Google Sees Self-Driving Car on Road Within Five Years from Detroit

Chris Urmson, director of Self-Driving cars for Google said that the goal is to have a driverless vehicles available on the market within five years which is now being built in Livonia and he expects that the regulations would not be a barrier in the goal.

The reason why Chris says for choosing Detroit for building self-driving vehicles – “If you want to do something auto, it’s out here,”

Phil Martens, CEO of Novelis, an aluminum supplier, said Google has the advantage of starting vehicle manufacturing from the scratch and potentially developing a car that can better meet the needs of millennials.

“When I look at the Google vehicle, and you think about urbanization and the complexity of the urban environment, that’s what I see,”

The National Transportation Highway Safety Administration (NHTSA) supports the development of autonomous driving technology because it promises great potential in vehicle safety. Google has been working with NHTSA and sharing data. “Just like any car built for use on U.S. roads, any autonomous vehicle would need to meet applicable federal motor vehicle safety standards, which falls under NHTSA’s jurisdiction,” an agency spokesman said. “The agency will have the appropriate policies and regulations in place to ensure the safety of these types of vehicles.”


Transcript

Mr. Urmson indicates that no matter how much advancement is implimented in driverless vehicles, the vehicles would not be 100% crash proof. “There will be failures of these vehicles,” he said. “We need to get to the point where we accept that.”

The advancement, legalization and real implementation of Google self-driving vehicles could drastically decrease the number of death and injuries every year in the United States and the rest of the world. What do you think about it?

Source:  Wall Street Journal The TRACY Law Firm | Original Publication: Jan 14th 2015 | Updated: Feb 1st 2015