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Here is my proposal for self driving cars: forget trying to make them drive on local roads at first. Add transponders to all interstate tarmac that can be used

Here is my proposal for self driving cars: forget trying to make them drive on local roads at first. Add transponders to all interstate tarmac that can be used to detect location and lane position. Then use a much cheaper LIDAR just to map where the other cars are. Boom: you have made long haul driving autonomous. You can then slowly expand this to smaller roads. But why try to recreate human drivers when machines can use much better sensors than us, but can process visual info much slower, and gather it with worse fidelity?

Eire_Banshee 7y ago
$$$. If you put the cost on taxpayers it will never be approved. Needs to be privately funded.
- throwaway743 7y ago
  Would rather not have a privately nor publicly funded and owned physical panopticon. Too much room for control and abuse.
- IgorPartola 7y ago
  Yes, let's have the Ford highway that only Ford vehicle can drive on because the transponders are proprietary. We don't have privately painted lane markings, why would we have privately installed radio lane markings?
agildehaus 7y ago
Because yours is a ludicrous proposal. It'd be well more expensive to modify infrastructure than to build a computerized driver. Not only is the modification expensive, you have to convince the local authority to foot the bill, do it right, maintain it, etc. Never going to happen. Your proposal also lacks reliability. What if one of these "transponders" fails? We can build redundancy into a self-driving car quite easily (a second computer, never relying on just one sensor). Providing redundancy to road infrastructure planet-wide is ... a much larger problem.
- devoply 7y ago
  Roads are extremely expensive, adding sensors to new roads should actually be a rounding error.
  - mirceal 7y ago
    what about the old roads?
    - SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
      And what about when you repave those roads? It's introduced an infrastructure burden that's there forever.
      - IgorPartola 7y ago
        The interstate itself is an infrastructure burden that's there forever. Somehow we find a way to pay for it, no? Painting lane markers costs $X/mile, right? This would take the cost to $(X + x)/mile where x is the cost of the transponders. Nobody said self-driving cars would be cheaper, just safer.
        lazyasciiart 7y ago
        No, we don't find a way to pay for it. https://www.ced.org/reports/fixing-americas-roads-bridges https://www.ced.org/reports/fixing-americas-roads-bridges
        mirceal 7y ago
        at this point I have to ask why are self driving cars needed when we're talking about the tax payer eating up the cost and are we sure we don't have other things in which the money would be better invested. sure, self-driving cars would be nice and we could even rationalize how this could make sense, but at the end of the day I would rather see everyone get 1) high-speed internet 2) clean water 3) reduce the dependency on fossil fuel 4) ensure access to quality food 5) move towards environmental friendly materials.
pjc50 7y ago
This goes out the window as soon as someone places a single traffic cone on the roadway. Lanes are not a fixed property of the road.
- IgorPartola 7y ago
  That means they would need to use new cones with transponders. Yes, it's more expensive, but also way more reliable.
  - sosuke 7y ago
    And less likely to be stolen when the cones can be tracked.
  - rayiner 7y ago
    So when a police officer puts down a cone behind a broken down car in the freeway--??
    - mikestew 7y ago
      The cone that transmits to every vehicle within listening range: "don't hit me"?
      - Balgair 7y ago
        And when all the cones' fancy electronics break or aren't charged? Is the cop just supposed to not stop? What about poorer jurisdictions that can't afford it?
        IgorPartola 7y ago
        And if the officer puts down a regular cone and the driver is texting and doesn't see it? Like, yes this would require changes to how we do things. Police officers will have to be careful to use the new style cones correctly. Is this any different than when they first started having use cones/flares? There is a price for every technology. I mean one of the alternatives is that we rely on the LIDAR being so good as to not hit the car and the officer standing next to it because it recognizes that situation. Which it will. Most of the time. Until it doesn't. Seems to be that having the transceiver and LIDAR backup is better than fancy expensive LIDAR.
mirceal 7y ago
i believe (and someone correct me if wrong) that driving on the interstate (and self driving cars/trucks) is a somewhat [way] easier problem than driving on any road. you’re not going to get a lot of value from what you’re proposing, but it’s going to be super expensive.
- IgorPartola 7y ago
  In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, not so much. Sure, we may see prototypes of self-driving cars going on the interstate in California on sunny days. But I have yet to see a self-driving car make it through a blizzard in Montana. You can't see lane markings with a LIDAR if you can't see the road covered in an inch of hard packed snow. But radio signals of correct frequencies have no problem with that. Think about it this way: the roads themselves are very expensive. But they make each car much cheaper. Most cars don't have to be equipped to drive over rocks and roots (we have tarmac), or lakes/ponds/rivers (we have bridges). We already spend a ton of taxpayer money to make it so that a 15 inch wheel with a mostly smooth tire and 5" of suspension travel is all a car needs. Why not install transceivers to make cars not require to have a super complicated LIDAR system?
  - bitL 7y ago
    LiDAR is just one small sensor fusion component in self-driving cars. There are up to 6 LiDARs, up to 4 radars, many cameras and sonic sensors that provide a stream of data for SLAM. The algorithms we have for perception right now are sufficient for 99.9% situations already, although not in real-time with the current technology. Once we surpass 200Hz, we should be fine. On the other hand, path planning is still in the stone age and there is not much hope it'd get better anytime soon (full of NP-Hard problems).
    - IgorPartola 7y ago
      Last I checked, the limiting factor was the fact that they couldn't build a complex enough LIDAR that was both small and cheap.
elviejo79 7y ago
Your proposal is exactly how self-driving cars were created: "Back in 1995 the goals for self-driving cars were more modest than they are today. They weren’t called autonomous, but self-driving. And there was no plan to have cars drive themselves on city streets, just on freeways and highways — on the Interstate. The plan was to bury cables in the pavement over which all the cars would drive and communicate with each other and with the road, itself. The goal was to fill the road with cars driving at the speed limit, spaced precisely one meter apart" [0] [0] https://www.cringely.com/2016/08/25/self-driving-car-old-enough-drink-drive/ https://www.cringely.com/2016/08/25/self-driving-car-old-eno...
05 7y ago
Given a LiDAR of a sufficient range, freeway driving is a solved problem. Google did it in 2013.
- IgorPartola 7y ago
  And yet I don't see a single self driving car for sale. Given sufficient energy we can create anything because E = mc^2, but we have yet to actually produce enough energy to create whatever matter we want.
- thebruce87m 7y ago
  Ice and snow are real conditions outside of the Bay Area. Edit: Downvoters, please explain yourselves. If you have evidence that ice and snow have been solved for level 5 I’d love to see it.
kybernetikos 7y ago
Maybe even separate long distance roads that only autonomous cars are allowed on.
slfnflctd 7y ago
I've been saying this for a couple years now. Naysayers don't fully understand the problem. There is no safe way to do self driving on our current roads in all climates without at least some infrastructure enhancements. Pretty much any of those enhancements you can imagine are orders of magnitude cheaper than building dedicated roads, which is the only other sufficiently safe option. The moment we start trying to take the driver out of the equation for real en masse, this will become obvious to everyone.
693471 7y ago
LIDAR is a dead end
- m463 7y ago
  I think Elon Musk is basically correct when he made that statement. It probably wouldn't change the way current cars drive. He was also right because, I believe the LIDAR units on say a waymo car probably cost more than an entire tesla vehicle. But I couldn't help thinking if one of these LIDAR startups comes out with an "automotive pricing cheap" chip, it would be a great sensor fusion thing to add.
m463 7y ago
That is the "boil the ocean" solution to the problem. Basically, "update all roads on the planet".

