7 ms·

Google's driverless cars designed to exceed speed limit

31 points by lsh123 12y ago

lsh123 12y ago
Just curios if Google is going to pay the ticket if a cop stops the car.
- praptak 12y ago
  I admit I'm not keeping up with the news but doesn't the law still require that a human driver be present in the car?
  - Zitrax 12y ago
    According to Wikipedia some laws even require a passenger: "Nevada's regulations require a person behind the wheel and one in the passenger’s seat during tests".
- Aldo_MX 12y ago
  Not likely
- talmand 12y ago
  I've seen similar questions arise from the thought of accidents. If a self-driving car causes a crash, who's responsible? The owner or the manufacturer? Another random thought: do the cars respond to a police officer trying to pull them over?
  - krapp 12y ago
    >If a self-driving car causes a crash, who's responsible? The owner or the manufacturer? My two cents: if the car has the capacity for manual override, the owner (negligence) otherwise the manufacturer. >do the cars respond to a police officer trying to pull them over? Legally, humans are supposed to, so why would it be different for self-driving cars (which can at least be programmed to give control over to a third party when requested?)
    - TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
      > if the car has the capacity for manual override, the owner (negligence) There are plenty of ways a self-driving car could mess up and cause an accident where you do not have enough time to react to it. Not "you should have been paying more attention". As in "You are not superhuman enough to react in time, period". Say, swerving on the highway into oncoming traffic. Some (incredibly rough) numbers: if you're going 108km/h and the car suddenly swerves into the other lane of a two-lane highway, if it's 20m between start of swerve and hitting the vehicle in the other lane, that's 2/3 of a second. You can't do that. You (or rather, an average person) are not going to be able to recover in time. The reaction time for an alert driver is something like 0.7s on average. [1] And that's not the most pessimistic assumptions either. [1] First link I found: http://www.technology-assoc.com/articles/reaction-time.html http://www.technology-assoc.com/articles/reaction-time.html
      - krapp 12y ago
        Maybe. I can imagine that in any other circumstance that the driver would be liable where they would be considered liable in a standard car. But of course if the self-driving car makes it impossible to react then that probably lies on the manufacturer. At that point you might as well blame the passenger of a commercial airliner for the autopilot going wrong.
  - bsder 12y ago
    > If a self-driving car causes a crash, who's responsible? The owner or the manufacturer? Manufacturer. However, what's going to eventually fall out is that self-driving cars are going to be SO much safer, that insurance companies eventually won't let YOU drive.
- deepsun 12y ago
  If driver manually overridden the speed setting, then yes. In case of other accidents -- pays insurance (and their pricing will be the best indication of how safe these cars are).
georgemcbay 12y ago
Good. It would be stupid not to, especially during the transition phase where driverless cars are the minority. YMMV depending upon local standards but here in San Diego, CA it is extremely common for the flow the traffic to be going 5-15 miles above posted speed limits and the cops do not care. Having a car going significantly slower than the flow of traffic is much worse than exceeding the speed limit. Also there are sometimes situations where very temporarily exceeding the limit is the best option (eg. you're at the speed limit and someone cuts into your lane toward the back of your car, potentially shunting you and you have no clearance on the other side, but do have room up front). Driverless cars with full 360 (or close to it) lidar would be ideal for dealing with this situation (as opposed to a human driver that is unlikely to even see the other car in his/her blindspot) but if they are capped at the speed limit their options for resolving the situation safely would be severely curtailed.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- josephschmoe 12y ago
  Definitely. I wouldn't want my car driving in an unsafe manner just to follow local ordinances. I'd be very curious if I could sue those local governments for endangering me if my vehicle is forced to follow their rules and gets in an avoidable accident because of them. It would be an eminent domain defense, in the sense that government can't deny me of my property without a justifiable (public safety) reason for doing so. And forcing my computer to behave in a certain way that causes it to potentially harm itself is definitely a denial of property. I'm sure they'll just write me a ticket though - and if no one has gotten out of that by citing statistics on road safety, my autonomous car won't be any better off. Hopefully, this will all be resolved reasonably with a national law and a nice bug report interface on Google's part.
- allochthon 12y ago
  but here in San Diego, CA it is extremely common for the flow the traffic to be going 5-15 miles above posted speed limits Same here in the Bay area. It would be unsafe to drive no faster than the speed limits in some conditions of traffic. (Some drivers do this, and you have to change lanes on short notice to remain at the same speed as the rest of traffic.)
