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The other way to look at it is that the traffic laws, taken to the letter, are too conservative in some circumstances, and there are perfectly safe, more effici

The other way to look at it is that the traffic laws, taken to the letter, are too conservative in some circumstances, and there are perfectly safe, more efficient limitations that can be employed (The 100% complete stop for example, frivolous waste of potential energy!) Maybe instead of teaching self-driving cars to break the laws like everyone else does, we should change the laws to reflect more how people drive.

jamesrcole 9y ago
> there are perfectly safe, more efficient limitations that can be employed (The 100% complete stop for example, frivolous waste of potential energy!) Genuine question: what do you think is the better alternative to the 100% complete stop? I'm not saying I think there is or isn't a better alternative, just wanted to know what you had in mind.
- userbinator 9y ago
  what do you think is the better alternative to the 100% complete stop? I think that would be to slow enough that you can stop if you need to, but not actually stop completely --- something which almost everyone already seems to do, because it saves wear and helps with passenger comfort too. (I've been in vehicles where the driver insisted on completely stopping exactly as legally specified, with the accompanying double-jerk of deceleration followed by acceleration. Not pleasant at all.)
  - Piskvorrr 9y ago
    If the stop causes a "jerk", the driver is braking far too aggressively for an expected and routine stop (which implies that they'll have much smaller margin of safety when emergency braking would be called for). This seems to strengthen the point "people are driving like crazy, that's not a good thing".
    - jon_richards 9y ago
      Next time you drive, come to a complete stop and feel the car as it rocks back on its suspension. This will happen even if you brake quite lightly. You can slowly raise the brake so that you are barely braking right as you stop, which will almost completely eliminate the feeling, but it makes your stop excruciatingly slow. Theoretically, you could also eliminate the rock back at a stop sign by lifting your foot off the brake right as the car stops (before it moves backwards that little bit). The vast majority of drivers who think they are stopping completely actually lift their foot off right before that moment, so they don't experience the jerk.
      - Piskvorrr 9y ago
        I understand what you mean. "Rocks back and forth" is IMHO a far gentler sensation than "a jerk".
      - scrumper 9y ago
        > lifting your foot off the brake right as the car stops You can do that even if you're braking very hard, and it doesn't have to make your stop slow. All you want to avoid is that bounce back right at the end, and backing off the pressure a bit just before the full stop will be enough to achieve that and create a very smooth ride. Of course you will always have the deceleration but for passengers that's far less jarring than the bounce that happens when the front suspension unloads when the car has stopped. Fortunately it's easy to practice as stop signs are everywhere.
        Retric 9y ago
        Exactly, it took a while to notice this was even possible. It does take a few more inches to stop. But, now I can't help but notice that some people get a lot more jerk
        Piskvorrr 9y ago
        It's sort of an art, what with variable conditions and whatnot. Surprisingly, automatic trains manage to get it right, being programmed to ease on the brakes just right to avoid a jostle altogether. Fewer variables to keep track of, I suppose.
  - mannykannot 9y ago
    There are already regulations allowing for that, but they are not used everywhere because some people abuse the privilege of being allowed to use their own judgement. If (and only if) everyone practiced good judgement and restraint, the regulations would not need to be so prescriptive (Full disclosure: I don't always practice what I preach.)
- balabaster 9y ago
  In the UK we have very few stop signs. In fact, in my entire life, I only recall ever coming across 2. We usually have a yield action at intersections so that you only even need to slow if the line of sight at the intersection is impeded to the point you cannot see the flow of traffic. Consequently there is no need to come to a full and complete stop unless the flow of traffic prevents your ability to turn where the yield sign actually requires that you come to a stop while you wait to merge into traffic. This functions far better than the ridiculousness that is stop signs that require you to come to a complete stop even if you are the only car on the road.
  - throwaway2016a 9y ago
    That sounds glorious. Nothing is more frustrating than coming to an intersection with full line of sight for miles in both directions, where you know there is no car that is close enough to hit you, and having to come to a full stop anyway.[1] In my part of the US we have a lot of rotaries (round abouts). Thousands of cars go through them every day, no stopping and no accidents... it can be done. [1] This is of course hyperbole. There are much more frustrating things. Edit: In fact I thought of something better. Waiting 10 minutes at a red light when there is no one else on the road.
    - dfox 9y ago
      In europe most of intersections that would be all-way stop in US either do not have any signage or signage to remind drivers of the rules of non-prioritized intersection ("warning, yield to the right"). Small roundabouts were to large extent specific to UK, until various european local authorities found out that building roundabouts is good way to meet their EU grant quotas.
  - justinhj 9y ago