Eire_Banshee 7y ago

$$$. If you put the cost on taxpayers it will never be approved. Needs to be privately funded.

throwaway743 7y ago
Would rather not have a privately nor publicly funded and owned physical panopticon. Too much room for control and abuse.
IgorPartola 7y ago
Yes, let's have the Ford highway that only Ford vehicle can drive on because the transponders are proprietary. We don't have privately painted lane markings, why would we have privately installed radio lane markings?

agildehaus 7y ago

Because yours is a ludicrous proposal. It'd be well more expensive to modify infrastructure than to build a computerized driver. Not only is the modification expensive, you have to convince the local authority to foot the bill, do it right, maintain it, etc. Never going to happen. Your proposal also lacks reliability. What if one of these "transponders" fails? We can build redundancy into a self-driving car quite easily (a second computer, never relying on just one sensor). Providing redundancy to road infrastructure planet-wide is ... a much larger problem.

devoply 7y ago
Roads are extremely expensive, adding sensors to new roads should actually be a rounding error.
- mirceal 7y ago
  what about the old roads?
  - SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
    And what about when you repave those roads? It's introduced an infrastructure burden that's there forever.
    - IgorPartola 7y ago
      The interstate itself is an infrastructure burden that's there forever. Somehow we find a way to pay for it, no? Painting lane markers costs $X/mile, right? This would take the cost to $(X + x)/mile where x is the cost of the transponders. Nobody said self-driving cars would be cheaper, just safer.
      - lazyasciiart 7y ago
        No, we don't find a way to pay for it. https://www.ced.org/reports/fixing-americas-roads-bridges https://www.ced.org/reports/fixing-americas-roads-bridges
      - mirceal 7y ago
        at this point I have to ask why are self driving cars needed when we're talking about the tax payer eating up the cost and are we sure we don't have other things in which the money would be better invested. sure, self-driving cars would be nice and we could even rationalize how this could make sense, but at the end of the day I would rather see everyone get 1) high-speed internet 2) clean water 3) reduce the dependency on fossil fuel 4) ensure access to quality food 5) move towards environmental friendly materials.

pjc50 7y ago

This goes out the window as soon as someone places a single traffic cone on the roadway. Lanes are not a fixed property of the road.

