Our current GPS system while quite accurate using the right algorithms, is somewhat dependent on accurate maps, which we don't yet have. Of course over time, the demand for better data could result in the accuracy we need.
True, which is where if I am not mistaken using the reflectors on the road as well as having the signs along the side of the road being able to communicate with the cars would all be a help. As well as building internal maps in the cars navigation systems. On the interstates having the mile markers report to the car not only that it just passed mile such and such but that it is on say I-4, I would have to think would help the car to know where it is. The same for exit signs, and posted speed signs.
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Digital_Cowboy
Live Long and Prosper
The cars themselves will need to be able to distinguish road from .. not road using scanners. We'd never be able to rely on reflectors and such being on every road around. Highways will be much more doable, and hence I can see automated highways being the only place for autonomous driving for decades to come.
The cars themselves will need to be able to distinguish road from .. not road using scanners. We'd never be able to rely on reflectors and such being on every road around. Highways will be much more doable, and hence I can see automated highways being the only place for autonomous driving for decades to come.
Current systems can already distinguish road from "not road," and people from "not people." There are vast arrays of systems being tested right now to do all that and more. The real issues at this point are reliability for the software and the size of the processors.
Processing power is getting cheaper all the time, but the software to do all these functions will have to be pretty darn complex, especially at first, when it has to deal with non-cooperative human drivers. (the very same issues cyclists now face... gee, fancy that...)
As more and more self driving cars are on the road, they will no doubt interface in a variety of ways and make decisions about traffic well before they actually physically meet.
No doubt this will all be introduced a bit at a time... like the self parking cars; adaptive cruise control; collision avoidance systems; automatic highway systems; and eventually "any road" systems.
I am willing to bet self driving cars on freeways will be common place in the next 10 years. Self parking, adaptive cruise control, and collision avoidance systems are already available as options on high end cars.
At some point, like airbags, the safety of the systems will probably mandate that all vehicles be so equipped.
God bless us one and all. I was promised a flying car in my childhood, and dagnabit I want a flying car.
Yeah I hear ya, but thus far we have not found a fuel efficient way to fly... either we need a whole new way of flying (anti-gravity) or some ultimate cheap fuel source (cold fusion), and neither one has done much about leaving the lab.
The self driving car has gone beyond the lab and is in prototype stage... the current limitations are sensors, processing power, and software. All three have been steadily improving. (processing power tends to follow Moore's law... which equates to a doubling of transistors in a processor about every two years). Your current cell phone has more processing power than your first computer, and then some. The vocoders, a key part of cell phones, were the size of refrigerators back in the mid 70s.
The software requirements are pretty intense... but given enough time, and memory, and lots of recursive testing, that too can be overcome.
The sensors have vastly improved in recent years with mm wave Radar and Lidar providing the "sight" a "driver" needs to discern the difference between objects.
It is all still rather large and cumbersome right now, but then so were cell phones in the early 90's. And remember when no one had a home computer?
I think the ubiquitous flying car is still a long way off; self driving cars are within my lifetime. (I am in my 50's) Good timing too... I probably won't have to depend on someone to drive me around, in my crusty old age.
The system can't only depend on such active transponder devices since the car would need to react to a variety of road obstacles - fallen trees or branches, rock slides, deer and other animals, children, etc. that would not be transponder-equipped. But there are very good radar and sonar devices that can provide the data for detecting hazards in the car's path - including cyclists.
Your right of course, I wonder if the whole discussion is moot anyway.
I heard a prediction recently of $100/barrel oil by the end of 2010 and $200/barrel oil as early as 2012, if $100.barrel oil translates into a $4/Gallon price, then $200/barrel oil would mean $8/Gallon, as a minimum, knowing the way oil companies work, a doubling of the price of oil, would probably mean closer to $10/Gallon. How many people could afford to drive with $10/Gallon gasoline?
Don't think the electric car will help the situation, what happens if you convert 500,000,000 cars to electric power, without a massive increase in generating capacity, the price of electric power gains altitude faster then a Saturn V. Even without considering fuel type and cost, it takes a decade often two, to go from decision to add a plant to getting power output from that plant. If you want production cars to be electric powered by 2019, you should have begun designing the power plants in 1999..... None of that helps if gas is $10/Gallon in 2012!