sbierwagen 12y ago
I'm a dilettante hypermiler, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-efficient_driving http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-efficient_driving) which is mostly about driving slowly. And wow, it's amazing how mad some people get when you drive the posted speed limit.
- jfuhrman 12y ago
  Going the speed limit or lower in the passing lane, especially in rush hour is dangerous and probably causes more accidents than just going a bit faster or moving over to the other lanes when someone gets too close. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2016721/Slow-drivers-dangerous-roads-cause-crashes.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2016721/Slow-drivers...
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    > Going the speed limit or lower in the passing lane Except when a special designation is made (common on, e.g., two lane highways that have a stretch where a third lane is added to one or the other side expressly for passing), no such thing exists in many US jurisdictions. There are some US jurisdictions where the leftmost lane is by default reserved for passing (or passing and allowing traffic to merge in the other lane), but that is the exception, not the general rule.
    - na85 12y ago
      The left lane is supposed to be a passing lane. If you are one of those people that set the cruise control and doesn't move over when people are behind you, then you are an asshole- jurisdiction or not.
      - dragonwriter 12y ago
        > The left lane is supposed to be a passing lane. No, its not. Except where it is. This varies from place to place -- differences in law represent different decisions about whether or not this is true by different communities. > If you are one of those people that set the cruise control and doesn't move over when people are behind you There is a difference between the left lane being reserved for passing and a convention of slower traffic being expected to move right. The reserved for passing rule is much less common -- either as law or social convention -- than some form of slow-traffic-move-right rule.
elwell 12y ago
> when surrounding vehicles were breaking the speed limit ... the Google car would accelerate to keep up for n, neighbor of neighbors if neighbor.vel > @vel # TODO: add something like: " and @vel < maxVel" @vel += 1 Just don't forget to grep for "TODO".
- rumbler 12y ago
  If Amazon were to make a driverless car, I'd worry. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384102,00.asp http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384102,00.asp
  - Turing_Machine 12y ago
    Despite the title, that's not an "Amazon algorithm". That's two third-party sellers operating buggy software.
helpbygrace 12y ago
Is this speed measured by GPS or vehicle? In my experience, even though speedmeter in the instrument panel shows 10mph over, actual GPS speed is around speed limit.
- ewoodrich 12y ago
  They really shouldn't differ by that much, your car likely has a speedometer that is out of calibration.
- jimmcslim 12y ago
  According to the Wikipedia page on speedometers, under the Error heading... 'Vehicle manufacturers usually calibrate speedometers to read high by an amount equal to the average error, to ensure that their speedometers never indicate a lower speed than the actual speed of the vehicle, to ensure they are not liable for drivers violating speed limits.', although no citation is currently provided. Error is introduced by tire diameter being different than what was assumed for initial calibration... i.e. wear on the tires or tires that are under/over-inflated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speedometer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speedometer
- Someone1234 12y ago
  Civilian GPS alone isn't accurate enough to be believed to within 10 MpH. Even with the fuzzing gone: http://www.maps-gps-info.com/gps-accuracy.html http://www.maps-gps-info.com/gps-accuracy.html http://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/performance/accuracy/ http://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/performance/accuracy/
- ianstallings 12y ago
  But how do you know the actual speed you're going to gauge the accuracy? Have you timed this over a set distance or something?
luos 12y ago
Would these cars overtake others, for example if there is a car towing an other on a one lane (each way) road going significantly under the speed limit?
Chinjut 12y ago
"Google's self-driving cars are programmed to exceed speed limits by up to 10mph (16km/h), according to the project's lead software engineer. Dmitri Dolgov told Reuters that when surrounding vehicles were breaking the speed limit, going more slowly could actually present a danger, and the Google car would accelerate to keep up." Clicking through to the source: "Google's driverless car is programmed to stay within the speed limit, mostly. Research shows that sticking to the speed limit when other cars are going much faster actually can be dangerous, Dolgov says, so its autonomous car can go up to 10 mph (16 kph) above the speed limit when traffic conditions warrant."
allochthon 12y ago
This link got thumped way down really quickly. And it's an interesting one.

