Volvo’s first self-driving cars now being tested live on public roads in Sweden

[augustl]

I own a 2013 XC60 and as a programmer, I'm amazed at how well their current automation works in practice. The car reads road signs to show me the current speed limit in the dash (actual OCR, not a GPS database). It works amazingly well, except when it's very dark in the winter. Adaptive cruise control flawlessly follows cars based on radar, even in somewhat dramatic full stops, e.g. when there's suddenly heavy traffic ahead. I always have my foot on the break pedal just in case, but I'm yet to have to intervene.

[malandrew]

My gut feeling tells me that there should be a mandate that requires all safety software to be open-source and liberally licensed. Safety should be very much part of the commons and we all lose out when this type of software isn't shared freely.

Building high quality safety software and sharing it with all car manufacturers wins way more brownie points in my book than using it as a selling point.

[thematt]

Why would it bother OCR'ing road signs? That seems much more error prone and needlessly complex. That data is readily available from a data sources based on your GPS location, I know TomToms and other navigation devices have it.

[tuxguy]

1. just curious, this is is sweeden, right ? 2. city driving/ highway ?

[jareds]

I wonder what the first country that will allow completely automated cars with no human driver is? As a blind person I wonder if that would be enough to have me consider migrating from the U.S. depending on the country.

[danielweber]

You should seriously consider approaching car companies. There will be some (understandable) public resistance to automatic cars, but you could make an excellent poster boy for their benefits.

[simonebrunozzi]

I've been talking about this for years with friends. I bet on Singapore. (I lived there 2.5 years and know the place a bit).

[ollebro]

It wouldn't surprise me if it was Sweden. Most cars you see on the road are Volvos and most new sold cars are Volvos.

[bluthru]

Has anything been said about an open protocol for inter-car communication? What about sharing point cloud data?

I have a bad feeling that Google is going to keep everything sealed in Google Maps. The industry would benefit from sharing all of their data with OpenStreetMap.

[icebraining]

Has anything been said about an open protocol for inter-car communication?

Yes: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/03/us-autos-technolog...

But I don't think it's for mapping, just safety.

[songgao]

A lot of companies are working on WAVE/DSRC. Here's a demo from Volvo: http://youtu.be/tasa3D1vVTc

And yes the safety applications like emergency brake, intersection collision warning, or curve speed warning etc., have high priority but other Applications like mapping are also possible. I think current mapping applications use road side infrastructures (also through DSRC) but I guess you could share traffic information (Waze?) using inter-vehicle communication.

Here's an technical paper if anybody is interested: http://secs.oakland.edu/~gpcorser/vanet-kenny-DSRC.pdf

[toomuchtodo]

> The industry would benefit from sharing all of their data with OpenStreetMap.

What is the barrier to entry for an open platform for people to submit this same data to OpenStreetMap. Precise Positioning + GoPros + data processing on the backend.

[ommunist]

This will probably not work in Britain. Especially at one particular roundabout on the Isle of Dogs. http://goo.gl/8AqnLE <~ See for yourself.

[squidsoup]

Can't help but think some of the traffic engineers in the UK are a little bonkers, see Swindon's Magic Roundabout (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Roundabout_(Swindon)).

[zizee]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_Light_tree (sculpture).

[amckenna]

Watching the video it struck me that the lights embedded in the barriers between lanes are a really good idea. It provides illumination of the road and the barrier without large poles lining the road which block the view and are expensive.

[mkempe]

In Sweden the national traffic authority is responsible for steadily improving the road conditions and environment in order to make road traffic safer (for everyone). What you noticed is one example of their many improvements.

[chiph]

No rotating laser dome on the roof?

[nabla9]

LIDAR does not work in rain, on wet roads or in the snow.

Google car drives only in good weather in California for a reason. In Sweden they could drive maybe a week in a year.

    ... Sommaren är kort   
    de mesta regnar bort ..

[andrelaszlo]

I spotted one of them close to where I work:

https://plus.google.com/105073266122249925354/posts/a7XDM2xg...

There's SOME kind of thingy on the roof. Not sure what it is though. Any ideas?

