while they can be incredibly accurate, they do
not provide information on how they reach a decision
. ..."
Ben Grush and John Niles have
a nice piece on Public
fleets of automated vehicles and how to manage
them
(p 16) " (which I commented on in a previous issue
of SDC)
C. Weller, Mar 25, "Earlier this month, Bay-Area-based
startup Spin introduced the first large-scale deployment
of a stationless bikesharing program in the US. As of
March 11, Austin, Texas now has hundreds of orange Spin
bikes randomly scattered around the downtown area, each
available for rent whenever and wherever Austinites need
them.
Each bike pairs with a mobile app that electronically
unlocks the bike for $1 per 30-minute trip....
K. Korosec, Mar 27, "...Making snow angels in Tahoe! We’re testing our self-driving Pacificas in cold weather & collecting snow data to train our software...
Waymo took the wraps off its autonomous minivans in
December. The following month ahead of the North
American International Auto Show kicked off in Detroit,
Krafcik
provided a deeper look into the company's business
model, the technology inside the vehicle, and its
timeline for testing on public roads...." Read
more Hmmmm...
Nice! Alain
Press release, mAR 27 " A recent national survey
commissioned by Erie Insurance, and conducted online by
Harris Poll among nearly 3,000 licensed U.S. drivers,
finds almost six in 10 (59 percent) think that
self-driving cars will eliminate the problem of
distracted driving. Two-thirds of men think this,
compared with just over half of women (66 percent to 52
percent, respectively).
But while it might be nice to completely kick back and
let the car do the driving, experts say the time for
that is likely a long way off...."The term 'self-driving
car' suggests I can hop in my car, enter a destination
and have it take me from point A to point B. ..."..." Read
more Hmmmm...
That's why you should call them 'Driverless' and
leave 'Self-driving' to be used only for those cars
for which the car drives itself for only part of the
trip. For that part of the trip, it allows you to
be totally distracted, without suffering the
consequences of being distracted. 'Safe-driving'
cars, cars that have Automated Collision and Lane
Departure Avoidance systems that actually work, also
mitigate the negative implications of distracted
driving. Alain
C. Fortuna, Apr 3, "During a week in which the House of Representatives voted to repeal Obama era Internet privacy protections, Tesla has come under fire from owners who dispute the all-electric carmaker’s right to disclose individual driver data to the media while also failing to share that data with the drivers themselves....
...What’s being contested here then? Several things,
actually. Tesla feels it has an explicit corporate need
to stand behind its driving-assist Autopilot technology
through public disclosures of individual driving data
when a crash occurs. Individual Tesla drivers, on the
other hand, express a desire to maintain the right to
information privacy regarding their driving performance.
And, while Tesla has disseminated individual driver
information to the media following Tesla crashes
involving its Autopilot system, it continues to deny
data sharing with individual customers. Moreover, the
company does not follow the commonly accepted research
practice of gaining permissions from study participants
prior to including them in a data set...." Read
more
Hmmmm... This is a real issue. It is
very important that data leading up to and including
crashes be made public. Since driving is supposedly
a 'privileged' not a 'right', society's greater good
may win. Also, the individual is not of interest,
so all personal information can be redacted. This
is a real issue. Alain
Press release, Mar 30, "IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced
that its scientists have been granted a patent around a
machine learning system that can dynamically shift
control of an autonomous vehicle between a human driver
and a vehicle control processor in the event of a
potential emergency, providing a safety measure that can
contribute to accident prevention...U.S.
Patent #9,566,986: Controlling driving modes of
self-driving vehicles for this invention."..." Read
more Hmmmm... What
was the examiner thinking??? Isn't there prior art
all over the place. Anti-lock brakes (apply the
brakes properly) and Electronic Stability Control
(don't lose your rear end) have been doing this for
years. Is this part of IBM's 'give the lawyers
something to do initiative'? I guess I don't
understand IBM's ingenuity here. Alain
Mar 25, "...Autonomous motoring expert Jochen Haab
(pictured) has already pinpointed one element of the
local driving environment that’s unique to Australia and
problematical for autonomous car engineers – Melbourne’s
confronting hook turns..." Read
more Hmmmm... We
have those in Jersey, They are called 'Jug
Handles'. What's worse are 'Michigan Lefts'. In
the end, these are much easier to deal with than
being cut off. Alain
Kyle, Apr 1, "NIVIDIA has hired former Tesla Vice President David Nistér who was a key player on the Autopilot team since April 2015. Nistér’s departure from Tesla follows a string of staff changes taking place on the Autopilot division, most recently seeing the arrival of 11-year Apple veteran Chris Lattner who joined Tesla early this year as the company’s newest VP of Autopilot. Lattner’s arrival came amid shake ups within the department after Tesla sued a former Director of Autopilot for allegedly stealing proprietary information from the Elon Musk-led electric car company...." Read more Hmmmm... Wild, Wild, West. Alain
http://orfe.princeton.edu/~alaink/SmartDrivingCars/Papers/
Intel’s deal for Mobileye seems to be a
recognition that chip-making rivals like Nvidia and
Qualcomm have moved slightly ahead in the race to
provide the computing power needed for autonomous
cars... Intel said it would continue investing in the
autonomous-driving industry, a sector that it said would
be worth about $70 billion by 2030..." Read
more Hmmm... The hits
keep coming! Friday..the California
Regs welcoming Driverless; Monday...