31 points by lsh123 12y ago

lsh123 12y ago

Just curios if Google is going to pay the ticket if a cop stops the car.

praptak 12y ago
I admit I'm not keeping up with the news but doesn't the law still require that a human driver be present in the car?
- Zitrax 12y ago
  According to Wikipedia some laws even require a passenger: "Nevada's regulations require a person behind the wheel and one in the passenger’s seat during tests".
Aldo_MX 12y ago
Not likely
talmand 12y ago
I've seen similar questions arise from the thought of accidents. If a self-driving car causes a crash, who's responsible? The owner or the manufacturer? Another random thought: do the cars respond to a police officer trying to pull them over?
- krapp 12y ago
  >If a self-driving car causes a crash, who's responsible? The owner or the manufacturer? My two cents: if the car has the capacity for manual override, the owner (negligence) otherwise the manufacturer. >do the cars respond to a police officer trying to pull them over? Legally, humans are supposed to, so why would it be different for self-driving cars (which can at least be programmed to give control over to a third party when requested?)
  - TheLoneWolfling 12y ago
    > if the car has the capacity for manual override, the owner (negligence) There are plenty of ways a self-driving car could mess up and cause an accident where you do not have enough time to react to it. Not "you should have been paying more attention". As in "You are not superhuman enough to react in time, period". Say, swerving on the highway into oncoming traffic. Some (incredibly rough) numbers: if you're going 108km/h and the car suddenly swerves into the other lane of a two-lane highway, if it's 20m between start of swerve and hitting the vehicle in the other lane, that's 2/3 of a second. You can't do that. You (or rather, an average person) are not going to be able to recover in time. The reaction time for an alert driver is something like 0.7s on average. [1] And that's not the most pessimistic assumptions either. [1] First link I found: http://www.technology-assoc.com/articles/reaction-time.html http://www.technology-assoc.com/articles/reaction-time.html
    - krapp 12y ago
      Maybe. I can imagine that in any other circumstance that the driver would be liable where they would be considered liable in a standard car. But of course if the self-driving car makes it impossible to react then that probably lies on the manufacturer. At that point you might as well blame the passenger of a commercial airliner for the autopilot going wrong.
- bsder 12y ago
  > If a self-driving car causes a crash, who's responsible? The owner or the manufacturer? Manufacturer. However, what's going to eventually fall out is that self-driving cars are going to be SO much safer, that insurance companies eventually won't let YOU drive.
deepsun 12y ago
If driver manually overridden the speed setting, then yes. In case of other accidents -- pays insurance (and their pricing will be the best indication of how safe these cars are).

georgemcbay 12y ago

Good. It would be stupid not to, especially during the transition phase where driverless cars are the minority. YMMV depending upon local standards but here in San Diego, CA it is extremely common for the flow the traffic to be going 5-15 miles above posted speed limits and the cops do not care. Having a car going significantly slower than the flow of traffic is much worse than exceeding the speed limit. Also there are sometimes situations where very temporarily exceeding the limit is the best option (eg. you're at the speed limit and someone cuts into your lane toward the back of your car, potentially shunting you and you have no clearance on the other side, but do have room up front). Driverless cars with full 360 (or close to it) lidar would be ideal for dealing with this situation (as opposed to a human driver that is unlikely to even see the other car in his/her blindspot) but if they are capped at the speed limit their options for resolving the situation safely would be severely curtailed.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
josephschmoe 12y ago
Definitely. I wouldn't want my car driving in an unsafe manner just to follow local ordinances. I'd be very curious if I could sue those local governments for endangering me if my vehicle is forced to follow their rules and gets in an avoidable accident because of them. It would be an eminent domain defense, in the sense that government can't deny me of my property without a justifiable (public safety) reason for doing so. And forcing my computer to behave in a certain way that causes it to potentially harm itself is definitely a denial of property. I'm sure they'll just write me a ticket though - and if no one has gotten out of that by citing statistics on road safety, my autonomous car won't be any better off. Hopefully, this will all be resolved reasonably with a national law and a nice bug report interface on Google's part.
allochthon 12y ago
but here in San Diego, CA it is extremely common for the flow the traffic to be going 5-15 miles above posted speed limits Same here in the Bay area. It would be unsafe to drive no faster than the speed limits in some conditions of traffic. (Some drivers do this, and you have to change lanes on short notice to remain at the same speed as the rest of traffic.)