    I’m a British person who had immigrated to North America. A four (or more) way stop sign is not replacing a yield at an intersection, it is replacing a roundabout. The reason you must come to a full stop is to signal to other drivers the time you arrived, since that is strictly the order that people use to go. It’s also a safety issue since you need to check right and left for out of control cars, bikes and so on. As s system I prefer roundabouts as they keep the traffic flowing, but anecdotally the stop sign seems much safer. Finally it’s a an enforcement issue. Cops don’t have to argue that you didn’t slow enough. If you didn’t stop completely you broke the law.
- misnome 9y ago
  As a UK driver, generally all the problems seem to be solved by the "Give Way" signs (Yield) rules and systems; Major/minor road priorities for asymmetric traffic loads, T-junctions, and mini-roundabouts for equal loads but small volumes (large volume is handled by traffic lights or normal roundabouts). Four-way stop signs seem to be a desperate attempt to either avoid telling American drivers to "not be selfish" and allow other traffic through ahead of themselves, or to just avoid having to have drivers learn priority systems. Avoiding major/minor road intersections seemed to be the main use of four-ways (around West-Chicago/Illinois, where I did most of my US driving), with ridiculous cases like four-way stop signs on roads where you could literally see hundreds of feet down each of the other roads, and not a car in sight except the cop car parked next to the intersection. True stop signs in the UK are reasonably uncommon except in cases where they are actually required e.g. a junction could appear misleading.
  - ekidd 9y ago
    > with ridiculous cases like four-way stop signs on roads where you could literally see hundreds of feet down each of the other roads, and not a car in sight except the cop car parked next to the intersection. Keep in mind that rotaries are extremely rare in the US, and that many four-way stops are replacing what would be rotaries in the UK. Also, some intersections are more dangerous than they look. I remember a 4-way intersection with a 3-way stop that looked safe, but after the 10th traffic accident or so, the town said, "Let's just make it a 4-way stop," and the accidents stopped. One of entering roads was right after a major speed change (so people wouldn't slow down enough), and another had slightly worse visibility than it seemed. But once everybody was made to stop, the intersection worked safely, at the cost of adding 30 seconds of travel time.
    - emodendroket 9y ago
      > Keep in mind that rotaries are extremely rare in the US, and that many four-way stops are replacing what would be rotaries in the UK. Come to Massachusetts.
- emodendroket 9y ago
  Roundabouts are safer than four-way intersections in pretty much every case and also don't require complete stops so that's one possibility
  - stephengillie 9y ago
    This varies per implementation of roundabout. Plenty of the roundabouts I've driven through have stop signs and only allow one car in the roundabout at a time. Others have been made in places (like a crevasse) where the circle is too small for a city bus to safely traverse - it has to jump the curb every time. The traffic light it replaced was actually slightly safer.
    - emodendroket 9y ago
      I guess if you compare a bad roundabout to an ideal four-way intersection that's true, but in general we can safely say roundabouts have much lower rates of accidents, especially serious ones, than do traditional intersections, despite many drivers' intuition that it should be the other way around.
    - pm215 9y ago
      I would say that if it has stop signs it's not a roundabout -- the concept requires that incoming traffic yields to traffic on the roundabout but need not stop.
- Danihan 9y ago
  2 way stops, yield signs.
  - rconti 9y ago
    Ban the 4 way stop. Seriously.
imron 9y ago
> we should change the laws to reflect more how people drive. We can do that once we are at (or close to) 100% robot drivers. In the meantime, I'd prefer my robot drivers to err on the side of conservative.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Indeed. With 100% robots on the road, we can relax the rules to what machines can safely handle. Which will mean much denser and faster traffic, because a) machines can handle more than humans, and b) machines don't (unless programmed to do so) routinely disrespect the rules like humans.
princeb 9y ago
the article alludes to something else: > Humans violate the rules in a safe and principled way that there are a lot of unwritten rules when it comes to road behaviour that traffic regulations does not fully capture.
perlgeek 9y ago
> Maybe instead of teaching self-driving cars to break the laws like everyone else does, we should change the laws to reflect more how people drive. In my experience, people always drive a bit faster than allowed. If you raise the limit, people raise their speed as well. Maybe the solution is to only allow the relaxed rules to robotic drivers? (though that would also raise resentment).
- setr 9y ago
  >In my experience, people always drive faster than allowed I think its more of people prefer to drive at the speed they're comfortable with (they believe its sufficiently safe given the environment), and legal speed limits tend to be significantly lower than that, except during special cases ie traffic jams. Im not sure if people are actually good at guaging where they should feel comfortable driving, but if you relax the rules for AI, it would be in a similar setup and the same question would apply.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    With AI you can determine the accuracy of its "sense of comfort" through design and testing; it's harder with humans. But the thing is, that on the road people often drive not at the speed they're personally comfortable with, but closer to the average speed all drivers on a given road stretch are comfortable with. I.e. I've often been in cases where the driver drove faster than he/she liked because otherwise everyone else would stick to their tail, honk, or aggressively pass by.