Didn't want to go too close though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_83efj9Xdg :)

[jotm]

I can't wait for self driving tech to be put into use - transportation will get cheaper and faster (no more 8-10 hours driving limit bs), not to mention that one or two persons could drive a dozen trucks filled with cargo (though a lot of truckers will hate that)...

[objclxt]

> transportation will get cheaper and faster (no more 8-10 hours driving limit bs)

Why do you say that? Somebody is still going to need to be awake at the controls, at least for the first few decades of self driving tech. There's a reason pilots on planes don't go to sleep when the auto-pilot kicks on.

[ableal]

> not to mention that one or two persons could drive a dozen trucks filled with cargo

Maybe autonomous vehicles will make smaller trucks cost-effective, and big trucks will then be charged their true cost in road damage and traffic risks.

That would be a much more visible change in the traffic landscape.

[majidarif]

This won't work in our country. Drivers don't follow traffic regulation, the roads can't even be called roads. Everything is just wrong. Even a very advance AI can't handle our roads in Philippines.

[jotm]

Heh, that's true for most countries. But I'm pretty sure the tech can already handle motorways - the cars could self-drive there, then let the driver take over in cities...

[MrClean]

“The test cars are now able to handle lane following, speed adaption, and merging traffic all by themselves,”

This is an important step, although I must say they appear to be far behind Google. My money is on Google getting to an acceptable deployment phase far earlier.

[protomyth]

Given the driving conditions in Sweden and the years of experience Volvo has as a car company, I would bet they will be able to deploy and all weather version before Google.

[sscalia]

Negative. We'll never see a Google self driving car commercially.

It's a science experiment.

[ams6110]

lane following, speed adaption, and merging traffic all by themselves

Well, that's better than most human Volvo drivers can do, by my experience. Whenever I see a car make a bone-headed move in traffic, chances are it's a Volvo.

[nigekelly]

Very interested in this space and how it will end up. We have a big emotional attachment to cars evidenced by the fact that the annual cost of taking taxis everywhere is probably cheaper than the annual costs of owning a car if you live in a city. NYC habitants have probably made this transition already.

SO if we end up with self driving taxis then this form of transport will become ridiculously cheap as the driver's salary is now eliminated. The rationale to own a car will become harder to justify.

Also I read recently that our actual usage of cars is very low over a year. This means huge inefficiency. There is plenty of spare capacity per car to do alot more journeys. If we all start taking self driving taxis that run 24x7 in a few years time where does that leave the car companies. One assumes with far fewer car sales. Are they shooting themselves in the foot?

[peteretep]

    > We have a big emotional attachment to cars evidenced by
    > the fact that the annual cost of taking taxis everywhere 
    > is probably cheaper than the annual costs of owning a
    > car if you live in a city

I don't think that's true of most cities. Definitely not true of London.

[cscx]

How does Subaru EyeSight compare to Volvo's autonomous safety features?

Note: I know EyeSight can't drive the car itself.

[dalek2point3]

anyone has any idea where their location data (i.e map) is coming from?

[andrelaszlo]

I'm guessing Lantmäteriet (National Land Survey - https://www.lantmateriet.se/).

[bra-ket]

did they warn the pedestrians?

[mkempe]

I know you meant this as a joke.. however, Volvo cars do watch for pedestrians and automatically stop for them if needs be. In the worst case, there is an external airbag that will deploy in front of the windshield to avoid the worst types of injuries based on decades of analysis of car accidents with pedestrians (in Sweden).

[hellbreakslose]

"tested live on public roads in Sweden" All I saw was a guy driving that car. Didn't actually get to see the car driving on its own.~ Can't believe it till I see it.

[GnarfGnarf]

Volvo have stopped selling manual transmission ("stick") cars in North America. They have lost me as a customer.

[ape4]

If you dislike automatic transition I guess you'll not like self driving cars.

[McGuffin]

Maybe if you'd bought a lot more Volvos, they still would've had a market for that option.

[jotm]

How is it possibly better than automatic? I've driven a manual Scania, it's a serious pain in the ass - automatic transmissions are a godsend for trucks...