Hydrogen for all the hype is really not going to help, it's an energy store, not an energy producer, and it costs more energy to produce then you actually get.
Yeah I hear ya, but thus far we have not found a fuel efficient way to fly...
If you look at the fuel efficiency of dirigibles, used to transport large loads, especially when they take advantage of things like the jet stream, I would contend that one of the most fuel efficient methods of transport is flying...
If you look at the fuel efficiency of dirigibles, used to transport large loads, especially when they take advantage of things like the jet stream, I would contend that one of the most fuel efficient methods of transport is flying...
But we are straying way off topic here.
You are right of course, but can you imagine the sky filled with those things?
I heard a prediction recently of $100/barrel oil by the end of 2010 and $200/barrel oil as early as 2012, if $100.barrel oil translates into a $4/Gallon price, then $200/barrel oil would mean $8/Gallon, as a minimum, knowing the way oil companies work, a doubling of the price of oil, would probably mean closer to $10/Gallon. How many people could afford to drive with $10/Gallon gasoline?
.......
Whoopee dooo. Back in 1974 I heard forecasts of $200 a barrel oil by 1990, and gas prices at $5 a gallon by 1985, and massive famines and die offs throughout the third world by 1985, and.....and....
Fortunately, other people know the way oil companies work, we found new sources througout the world, and the rest, as they say, is history. The under the radar story in recent years has been the huge increase in natural gas sources and production.
Whoopee dooo. Back in 1974 I heard forecasts of $200 a barrel oil by 1990, and gas prices at $5 a gallon by 1985, and massive famines and die offs throughout the third world by 1985, and.....and....
Fortunately, other people know the way oil companies work, we found new sources througout the world, and the rest, as they say, is history. The under the radar story in recent years has been the huge increase in natural gas sources and production.
roughstuff
In 1974 that prediction was 16 years out, and we had never seen $100/barrel oil prices. Only 2 years ago, we saw $140/barrel oil, the reasons for that haven't really changed. You could count the number of personal motor vehicles in China and India on one hand with 2 fingers missing. Now we have cheap cars in India and China which means the demand for oil, is growing considerably in those countries, and remember they, combined have 40% of the planets population. One other thing to remember, China has an army that is bigger then the entire population of the United States, if China wants to, they could walk that army into the Middle East, and say this belongs to us now. America couldn't manufacture enough arms to fight an army like that.
I think the chances of $200/barrel oil and $10/Gallon gas, is a very real possibility, unless you can find a very very large supply within the next six months or so.
In 1974 that prediction was 16 years out, and we had never seen $100/barrel oil prices. Only 2 years ago, we saw $140/barrel oil, the reasons for that haven't really changed. You could count the number of personal motor vehicles in China and India on one hand with 2 fingers missing. Now we have cheap cars in India and China which means the demand for oil, is growing considerably in those countries, and remember they, combined have 40% of the planets population. One other thing to remember, China has an army that is bigger then the entire population of the United States, if China wants to, they could walk that army into the Middle East, and say this belongs to us now. America couldn't manufacture enough arms to fight an army like that.
I think the chances of $200/barrel oil and $10/Gallon gas, is a very real possibility, unless you can find a very very large supply within the next six months or so.
Or, in so many words, this time its different. Perhaps, though thats been said many times. History is littered with 'running out of oil' scenarios. People look at demand trends and draw straight lines to infinity; never considering the role of conservation and substitutes. Lets hope bicycles are one of thos substitutes. Maybe china should have a 'cash for clunkers' program...turn in your old clunky Chairman Mao bicycle, and get a $500 cash payment to buy a Fuji touring bike.
I am not worried about China...most of their supposed 'growth' is a mirage, anyway. Its all along the coastal cities where the expatriates and news media live; not in the middle of the country where the 'Chinese' people live. The folks telling ya China is gonna take over the world in the 2000-teens are the same ones who told ya Japan was gonna take over the world back in the 1980s. As for their vaunted army, show me a successful Chinese invasion recently? They do have a marked affinity for those Tibetan monks....maybe, like Algore, they like guys in Saffron robes. Got their butts kicked by the Vietnamese a few years back, if I recall, though.
