The Drive Less Car

    Have you heard of a drive less car?  What was once a secret project has now been revealed to the public. Google has been developing new technology for autonomous cars. Google's robotic cars start as standard vehicles but each packs about $150,000 in equipment, including a $70,000 radar like Lidar system, with a laser on the roof and enough cameras and high-tech gadgets inside. Google's fleet of robotic Toyota Priuses has now logged more than 190,000 miles (about 300,000 kilometers), driving in city traffic, busy highways, and mountainous roads with only occasional human intervention. Two things seem particularly interesting about Google's approach. First, it relies on very detailed maps of the roads and terrain, something that Urmson said is essential to determine accurately where the car is. The project team has equipped a test group of at least ten cars, consisting of six Toyota Prius, an Audi TT, and three Lexus RX450h ,each accompanied in the driver's seat by one of a dozen drivers with perfect driving records and in the passenger seat by one of Google's engineers. Driver less cars could prevent "up to 30,000 fatalities a year, or 80 per day," said Larry Burns, a professor of engineering at the University of Michigan and a Google consultant. Human drivers would be expected to take control if the computer fails. The promise is that, eventually, there would be no need for a human fallback. The project began in 2009 and is still far from working successfully, but hopefully will be available to the public within the next six years. How do you feel about driving a drive less car?