Speaker 1: A self driving shuttle bus in Las Vegas operated for
Speaker 1: almost two whole hours before being involved in a minor accident.
Speaker 1: Are self driving vehicles really the safest option? Yes, they are.
Speaker 1: I'm Jonathan Strickland and this is text Updaily. Let's cover
Speaker 1: the news first. A French company called Navia developed an
Speaker 1: autonomous electric vehicle designed to travel along predetermined routes. The
Speaker 1: city of Las Vegas had such a shuttle to carry
Speaker 1: passengers around the Fremont East district. The shuttle itself has
Speaker 1: a very modest route at just over a half mile.
Speaker 1: It's really just a convenience vehicle. In early November, after
Speaker 1: being an operation for about two hours, one such shuttle
Speaker 1: collided with a truck, or rather, it's more appropriate to
Speaker 1: say a human operated truck backed into the shuttle. According
Speaker 1: to a Triple A representative, the accident was due to
Speaker 1: human error, not the shuttle. Triple A, by the way,
Speaker 1: is a sponsor of this driverless shuttle pilot program. A
Speaker 1: representative of the city of Las Vegas gave a bit
Speaker 1: more information on the official Tumblr page for the Las
Speaker 1: Vegas City government. It read the shuttle did what it
Speaker 1: was supposed to do and that its sensors registered the truck,
Speaker 1: and the shuttle stopped to avoid the accident. Unfortunately, the
Speaker 1: delivery truck did not stop and graze the front fender
Speaker 1: of the shuttle. While the headlines may make it sound
Speaker 1: like driverless vehicles are unreliable and unsafe, a closer look
Speaker 1: at stories shows that that's not really the case. Google's
Speaker 1: self driving vehicles have been in operation for a few years,
Speaker 1: running tests quietly in northern California, and while the cars
Speaker 1: have been involved in several incidents, nearly all of those
Speaker 1: were due to human error. In some cases, the Google
Speaker 1: vehicle was in manual operation mode at the time, meaning
Speaker 1: a human driver was at the controls and made a
Speaker 1: mistake resulting in an accident. In other cases, drivers of
Speaker 1: other vehicles failed to follow the rules of the road
Speaker 1: and caused an accident. In fact, before a Google spun
Speaker 1: out its self driving car division into a new company
Speaker 1: called Waymo, the list of incidents only contained one case
Speaker 1: in which the company determined the self driving system was
Speaker 1: at fault. In that incident, a Google car was navigating
Speaker 1: a street in Mountain View, California, and approaching an intersection.
Speaker 1: The car sinced an obstacle in the road. It was
Speaker 1: a pile of sandbags around a storm drain. The car
Speaker 1: moved slightly out of its own lane to pass the obstacle,
Speaker 1: then attempted to get back into the lane it was
Speaker 1: supposed to be in. The only problem was that a
Speaker 1: bus was approaching from behind and started to fill that space.
Speaker 1: The self driving cars AI assumed the bus driver would
Speaker 1: slow or yield to the self driving vehicle, and it
Speaker 1: began to merge back into its lane. Then the self
Speaker 1: driving car learned the valuable lesson that two objects cannot
Speaker 1: coexist in the same physical space at the same time.
Speaker 1: There was a low speed collision. Google admitted the car
Speaker 1: was at fault for making a baseless assumption that the
Speaker 1: human driver would yield, And yes, the apology did sound
Speaker 1: a bit like Google was throwing a little shade at
Speaker 1: the bus driver, but only a little. If you look
Speaker 1: at statistics, self driving cars are extremely safe, particularly if
Speaker 1: you're looking only for the times they are at fault
Speaker 1: in an accident. Google's cars have driven more than two
Speaker 1: million miles on streets in the United States with only
Speaker 1: one at fault accident. That's significantly lower than for human drivers.
Speaker 1: New drivers are forty times more likely to get into
Speaker 1: an accident than a self driving vehicle is. However, self
Speaker 1: driving cars do tend to get into accidents caused by
Speaker 1: human drivers at a rate higher than you'd see in
Speaker 1: an experienced human driver. Self driving cars might be a
Speaker 1: bit too polite and safe, avoiding aggressive tactics that can
Speaker 1: sometimes prevent an accident. Maybe self driving cars place more
Speaker 1: faith in humans to do the right thing when they
Speaker 1: drive foolish robots that will be their downfall to be
Speaker 1: serious for a moment. Self driving cars have the potential
Speaker 1: to make an enormous positive impact. For the year sixteen
Speaker 1: in the United States, the National Safety Council estimated that
Speaker 1: forty thousand people died in motor vehicle crashes. From a
Speaker 1: statistical standpoint, self driving cars have the potential to prevent
Speaker 1: thousands of deaths every year. On a lesser note, they
Speaker 1: could also reduce property damage incidents and reduce strain placed
Speaker 1: on emergency rooms and first responders. They could also help
Speaker 1: alleviate traffic snarls and reduce commute times in dense cities.
Speaker 1: While several companies, including Waymo, are aggressive in getting self
Speaker 1: driving cars out on the streets and more real world scenarios,
Speaker 1: we also have to face some facts. The National Highway
Speaker 1: Traffic Safety Administration recognizes six levels of autonomy, from zero
Speaker 1: to five. At zero, you have a car that is
Speaker 1: completely human operated. Levels one and two cover driver assist systems,
Speaker 1: in which an automated feature might kick into gear when needed,
Speaker 1: but the car is still largely under the control role
Speaker 1: of a human driver. A Level three system is largely
Speaker 1: automated but can allow for a human to take control
Speaker 1: in a safety critical situation. This one is tricky because
Speaker 1: handing off the control of a vehicle isn't easy to
Speaker 1: do in a seamless way. It's sort of like having
Speaker 1: a passenger reach over and grab the steering wheel to
Speaker 1: yanket to the side in order to avoid a crash.
Speaker 1: The passenger and driver might find themselves struggling against each
Speaker 1: other for a moment. Level four is a fully autonomous
Speaker 1: vehicle that can operate in an operational design domain or
Speaker 1: o d D. That means the vehicle has restrictions on
Speaker 1: where it goes and under what conditions it operates. This
Speaker 1: is the level the shuttle bus I mentioned at the
Speaker 1: top of the show is supposed to inhabit. The vehicle
Speaker 1: should be capable of handling all situations that fall inside
Speaker 1: that O d D. You could argue the shuttle failed
Speaker 1: to do this and that it didn't find some means
Speaker 1: of preventing the fender bender, though without all the details
Speaker 1: that's hard to say. Level five is a fully autonomous
Speaker 1: system that can work under any dry driving scenario. That
Speaker 1: would be a car that could adapt to conditions the
Speaker 1: way human drivers can, no matter whether traffic or road conditions.
Speaker 1: Most experts in the fields say we are still a
Speaker 1: far away away from this, as teaching machines how to
Speaker 1: recognize a threat versus something that is ultimately harmless is tricky.
Speaker 1: Humans can extrapolate based upon experience. Machines have trouble with that.
Speaker 1: All that being said, I'd still hop into a self
Speaker 1: driving shuttle without hesitation, assuming I was confident in the
Speaker 1: abilities of the company that made the sensors and software. I,
Speaker 1: for one, welcome our robot chauffeur Overlords. To learn more
Speaker 1: about autonomous vehicles and all other things tech related, subscribe
Speaker 1: to the tech Stuff podcast It's robot Approved. See you
Speaker 1: again soon.