Or, in so many words, this time its different. Perhaps, though thats been said many times. History is littered with 'running out of oil' scenarios. People look at demand trends and draw straight lines to infinity; never considering the role of conservation and substitutes. Lets hope bicycles are one of thos substitutes. Maybe china should have a 'cash for clunkers' program...turn in your old clunky Chairman Mao bicycle, and get a $500 cash payment to buy a Fuji touring bike.
I am not worried about China...most of their supposed 'growth' is a mirage, anyway. Its all along the coastal cities where the expatriates and news media live; not in the middle of the country where the 'Chinese' people live. The folks telling ya China is gonna take over the world in the 2000-teens are the same ones who told ya Japan was gonna take over the world back in the 1980s. As for their vaunted army, show me a successful Chinese invasion recently? They do have a marked affinity for those Tibetan monks....maybe, like Algore, they like guys in Saffron robes. Got their butts kicked by the Vietnamese a few years back, if I recall, though.
roughstuff
Well, basic physics, if you have a limited supply of a resource, and you continually increase demand, without an increase in supply, to keep supply and demand in balance, then you run into a problem. Oil is far from running out, cheap and easy to get oil, the stuff that we are using today is running into short supply.
Add in a huge new demand, China has 1.3 Billion people, India 1.2 Billion, even a small percentage of new drivers with those kinds of populations, is a huge demand.... Now when the supply is stagnant, what happens to supply and demand, well, it means pressure on prices to attenuate demand.
As for China taking over the world, they already have, it's getting hard to buy a manufactured good in North America where it wasn't made in China.
Hi. One thing that had not been mentioned is driverless cars (self-driving cars) are great for visual impairment, however, I don't know of any cyclists that are visually impaired who ride a two-wheel bike.
Wouldn't self-driving cars minimize the chance of having a driver's license and car insurance as long as people don't drive by themselves?
Hi. One thing that had not been mentioned is driverless cars (self-driving cars) are great for visual impairment, however, I don't know of any cyclists that are visually impaired who ride a two-wheel bike.
I understand both points but I'm not sure how they're related or what you're inferring.
Wouldn't self-driving cars minimize the chance of having a driver's license and car insurance as long as people don't drive by themselves?
Well, the driverless car does the driving for the visually impaired, minimizing the risks of hitting a two-wheel bicycle who may be visually impaired or not.
I forgot to take off this part as I didn't know why I think about putting this in:
"...however, I don't know of any cyclists that are visually impaired who ride a two-wheel bike."
So you're right. I forgot to leave that part off as the sentence with two parts of the sentence does not seem to be related. It all comes down to when I think about visual impairment and transportation.
I've heard of blind stokers in tandem rides. As for the blind being "driven" , I can imagine the 'system' would require capable driver to be the 'backup' [for quite sometime to come. Depending on the tech used the self drive option maybe a feature of a smart road AND car interacting.
Grayson, You've obviously not heard of Bobby McMullen; mountain biker, occasionally races, did the last Kamikaze a couple years ago. He describes his vision as 'seeing thru a paper towel roller with vaseline smeared over the opening' -- and that, as with you, is out of one eye. He does this by using a 'seeing-eye rider', whom he can hear turning and such, and who also calls out cues to him. The trick about it is, he wasn't the last one down the mountain.
Granted, he doesn't commute by bike, as I'm sure you're referring to, but he RIDES, and does so with passionate assertion.
So there you go -- you have a 'doppel'.
WE ARE TRAFFIC, not pedestrians on wheels.
cut his balls off. plow salt into his land. then skin him and roll him in Cheese Whiz.
Hi. One thing that had not been mentioned is driverless cars (self-driving cars) are great for visual impairment, however, I don't know of any cyclists that are visually impaired who ride a two-wheel bike.
Depends on the degree of the impairment. I do know people who are unable to pass the vision test to qualify for a driver's license who use their bicycles as their primary means of transportation and have no problems doing so.
Well, I can see clearly with my right eye (except for reading small print in paper but I used to read at 9 point size in a 17" monitor up close), so I don't have glaucoma or anything like that. Besides, when it comes to transportation, I'm a "get-in-a-car" kind of person, in which a driverless car would be an idea for me, but in the meantime, once I know how to ride a bike (like learn how to balance a bicycle), the bicycle will be the primary means of transportation for me.
Well, mine's kind of personal but I better get back in topic.
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Originally Posted by genec