IgorPartola 7y ago
That means they would need to use new cones with transponders. Yes, it's more expensive, but also way more reliable.
- sosuke 7y ago
  And less likely to be stolen when the cones can be tracked.
- rayiner 7y ago
  So when a police officer puts down a cone behind a broken down car in the freeway--??
  - mikestew 7y ago
    The cone that transmits to every vehicle within listening range: "don't hit me"?
    - Balgair 7y ago
      And when all the cones' fancy electronics break or aren't charged? Is the cop just supposed to not stop? What about poorer jurisdictions that can't afford it?
      - IgorPartola 7y ago
        And if the officer puts down a regular cone and the driver is texting and doesn't see it? Like, yes this would require changes to how we do things. Police officers will have to be careful to use the new style cones correctly. Is this any different than when they first started having use cones/flares? There is a price for every technology. I mean one of the alternatives is that we rely on the LIDAR being so good as to not hit the car and the officer standing next to it because it recognizes that situation. Which it will. Most of the time. Until it doesn't. Seems to be that having the transceiver and LIDAR backup is better than fancy expensive LIDAR.

mirceal 7y ago

i believe (and someone correct me if wrong) that driving on the interstate (and self driving cars/trucks) is a somewhat [way] easier problem than driving on any road. you’re not going to get a lot of value from what you’re proposing, but it’s going to be super expensive.

IgorPartola 7y ago
In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, not so much. Sure, we may see prototypes of self-driving cars going on the interstate in California on sunny days. But I have yet to see a self-driving car make it through a blizzard in Montana. You can't see lane markings with a LIDAR if you can't see the road covered in an inch of hard packed snow. But radio signals of correct frequencies have no problem with that. Think about it this way: the roads themselves are very expensive. But they make each car much cheaper. Most cars don't have to be equipped to drive over rocks and roots (we have tarmac), or lakes/ponds/rivers (we have bridges). We already spend a ton of taxpayer money to make it so that a 15 inch wheel with a mostly smooth tire and 5" of suspension travel is all a car needs. Why not install transceivers to make cars not require to have a super complicated LIDAR system?
- bitL 7y ago
  LiDAR is just one small sensor fusion component in self-driving cars. There are up to 6 LiDARs, up to 4 radars, many cameras and sonic sensors that provide a stream of data for SLAM. The algorithms we have for perception right now are sufficient for 99.9% situations already, although not in real-time with the current technology. Once we surpass 200Hz, we should be fine. On the other hand, path planning is still in the stone age and there is not much hope it'd get better anytime soon (full of NP-Hard problems).
  - IgorPartola 7y ago
    Last I checked, the limiting factor was the fact that they couldn't build a complex enough LIDAR that was both small and cheap.

elviejo79 7y ago

Your proposal is exactly how self-driving cars were created: "Back in 1995 the goals for self-driving cars were more modest than they are today. They weren’t called autonomous, but self-driving. And there was no plan to have cars drive themselves on city streets, just on freeways and highways — on the Interstate. The plan was to bury cables in the pavement over which all the cars would drive and communicate with each other and with the road, itself. The goal was to fill the road with cars driving at the speed limit, spaced precisely one meter apart" [0] [0] https://www.cringely.com/2016/08/25/self-driving-car-old-enough-drink-drive/ https://www.cringely.com/2016/08/25/self-driving-car-old-eno...

05 7y ago

Given a LiDAR of a sufficient range, freeway driving is a solved problem. Google did it in 2013.

IgorPartola 7y ago
And yet I don't see a single self driving car for sale. Given sufficient energy we can create anything because E = mc^2, but we have yet to actually produce enough energy to create whatever matter we want.
thebruce87m 7y ago
Ice and snow are real conditions outside of the Bay Area. Edit: Downvoters, please explain yourselves. If you have evidence that ice and snow have been solved for level 5 I’d love to see it.

kybernetikos 7y ago

Maybe even separate long distance roads that only autonomous cars are allowed on.

slfnflctd 7y ago

I've been saying this for a couple years now. Naysayers don't fully understand the problem. There is no safe way to do self driving on our current roads in all climates without at least some infrastructure enhancements. Pretty much any of those enhancements you can imagine are orders of magnitude cheaper than building dedicated roads, which is the only other sufficiently safe option. The moment we start trying to take the driver out of the equation for real en masse, this will become obvious to everyone.

693471 7y ago

LIDAR is a dead end

m463 7y ago
I think Elon Musk is basically correct when he made that statement. It probably wouldn't change the way current cars drive. He was also right because, I believe the LIDAR units on say a waymo car probably cost more than an entire tesla vehicle. But I couldn't help thinking if one of these LIDAR startups comes out with an "automotive pricing cheap" chip, it would be a great sensor fusion thing to add.

m463 7y ago

That is the "boil the ocean" solution to the problem. Basically, "update all roads on the planet".