Why Move Toward Autonomous Vehicles?

• Author: Nathan Baker
• Pages: 143-152

143

chapter 6

WHY MOVE TOWARD AUTONOMOUS

VEHICLES?

A. SAFETY

Initially, automated vehicles will suf‌fer from growing pains as vehicles are

programmed and we learn how to use them. As well, they will suf‌fer from

an unexpected predicament. These vehicles follow the rules of the road—

strictly. As a result of not bending or breaking the law, they react in ways

that human drivers do not always expect.1 For example, a person may try

to merge illegally. A human driver may let the illegal merger occur and

utter a curse under their breath. The automated vehicle may not expect

or understand the merger and may maintain its lane. The fault lies with

the illegally merging driver but nonetheless ends in a crash. For now, the

inability of automation to appreciate the inventive stupidity of human

decision making is a limiting factor.

Driver error is responsible for the vast majority of vehicle crashes. Some

studies suggest that up to 94 percent of crashes are as a result of driver, and

1 See Brandon Schoettle & Michael Sivak, “A Preliminary Analysis of Real-World

Crashes Involving Self-Driving Vehicles,” UMTRI-2015-34 (October 2015), online (pd):

University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute www.umich.edu/~umtriswt/

PDF/UMTRI-2015-34.pdf.