Usability Evaluation of Self-driving (Autonomous) Cars
Introduction
Autonomous cars or driverless cars, also known as self-driving cars, use the combination of sensors, radar, cameras and artificial intelligence to travel between destinations without a human operator. Currently, there are no legally operating, fully-autonomous vehicles in the United States. However, there are partially-autonomous vehicles — cars and trucks with varying amounts of self-automation, from conventional cars with brake and lane assistance to highly-independent, self-driving prototypes.
Companies which developed self-driven cars include Audi, BMW, Ford, Google, General Motors, Tesla, VW and Volvo. Artificial intelligence powers self-driving cars whose development includes large amounts of data from image recognition systems, along with machine learning and neural networks, to build such maturity-based systems that can drive autonomously. These cars include the combination of LIDAR, i.e. light detection, ranging and cameras that combines all the data which system generate to identify the surroundings of the vehicle and predict what those objects might do next.
Though still in its beginning, self-driving technology is becoming increasingly common and could radically transform our transportation system (and by extension, our economy and society). Based on automaker and technology company estimates, fully-autonomous self-driving cars could be for sale in the next several years. Experts state that autonomous driving software development has a great future. However, while there are numerous advantages of self-driving vehicles, there are also some disadvantages.
Advantages
One of the most important advantages of these self-driving cars is the prevention of car accidents. As reports say, in the past 3 months more than 3 million people died in car accidents. Therefore, this can be reduced to a large extend. It is more consumer-friendly as it provides convenience to the user and more luxury as it will be moving at a specific speed and sudden breaks are avoided resulting in the increase of relaxation behaviour of the person travelling by autonomous car. Especially for the impaired individuals travelling will be a lot more convenient. It will provide the least stressful driving experience to the person and provide time for other activities. Driverless cars will also ensure safety based on accident and women safety from the cab drivers. The fuel efficiency of these cars will be more as compared to manual cars because these cars will travel at constant acceleration and increase car mileage. The car lives are enhanced compared to the manual cars due to less wear and tear of the car.
It opens new avenues towards the business industry and manufacturing sector. Driverless cars help in the city development and control the emission of harmful gases. Self-driving cars will bring changes to the ownership paradigm. No traffic rules would be exploited resulting in minimal traffic on the roads. With the help of data stored in the car feed, it can be traced very easily in case of any emergency. The daily time to commute will be reduced as these autonomous cars would be able to figure out whenever they can increase the speed to make the commute quicker. Moreover, the possibility of missing an exit will be eradicated since this stems from human error. Lastly, self-driving cars could help reduce the automobile thefts with the help of biometric technologies which can recognize an individual’s fingerprints and faces. Biometrics would be used the same way as we use these days to unlock our phones or any other electronic devices. This means if someone else tries to use our car, it will refuse to start or immediately shut itself down.
Disadvantages
In the previous section, I explained the advantages of autonomous cars and was positive being fewer accidents in future. However, there is also a negative side to it if is adopted too early. Self-driving cars may also fail sometimes due to lack of information and data requirement for travelling. Due to a programming system, the car may fail to take the ethical decisions where a human decides in the fraction of seconds. These cars also have a mechanical error while travelling which may cause wastage of time and catastrophe on the roads. An individual is afraid to directly rely on the technology and it may affect the sale of such cars. A lot of testing of such cars is required as it is still at an early stage of development. For instance, In Arizona, a woman was killed by an Uber self-driving test car in March 2018. It saw the woman 6 seconds before impact but couldn’t recognize her and didn’t alert the driver. One of the Uber’s self-driving Volvo SUVs has been involved in a crash in Arizona which left the vehicle flipped onto its side. It also damaged two other human-driven cars in this accident.
Another disadvantage of these driverless cars is an increase in the costing of the vehicle as it requires many technological instruments to develop these kinds of cars. So, these cars are not economically afforded by everyone. These autonomous cars will eliminate the existing jobs of cab drivers leading to new job search. There will also be a lot of misuse of technology, directly affecting the society and sale of cars. As complex technology is involved, the maintenance of these cars will also be strenuous. It will also require different infrastructure that can be programmed easily in the system of the car. CEO of TESLA, Elon Musk made it clear during an interview that the system doesn’t hold up so he also can not regulate it properly. These cars will also bring privacy at a stake as it will use a large amount of camera and voice recognition programming. The speed of these cars will also be limited which will also cause problems.
Market overview
Companies such as Tesla, Google, Toyota, Audi, Volvo, Mercedes-Benz, General Motors, Nissan, Bosch, Psa Peugeot Citroen are some of the top companies which are approaching these autonomous cars. The market size of autonomous cars is expected to be approximately 7 thousand units by the end of 2020 and anticipated to expand at a Compound annual growth rate of 64% from 2021 till 2030. The countries which are having the scope to develop and use of these cars are U.S, Canada, Mexico, U.K, Germany, France, Netherlands, Sweden, China, Japan, Singapore, Australia and Brazil.
Applications
A self-driving car would make lives easier and less stressful. It will also save your time as it will itself go to the mechanic for its servicing. The parents would not be driving the kids to school and the time can be consumed in some other activity while you can also keep an eye on the child through continuous monitoring on your device. The autonomous car will make the world safer and prevent accidents as the traffic laws like over speeding, lane jumping, cutting people off and brake checking as the car will be in proper control and following the actual rules of roads. These cars will also bring an extra income to the individual owning the car as during the time of the job shifting the car can just drive away and can be used as the cab of others. The person won’t even have to look for parking. The individual just does not have to own a car or deal with the headache of dealing with maintenance and insurance. It will also affect the car dealership and exchange plus replacement of any spare part would be difficult and expensive.
Interview
I found some articles on the interview with the industrial experts of self-driving cars. Bosch is a multinational engineering and technology company that was founded by Robert Bosch in 1886. Bosch has converted a Tesla Model S into a test vehicle which is one of the few self-driving cars that have been permitted to drive on freeways in Germany. In the interview, Bosch’s project manager Michael Fausten was asked about the biggest social benefit of a new driving culture where he answered that “Automated driving is a perfect fit for our ‘Invented for Life’ ethos”. He says that there will be many benefits with this new kind of driving, like reduced traffics jams because automated cars like Tesla won’t slow down at the accident scene. They will also not constantly change the lanes to reach faster at their destination. These vehicles will also save us some time, energy and fuel. Automated vehicles are very advantageous to elderly people so they can be active in the culture. He says that most of the traffic accidents are human errors so that can be eliminated by automated cars.
Another interview was with Prof. Dr Andreas Herrmann, who is the director of the Center for Customer Insight at the University of St. Gallen. Mr Herrmann has also been a consultant to many companies like Audi, Mercedes, BMW, Porsche and a few more. He says that Autonomous driving promises to bring enormous modifications for society and the wider economy. These automated cars could also influence the architecture of cities particularly the parking spaces because those parking spaces and parking streets could be reduced. Moreover, automated cars will also reduce some costs of driving in terms of injury recompense and lower fuel utilization because of smooth driving.
Conclusion
With the amount of public interest and the increase in the investment of companies, self-driving cars will be soon into the market. There are both advantages and disadvantages to autonomous cars. We cannot say for sure which category succeeds, but we are sure that technological advancement and improvement is unstoppable. Therefore, looking to the boom of technology all the disadvantages will be eliminated in the future years. As advantages like decreasing the mortality due to road accidents and technology involving fuel and energy efficiency will improve. I believe that autonomous vehicles will eradicate all fatalities. In the coming years, self-driving cars will not only make drivers’ life more comfortable but also make this world a better and safer place for everyone.
