Early Saturday morning I’m making a 500 mile drive. That’s about 8 hours in the car. I enjoy road trips, but I don’t enjoy driving. I wish I could do stuff while sitting in the car. For example, I’d love to be editing Flynn’s Log 4.
Self driving cars seem a little scary to some, as if computers will be worse drivers than people. Others don’t want to give up control of driving. I’m on the other side, I think we would be so much safer is computers drove our cars. We could do whatever we want in the car and not have to try to multi-task as drivers.
Imagine your future, you’ll walk out your front door, a car will know your schedule and will pull up to your front step. You’ll climb in and the car will find the fastest route to get you to your destination. You’ll be able to keep doing whatever you are doing. Talking on your phone, texting, playing a game, reading, whatever. When you arrive at your destination, you get out of the car and it drives away, to park or to give someone else a ride.
The car will communicate with other cars. If it needs to change lanes, it’ll change lanes and the other cars will let it in. There will be no more stop and go traffic because cars will communicate with each other, moving into the appropriate lane at the appropriate time. Commuting will be much more efficient.
Have you ever waited at a red light for no reason? It happens all of the time, especially later in the day. I’ll be sitting there waiting for the light to change and no one will be coming from any direction. That’s the kind of thing self driving cars could do away with.
In your future this will happen. Cars will ping ahead, looking for other cars, people, anything that is or might get in its way. The car will make intelligent and safe decisions. There won’t be a need for traffic signals, cars will slow or speed up based on mathematical equations and timing. You know that cars are most inefficient when accelerating; well, when cars are not stopping at every light they will also be much more efficient.
Even in an emergency, computers will be safer. If someone steps in front of a moving car, the car will take immediate action, braking and swerving. The best part is that the brake and swerve will be communicated to the surrounding cars, which can react appropriately, preventing crashes.
The future is bright, and it’s your future. You are going to imagine the most awesome things!
-Stone Marshall