By Nicasia Thelen
In 2020, at least 10 million self-driving cars will already be on the road. It was once just a futuristic idea but now there are already self driving cars being tested on roads.
Self driving cars are designed to navigate safely through cities and neighborhoods. They have sensors to detect objects as far as two football fields away in all directions, including cyclists, pedestrians, vehicles or even miscellaneous objects in the streets. Having self drving cars could make the roads safer for all drivers.
“I am excited to see the self driving cars on the road because I think it will be a good change to the road and it will hopefull make the road much safer to drive on and cause less accidents, “ said sophmore Sarah Johnson
According to the Google Self-Driving Car Project. The Google cars have self-driven more than two million miles and are currently on the streets of four states in the U.S. including Metro Phoenix, AZ. The testing cars include both a modified Lexus SUV, and a new prototype vehicle that is built from the ground up to be fully self-driving.
Cities across the country are already planning for the future. Some cities are creating roadmaps for its autonomous future. This means that cities are able to plan for fewer cars on the roads, and also planning for more self driving cars on the roads.
There is a debate about whether or not the self-driving car should have a steering wheel to allow control to pass from human to computers. This allows drivers to switch from autonomous to semi-autonomous mode. Some advocates say they want to get rid of the steering wheel and have the computer to take over, 100 percent of the time.
“I think that they should just have the software
take over because then they can completely eliminate
things like drunk driving and drowsy driving,” said Johnson.
There have been many question as to how much a self driving car will actually cost. However autonomous cars will add between $7,000 and $10,000 to a car’s sticker price in 2025, that figure will drop about $5,000 in 2030, according to fortune.com.
According to the Google Self-Driving Car Project. Automated cars could save up to 300,000 lives per decade in the U.S. Many people like the idea of self driving cars because they know how much safer the roads are going to be.
“I think having self driving cars on the road will make streets and cities safer because people will not be able to drive as crazy,” said Sophomore Ashley Kallhoff.
They could also free up as much as 50 minutes a day for users, who would be able to spend traveling time working, relaxing, or finding a source of entertainment.
“I like the fact that self driving cars can free up more time because I know I don’t want to spend all of my time driving,” said Johnson.
Self driving cars are not entirely foolproof. According to Fortune.comGoogle confirmed that one of its self driving cars sustained great damage in a traffic accident involving a commercial van on Sept. 23. The collision happened in Mountain View, California when the driver of the van ran a red light and hit the passenger side of the Google’s Lexus. The car was operating in its autonomous mode at the time of the crash, and the human in the vehicle did try and step on the brake when he spotted the oncoming van. No one sustained any injuries during this crash
Self driving cars were once just a futuristic idea, now they are already on roads in cities all over America. Self driving cars have a long ways to go to ensure the safety of everyone.