Smart Cars – Can We Avoid Crashes in these Cars?

There are two sides to the argument of semi and fully-autonomous driving. Some people think we’re already too dependent on the active systems of the smart cars we drive while others feel as if the vehicle that’s equipped with self-driving technology can keep you safe on the road. The problem is with a system that straddles the line. In a perfect world, a complete system that can’t be cracked and never fails will keep you safe and help you avoid a crash, but we don’t have this yet, and the path toward it is a murky one.

Tesla has offered us a smart car with a semi-autonomous system called Autopilot for a few years now. The name alone for this system tells you it should be able to take over and makes you feel as if you’re flying in the air and the pilot of a plane that’s set to autopilot to stay on course. The difference is, there isn’t nearly as much traffic in the air and certainly not as many chances for you to be in an accident while flying as there are on the road. This leaves us with the question asked and very few answers.

We Need to be Smarter Drivers in Smart Cars

When you drive on the road have you noticed how many people have their phones up to their ears, look down in their laps while on the road, or are obviously distracted by food, drink, or makeup while driving. We try hard to fit more activities the time we’re supposed to be used to drive, but we don’t take the time to actually drive. Rather than worry about the music playing on your radio, you should be focused on the road ahead, but many of us are distracted in some way.
Because we face and cause so many different distractions on the road shouldn’t we have some autonomy from our smart cars to help us drive? Absolutely, the addition of blind spot warnings, emergency braking, and other safety systems are helpful to make it so that we can stay in our lane and on the road. These systems allow for a small number of distractions while behind the wheel, but don’t take over the drive. Unfortunately, we’ve heard too many stories of drivers that have allowed the Autopilot system to take over the driving duties and then ended up in a collision because the system failed in some way.
The problem is, the Autopilot system didn’t actually fail, the driver did. Autopilot has never been advertised as a fully-autonomous system, which means drivers need to pay attention, even when driving a Tesla vehicle. If you trust your car to do all the driving for you and keep you safe, you’ve made a bad decision. The added driver assistance systems allow for a small amount of distraction, but not to completely stop paying attention while on the road. Minimize your distractions and pay attention to what you’re supposed to be doing from behind the wheel, driving.