jamesrcole 9y ago

> there are perfectly safe, more efficient limitations that can be employed (The 100% complete stop for example, frivolous waste of potential energy!) Genuine question: what do you think is the better alternative to the 100% complete stop? I'm not saying I think there is or isn't a better alternative, just wanted to know what you had in mind.

userbinator 9y ago
what do you think is the better alternative to the 100% complete stop? I think that would be to slow enough that you can stop if you need to, but not actually stop completely --- something which almost everyone already seems to do, because it saves wear and helps with passenger comfort too. (I've been in vehicles where the driver insisted on completely stopping exactly as legally specified, with the accompanying double-jerk of deceleration followed by acceleration. Not pleasant at all.)
- Piskvorrr 9y ago
  If the stop causes a "jerk", the driver is braking far too aggressively for an expected and routine stop (which implies that they'll have much smaller margin of safety when emergency braking would be called for). This seems to strengthen the point "people are driving like crazy, that's not a good thing".
  - jon_richards 9y ago
    Next time you drive, come to a complete stop and feel the car as it rocks back on its suspension. This will happen even if you brake quite lightly. You can slowly raise the brake so that you are barely braking right as you stop, which will almost completely eliminate the feeling, but it makes your stop excruciatingly slow. Theoretically, you could also eliminate the rock back at a stop sign by lifting your foot off the brake right as the car stops (before it moves backwards that little bit). The vast majority of drivers who think they are stopping completely actually lift their foot off right before that moment, so they don't experience the jerk.
    - Piskvorrr 9y ago
      I understand what you mean. "Rocks back and forth" is IMHO a far gentler sensation than "a jerk".
    - scrumper 9y ago
      > lifting your foot off the brake right as the car stops You can do that even if you're braking very hard, and it doesn't have to make your stop slow. All you want to avoid is that bounce back right at the end, and backing off the pressure a bit just before the full stop will be enough to achieve that and create a very smooth ride. Of course you will always have the deceleration but for passengers that's far less jarring than the bounce that happens when the front suspension unloads when the car has stopped. Fortunately it's easy to practice as stop signs are everywhere.
      - Retric 9y ago
        Exactly, it took a while to notice this was even possible. It does take a few more inches to stop. But, now I can't help but notice that some people get a lot more jerk
        Piskvorrr 9y ago
        It's sort of an art, what with variable conditions and whatnot. Surprisingly, automatic trains manage to get it right, being programmed to ease on the brakes just right to avoid a jostle altogether. Fewer variables to keep track of, I suppose.
- mannykannot 9y ago
  There are already regulations allowing for that, but they are not used everywhere because some people abuse the privilege of being allowed to use their own judgement. If (and only if) everyone practiced good judgement and restraint, the regulations would not need to be so prescriptive (Full disclosure: I don't always practice what I preach.)
balabaster 9y ago
In the UK we have very few stop signs. In fact, in my entire life, I only recall ever coming across 2. We usually have a yield action at intersections so that you only even need to slow if the line of sight at the intersection is impeded to the point you cannot see the flow of traffic. Consequently there is no need to come to a full and complete stop unless the flow of traffic prevents your ability to turn where the yield sign actually requires that you come to a stop while you wait to merge into traffic. This functions far better than the ridiculousness that is stop signs that require you to come to a complete stop even if you are the only car on the road.
- throwaway2016a 9y ago
  That sounds glorious. Nothing is more frustrating than coming to an intersection with full line of sight for miles in both directions, where you know there is no car that is close enough to hit you, and having to come to a full stop anyway.[1] In my part of the US we have a lot of rotaries (round abouts). Thousands of cars go through them every day, no stopping and no accidents... it can be done. [1] This is of course hyperbole. There are much more frustrating things. Edit: In fact I thought of something better. Waiting 10 minutes at a red light when there is no one else on the road.
  - dfox 9y ago
    In europe most of intersections that would be all-way stop in US either do not have any signage or signage to remind drivers of the rules of non-prioritized intersection ("warning, yield to the right"). Small roundabouts were to large extent specific to UK, until various european local authorities found out that building roundabouts is good way to meet their EU grant quotas.
- justinhj 9y ago
  I’m a British person who had immigrated to North America. A four (or more) way stop sign is not replacing a yield at an intersection, it is replacing a roundabout. The reason you must come to a full stop is to signal to other drivers the time you arrived, since that is strictly the order that people use to go. It’s also a safety issue since you need to check right and left for out of control cars, bikes and so on. As s system I prefer roundabouts as they keep the traffic flowing, but anecdotally the stop sign seems much safer. Finally it’s a an enforcement issue. Cops don’t have to argue that you didn’t slow enough. If you didn’t stop completely you broke the law.
misnome 9y ago
As a UK driver, generally all the problems seem to be solved by the "Give Way" signs (Yield) rules and systems; Major/minor road priorities for asymmetric traffic loads, T-junctions, and mini-roundabouts for equal loads but small volumes (large volume is handled by traffic lights or normal roundabouts). Four-way stop signs seem to be a desperate attempt to either avoid telling American drivers to "not be selfish" and allow other traffic through ahead of themselves, or to just avoid having to have drivers learn priority systems. Avoiding major/minor road intersections seemed to be the main use of four-ways (around West-Chicago/Illinois, where I did most of my US driving), with ridiculous cases like four-way stop signs on roads where you could literally see hundreds of feet down each of the other roads, and not a car in sight except the cop car parked next to the intersection. True stop signs in the UK are reasonably uncommon except in cases where they are actually required e.g. a junction could appear misleading.
- ekidd 9y ago
  > with ridiculous cases like four-way stop signs on roads where you could literally see hundreds of feet down each of the other roads, and not a car in sight except the cop car parked next to the intersection. Keep in mind that rotaries are extremely rare in the US, and that many four-way stops are replacing what would be rotaries in the UK. Also, some intersections are more dangerous than they look. I remember a 4-way intersection with a 3-way stop that looked safe, but after the 10th traffic accident or so, the town said, "Let's just make it a 4-way stop," and the accidents stopped. One of entering roads was right after a major speed change (so people wouldn't slow down enough), and another had slightly worse visibility than it seemed. But once everybody was made to stop, the intersection worked safely, at the cost of adding 30 seconds of travel time.
  - emodendroket 9y ago
    > Keep in mind that rotaries are extremely rare in the US, and that many four-way stops are replacing what would be rotaries in the UK. Come to Massachusetts.
emodendroket 9y ago
Roundabouts are safer than four-way intersections in pretty much every case and also don't require complete stops so that's one possibility
- stephengillie 9y ago
  This varies per implementation of roundabout. Plenty of the roundabouts I've driven through have stop signs and only allow one car in the roundabout at a time. Others have been made in places (like a crevasse) where the circle is too small for a city bus to safely traverse - it has to jump the curb every time. The traffic light it replaced was actually slightly safer.
  - emodendroket 9y ago
    I guess if you compare a bad roundabout to an ideal four-way intersection that's true, but in general we can safely say roundabouts have much lower rates of accidents, especially serious ones, than do traditional intersections, despite many drivers' intuition that it should be the other way around.
  - pm215 9y ago
    I would say that if it has stop signs it's not a roundabout -- the concept requires that incoming traffic yields to traffic on the roundabout but need not stop.
Danihan 9y ago
2 way stops, yield signs.
- rconti 9y ago
  Ban the 4 way stop. Seriously.

