[nfbwatlk] Driving article Take 2

Wed Jun 2 18:08:25 UTC 2010

I'm sorry the link didn't work. I copied and pasted the entire article in
this email post (below this link which I just tested and it works. But who
knows what happens after I hit send).  
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/31/AR2010053101
915.html?wpisrc=nl_headline

With advanced sensors, cars become increasingly capable of driving
themselves
By Nic Fleming
New Scientist 
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
With his jeans, white trainers and stripy top, Bob is every inch the
well-dressed 6-year-old. He's standing in the middle of a hotel parking lot
and, scarily, I'm driving straight at him. Instead of hitting the brakes, I
put my foot down on the accelerator. With only about 10 yards to go, a row
of red lights flashes across my windshield, and there's an urgent,
high-pitched beeping sound. An instant later, I am jerked forward as the
brakes slam on automatically and the car screeches to a halt just short of
Bob's stomach. 
This is what Bob is for. The child-size dummy has just helped me test the
first in-car system that can sense an imminent collision with pedestrians
and brake automatically if the driver doesn't. It is being tested by Volvo
Car Corp. in its new S60 model. 

The system is the latest in a line of developments made possible by
sophisticated sensors based on cameras, radar and lasers. These sensors
already provide drivers with adaptive cruise control, which alters a car's
speed to maintain a safe distance from the vehicle in front, as well as
technology such as semi-autonomous parking systems. 
Yet according to Jonas Ekmark, a researcher at Volvo headquarters near
Gothenburg, Sweden, this is just the start. He says we are entering an era
in which vehicles will also gather real-time information about the weather
and highway hazards, using this to improve fuel efficiency and make life
less stressful for the driver and safer for all road users. "Our long-term
goal is the collision-free traffic system," says Ekmark. 
Ultimately, that means bypassing the fallible humans behind the wheel -- by
building cars that drive themselves. Alan Taub, vice president for research
and development at General Motors, expects to see semi-autonomous vehicles
on the road by 2015. They will need a driver to handle busy city streets and
negotiate complex intersections, but once on the highway they will be able
to steer, accelerate and avoid collisions unaided. A few years later, he
predicts, drivers will be able to take their hands off the wheel completely:
"I see the potential for launching fully autonomous vehicles by 2020." 
Japan leads the way

Traffic accidents kill about 37,000 people a year in the United States, with
driver error a contributing factor in more than 90 percent of them. But a
glimpse of a safer future has come from a trial, completed in Sweden in
2008, of the Slippery Road Information System (SRIS). The system used
sensors and computers installed in 100 cars to gather information on the use
of brakes, fog lights, windshield wipers and electronic stability systems,
as well as weather conditions. Unlike the Volvo system, in which each car
uses only information from its own sensors, the cars in the SRIS trial
beamed the data they gathered to a central database every five minutes. 
A more sophisticated system involving shared data is being deployed in Japan
this year. The country has become a world leader in the field with the
government's decision to fund a network of infrared, microwave and radio
transmitters at the roadside. About 2 million vehicles on Japanese roads can
already pick up news on congestion, roadwork, accidents, weather, speed
limits and parking availability from these transmitters, broadcasting as
part of the Vehicle Information and Communication System (VICS). 
Over the next few months, cameras and sensors positioned around 20 major
intersections in Tokyo and Kanagawa prefecture will begin alerting drivers
of cars with VICS receivers to potential hazards such as vehicles attempting
to merge into their lane or traffic crossing an upcoming intersection. The
new setup can also show alerts warning of traffic lights, stop signs and
even pedestrians and cyclists. It will be in use at major intersections
nationwide by the middle of 2011. 
By that time, a similar system designed to operate on major Japanese
highways should also be in place to warn when the driver gets too close to
the vehicle in front, when vehicles are converging from the side and when
there is congestion ahead. 
In Europe and the United States, meanwhile, vehicle manufacturers see direct
vehicle-to-vehicle communication as a simpler and cheaper solution. They
envisage using Wi-Fi links between vehicles to form ad hoc networks that
will share information on road conditions, weather and traffic accidents. 
The most ambitious of these projects, a collaboration between seven European
manufacturers and universities, would also allow up to eight cars a little
more than a yard apart driving in convoy, controlled by a lead vehicle
operated by a professional driver. 
Ordinary drivers would book a place in convoys and hand over control of
their car to software on the lead vehicle. Steering, acceleration and
braking would be controlled by an on-board computer that uses data sent
wirelessly from the lead vehicle, along with information from cameras and
radar and laser detectors on the front and rear of the car itself. 
Drivers will be able to work, read, watch films or even sleep while their
cars are driven for them. "It will be like sitting on a bus or a train,"
says Ekmark. When the convoy nears an exit at which drivers wish to leave,
they can resume control and continue their journey. A test of the convoy
system is planned for later this year on test tracks; if successful, a
full-fledged demonstration is planned on public roads in Spain in 2011. 
Let the Boss drive

What fully autonomous vehicles might be like is hinted at by an experimental
car built by a GM-backed team of engineering students at Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh. Their "Boss" car earned a $2 million prize in 2007
by outperforming 10 other autonomous vehicles in a simulated urban
environment. To win, it had to execute complex maneuvers such as merging
into flowing traffic, passing, parking and negotiating intersections, while
interacting with other autonomous vehicles and 30 human-driven ones. 
Boss's computer builds a model of the immediate environment by processing
data from radar, laser sensors, cameras and GPS devices. It then uses this
model, along with information such as local traffic rules, to plan the best
route and provide the situational awareness the vehicle needs to change
lanes safely or to determine whether it has right of way at an intersection.
Right now, however, operating Boss requires the equivalent of 10 desktop
computers, and miniaturizing the electronics so that they can be hidden away
in a normal-size car remains a challenge. 
Taub predicts that by about 2020, vehicles like Boss will start to appear on
public roads; drivers will be able to disengage totally and hand control
over to the car. The question at that point will be whether we will have the
nerve to take our hands off the wheel and let the machines take over. 
Fleming is a science and technology writer based in London. This article is
adapted from one that appeared in the New Scientist
(http://www.newscientist.com).

Joanne Laurent 
Certified Orientation and Mobility Specialist
If you can't learn it, I'm not teaching it right!
www.blindcoach.com

Highest Expectations Travel and Adaptive Skills Instruction for the Blind
P.O. Box 586 Ariel, WA 98603
(360) 231-4597 

-----Original Message-----
From: nfbwatlk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfbwatlk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of Joanne Laurent
Sent: June 01, 2010 9:43 PM
To: 'NFB of Washington Talk Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [nfbwatlk] Driving

The link below is a Washington Post article dated June 1, 2010 titled: With
advanced sensors, cars become increasingly capable of driving themselves

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/31/AR2010053101
915.html?wpisrc=nl_headline

Joanne Laurent 
Certified Orientation and Mobility Specialist
If you can't learn it, I'm not teaching it right!
www.blindcoach.com

Highest Expectations Travel and Adaptive Skills Instruction for the Blind
P.O. Box 586 Ariel, WA 98603
(360) 231-4597 

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