this. Tomorrow... nVIDIA???? Alain
E. Gurdus, Feb 27, "The self-driving car
business could become a major threat to insurance
companies when the technology hits the market,
billionaire investor Warren Buffett told CNBC's "Squawk
Box" on Monday.
If autonomous vehicles prove to be safer than regular
cars, insurance costs will plummet, and by the time
roads are filled with self-driving cars insurers like
Geico will have taken a serious hit, Buffett said...
"If I had to take the over and under [bet]
ten years from now on whether 10 percent of the cars on
the road would be self-driving, I would take the under,
but I could very easily be wrong," he said...." Read
more Hmmm...Really
shouldn't go against Buffet; however, he's going to
be smiling all the way to the bank. I just don't
see how the premise implies Geico takes a serious
hit. I tell everyone that I don't understand
insurance. I guess I just don't understand
insurance. :-(
I suspect that by cars he means cars + light trucks for which there are about 250M currently registered in the US with 38% being greater than 10 years old. Assuming these basic numbers remain roughly constant: of the 155M vehicles sold in the next 10 years, 25M or 16% would need to be 'Self-driving'. Since we are starting from a zero base with zero production, we are going to need to be upwards of a 30% adoption rate in the 10th year in order to have populated 16% of the fleet through that year. So, I agree with Warren wrt 'Self-driving'": "I would take the under, but I could very easily be wrong" Wrt 'Safe-driving, I would take the over, because the early numbers are attainable, especially if Insurance comes on board. Wrt 'Diverless': No way unless they are manufactured by a non-traditional entity that is totally disruptive in years 8, 9 and 10. Alain
A. Kornhauser, Jan 14, "Orf467F16 Final Project Symposium quantifying implications of such a Nation-wide mobility system on Average Vehicle Occupancy (AVO), energy, environment and congestion, including estimates of fleet size, needed empty vehicle repositioning, and ridership implications on existing rail transit systems (west, east, NYC) and Amtrak of a system that would efficiently and effectively perform their '1st mile'/'last-mile' mobility needs. Read more Hmmm... Now linked are 1st Drafts of the chapters and the powerPoint summaries of these elements. Final Report should be available by early February. The major finding is, nationwide there exists sufficient casual ridesharing potential that a well--managed Nationwide Fleet of about 30M aTaxis (in conjunction with the existing air, Amtrak and Urban fixed-rail systems) could serve the vehicular mobility needs of the whole nation with VMT 40% less than today's automobiles while providing a Level-of-Service (LoS) largely equivalent and in many ways superior than is delivered by the personal automobile today. Also interesting are the findings as to the substantial increased patronage opportunities available to Amtrak and each of the fixed rail transit systems around the country because the aTaxis solve the '1st and last mile' problem. While all of this is extremely good news, the challenging news is that since all of these fixed rail systems currently lose money on each passenger served, the additional patronage would likely mean that they'll lose even more money in the future. :-( Alain
B. Grush, Oct. 2016, "Two contradictory
stories about our transportation infrastructure are
currently in circulation. One is that Ontario’s aging,
inadequate and congested infrastructure is perennially
unable to catch up with a growing and sprawling GTHA.
The other is that vehicle automation will soon
dramatically multiply current road capacity by enabling
narrower lanes, shorter headways and coordinated streams
of connected vehicles to pass through intersections
without traffic signals to impede flow.
Since the premature forecast of peak car in 2008 and now
the hype surrounding the automated vehicle, we are often
told that we have enough road capacity; that shared
robotic taxis will optimize our trips, reduce
congestion, and largely eliminate the need for parking.