imron 9y ago

> we should change the laws to reflect more how people drive. We can do that once we are at (or close to) 100% robot drivers. In the meantime, I'd prefer my robot drivers to err on the side of conservative.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
Indeed. With 100% robots on the road, we can relax the rules to what machines can safely handle. Which will mean much denser and faster traffic, because a) machines can handle more than humans, and b) machines don't (unless programmed to do so) routinely disrespect the rules like humans.

princeb 9y ago

the article alludes to something else: > Humans violate the rules in a safe and principled way that there are a lot of unwritten rules when it comes to road behaviour that traffic regulations does not fully capture.

perlgeek 9y ago

> Maybe instead of teaching self-driving cars to break the laws like everyone else does, we should change the laws to reflect more how people drive. In my experience, people always drive a bit faster than allowed. If you raise the limit, people raise their speed as well. Maybe the solution is to only allow the relaxed rules to robotic drivers? (though that would also raise resentment).

setr 9y ago
>In my experience, people always drive faster than allowed I think its more of people prefer to drive at the speed they're comfortable with (they believe its sufficiently safe given the environment), and legal speed limits tend to be significantly lower than that, except during special cases ie traffic jams. Im not sure if people are actually good at guaging where they should feel comfortable driving, but if you relax the rules for AI, it would be in a similar setup and the same question would apply.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  With AI you can determine the accuracy of its "sense of comfort" through design and testing; it's harder with humans. But the thing is, that on the road people often drive not at the speed they're personally comfortable with, but closer to the average speed all drivers on a given road stretch are comfortable with. I.e. I've often been in cases where the driver drove faster than he/she liked because otherwise everyone else would stick to their tail, honk, or aggressively pass by.