sbierwagen 12y ago

I'm a dilettante hypermiler, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-efficient_driving http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-efficient_driving) which is mostly about driving slowly. And wow, it's amazing how mad some people get when you drive the posted speed limit.

jfuhrman 12y ago
Going the speed limit or lower in the passing lane, especially in rush hour is dangerous and probably causes more accidents than just going a bit faster or moving over to the other lanes when someone gets too close. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2016721/Slow-drivers-dangerous-roads-cause-crashes.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2016721/Slow-drivers...
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > Going the speed limit or lower in the passing lane Except when a special designation is made (common on, e.g., two lane highways that have a stretch where a third lane is added to one or the other side expressly for passing), no such thing exists in many US jurisdictions. There are some US jurisdictions where the leftmost lane is by default reserved for passing (or passing and allowing traffic to merge in the other lane), but that is the exception, not the general rule.
  - na85 12y ago
    The left lane is supposed to be a passing lane. If you are one of those people that set the cruise control and doesn't move over when people are behind you, then you are an asshole- jurisdiction or not.
    - dragonwriter 12y ago
      > The left lane is supposed to be a passing lane. No, its not. Except where it is. This varies from place to place -- differences in law represent different decisions about whether or not this is true by different communities. > If you are one of those people that set the cruise control and doesn't move over when people are behind you There is a difference between the left lane being reserved for passing and a convention of slower traffic being expected to move right. The reserved for passing rule is much less common -- either as law or social convention -- than some form of slow-traffic-move-right rule.

elwell 12y ago

> when surrounding vehicles were breaking the speed limit ... the Google car would accelerate to keep up for n, neighbor of neighbors if neighbor.vel > @vel # TODO: add something like: " and @vel < maxVel" @vel += 1 Just don't forget to grep for "TODO".

rumbler 12y ago
If Amazon were to make a driverless car, I'd worry. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384102,00.asp http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384102,00.asp
- Turing_Machine 12y ago
  Despite the title, that's not an "Amazon algorithm". That's two third-party sellers operating buggy software.

helpbygrace 12y ago

Is this speed measured by GPS or vehicle? In my experience, even though speedmeter in the instrument panel shows 10mph over, actual GPS speed is around speed limit.

ewoodrich 12y ago
They really shouldn't differ by that much, your car likely has a speedometer that is out of calibration.
jimmcslim 12y ago
According to the Wikipedia page on speedometers, under the Error heading... 'Vehicle manufacturers usually calibrate speedometers to read high by an amount equal to the average error, to ensure that their speedometers never indicate a lower speed than the actual speed of the vehicle, to ensure they are not liable for drivers violating speed limits.', although no citation is currently provided. Error is introduced by tire diameter being different than what was assumed for initial calibration... i.e. wear on the tires or tires that are under/over-inflated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speedometer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speedometer
Someone1234 12y ago
Civilian GPS alone isn't accurate enough to be believed to within 10 MpH. Even with the fuzzing gone: http://www.maps-gps-info.com/gps-accuracy.html http://www.maps-gps-info.com/gps-accuracy.html http://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/performance/accuracy/ http://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/performance/accuracy/
ianstallings 12y ago
But how do you know the actual speed you're going to gauge the accuracy? Have you timed this over a set distance or something?

luos 12y ago

Would these cars overtake others, for example if there is a car towing an other on a one lane (each way) road going significantly under the speed limit?

Chinjut 12y ago

"Google's self-driving cars are programmed to exceed speed limits by up to 10mph (16km/h), according to the project's lead software engineer. Dmitri Dolgov told Reuters that when surrounding vehicles were breaking the speed limit, going more slowly could actually present a danger, and the Google car would accelerate to keep up." Clicking through to the source: "Google's driverless car is programmed to stay within the speed limit, mostly. Research shows that sticking to the speed limit when other cars are going much faster actually can be dangerous, Dolgov says, so its autonomous car can go up to 10 mph (16 kph) above the speed limit when traffic conditions warrant."

allochthon 12y ago

This link got thumped way down really quickly. And it's an interesting one.