Comments on: A 3,000-vehicle test of wireless crash-avoidance system

By: Gorden Russell

Gorden Russell — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 18:24:50 +0000

Right, Edwin. I’m pushing 60 years-of-age now and just don’t want to go on another 18-hour road-trip. I don’t even want to try it until this system is available.

By: SaltyCoins

SaltyCoins — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 16:54:24 +0000

You are focusing on being lazy. But think about how many lives could be saved! All those people who drive drunk or were texting or were not paying attention. Hundreds of thousands per year.
Who cares if there may one day be a switch to turn on auto drive. Seriously boomers grow up.

By: Kiwini

Kiwini — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 16:46:06 +0000

“Drivers are alerted to a potential crash situation —such as a nearby vehicle unexpectedly braking, a sudden lane change, merging traffic, etc. — by a visual or audible warning inside their vehicles.”

-so they can put their call on hold, or what?.

WTF???… isn’t that a task that the driver is SUPPOSED to be doing?.

Hang up the electronic distractors, and DRIVE!

By: Bruce Wright

Bruce Wright — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 16:29:04 +0000

This technology doesn’t appear to be anywhere near “driverless” cars, but might be one of a number of steps in that general direction.

The thing that concerns me the most about the study is that with only 3000 cars and a handful of static point stations, are they going to get enough interactions to make this a worthwhile experiment? From the descriptions, it doesn’t sound like the vehicles are sensing objects around them, they’re just communicating with other similarly-equipped cars and with static point stations at intersections and the like, and I’d expect 3000 cars would be a rather small fraction of all the cars in the city – so most potential crashes will probably not be between cars equipped with this device. Are the static point stations better-equipped, so that they can sense what cars are passing or approaching them? That’s the only way I can think of that might make this a bit more realistic, but there apparently aren’t a whole lot of them.

By: Edwin

Edwin — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 16:06:08 +0000

I’d love it if my car was like sitting in my living room (except moving). Think of how much more productive it could be, how much more time to work, or be with family there could be if you didn’t have to concentrate on driving. Driverless cars could completely revolutionize the way we think about travel, never mind how it would change the form of the car itself.

By: charlie

charlie — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 15:44:09 +0000

sounds like there could be a lot of privacy concerns here. what is there to prevent governments from using this to track individuals, determine their driving habits, monitor where they go, determine if they are speeding?

By: Bri

Bri — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 11:27:21 +0000

Yea!!!! I’ve driven well over one million miles. I love to drive for many reasons. I can’t stand how other people think of it. Like they are sitting on thier living room coach!!!!!