This advice implies we need wait only a few short years
to experience relief from our current infrastructure
problems given by decades of under-investment in
transportation infrastructure.
This is wishful thinking. Vehicle automation will give rise to two different emerging markets: semi-automated vehicles for household consumption and fully automated vehicles for public service such as robo-taxi and robo-transit. These two vehicle types will develop in parallel to serve different social markets. They will compete for both riders and infrastructure. The purpose of this report is to look at why and how government agencies and public interest groups can and should influence the preferred types and deployment of automated vehicles and the implication of related factors for planning..." Read more Hmmm...Bravo! The Key Findings & Recommendations are excellent. This is an excellent report (but it largely misses goods movement.) Especially 5.1 (read 'semi-autonomous' as 'Self-driving' and 'full-automation' as 'Driverless'. My view: Driverless may well be at the heals of Self-driving because it is a business play rather than a consumer play. Driverless will be ordered by the hundreds or thousands rather than individually.) and, of course Ch 10: Ownership (the business model) is more important than technology. Alain
September 2016, "Executive Summary...For
DOT, the excitement around highly automated vehicles
(HAVs) starts with safety. (p5)
...The development of advanced automated
vehicle safety technologies, including fully
self-driving cars, may prove to be the greatest personal
transportation revolution since the popularization of
the personal automobile nearly a century ago. (p5)
...The benefits don’t stop with safety. Innovations have the potential to transform personal mobility and open doors to people and communities. (p5)
...The remarkable speed with which increasingly complex HAVs are evolving challenges DOT to take new approaches that ensure these technologies are safely introduced (i.e., do not introduce significant new safety risks), provide safety benefits today, and achieve their full safety potential in the future. (p6) Hmmm...Fantastic statements and I appreciate that the fundamental basis and motivator is SAFETY. We all have recognized safety as a necessary condition that must be satisfied if this technology is to be successful. (unfortunately it is not a sufficient condition, (in a pure math context)). This policy statement appropriately reaffirms this necessary condition. Alain
"...we divide the task of facilitating the
safe introduction and deployment (...defines
“deployment” as the operation of an HAV by members of
the public who are not the employees or agents of the
designer, developer, or manufacturer of that HAV.) of
HAVs into four sections:(p6) Hmmm...Perfect!
Alain
"...2. Model State Policy (p7) The Model
State Policy confirms that States retain their
traditional responsibilities...but...
The shared objective is to ensure the establishment of a
consistent national framework rather than a patchwork of
incompatible laws..." Hmmm...
Well done. Alain
"...3. NHTSA Current Regulatory Tools (p7) ... This document provides instructions, practical guidance, and assistance to entities seeking to employ those tools. Furthermore, NHTSA has streamlined its review process and is committing to..." Hmmm... Excellent. Alain
"...4. New Tools and Authorities (p7)...The speed with which HAVs are advancing, combined with the complexity and novelty of these innovations, threatens to outpace the Agency’s conventional regulatory processes and capabilities. This challenge requires DOT to examine whether the way DOT has addressed safety for the last 50 years should be expanded to realize the safety potential of automated vehicles over the next 50 years. Therefore, this section identifies potential new tools, authorities and regulatory structures that could aid the safe and appropriately expeditious deployment of new technologies by enabling the Agency to be more nimble and flexible (p8)..." Hmmm... Yes. Alain
"...I. Vehicle Performance
Guidance for Automated Vehicles (p11) A. Guidance:
if a vehicle is compliant within the existing FMVSS
regulatory framework and maintains a conventional
vehicle design, there is currently no specific federal
legal barrier to an HAV being offered for sale.(footnote
7) However, manufacturers and other entities
designing new automated vehicle systems
are subject to NHTSA’s defects, recall and enforcement
authority. (footnote 8) .
and the "15
Cross-cutting Areas of Guidance" p17)
In sum this is a
very good document and displays just how far DoT
policy has come from promoting v2v, DSRC and
centralized control, "connected", focus to creating
an environment focused on individual vehicles that
responsibly take care of themselves. Kudos to
Secretary Foxx for this 180 degree policy turn
focused on safety. Once done correctly, the HAV
will yield the early safety benefits that will
stimulate continued improvements that, in turn, will
yield the great mobility, environmental and
quality-of-life benefits afforded by driverless
mobility.
What are not addressed are commercial trucking and buses/mass transit. NHTSA is auto focused, so maybe FMCSA is preparing similar guidelines. FTA (Federal Transit Administration) seems nowhere in sight. Alain
Hmmm...What we know now (and don't know):