SAE Level 5 self-driving will take way longer than most developers suggest or choose to believe themselves. I can understand that since often hundreds of millions have been invested in AV undertakings, those developers still hope for some return on investment. But IMO it is better to start thinking about ‘viability strategies’ rather than pressure authorities like the NHTSA into adapting legislation and the rules of the game. Five solid reasons it will take longer, that I haven’t seen AV developers seen address properly.

1. Mimicking the human brain. Billions of brain cells multiplied by tens of thousands of synapses in each individual human brain make for more instant connections than there are stars in 20 to 40 thousand galaxies. Housed in a roundish ‘cockpit’ capable of swiveling (human head), equipped with two amazingly effective optic and ditto hearing sensors (eyes and ears) and a hard-drive full of constantly updatable lessons, topped off by the human intuition, they enable us to split-sec reference what we see, hear and feel when driving. Hard to beat those, if ever.
2. ‘Other cars’. Ever realized that before you can expect driverless vehicles to take over, you will probably need to phase out conventional, manually operated cars, and probably need overlaying grid control? AVs will be limited to campuses, industrial parks, gated communities, or ‘smart cities’ like the one Toyota is planning right now.
3. ‘Road anomalies’. A lot will probably need to happen before AVs can be considered safe. Intersections may need to be changed, improved, standardized. ‘Road anomalies’ may have to be removed, not to confuse an AV. It’s going to be a long and very costly process. Until that time, slow and cautiously maneuvering AVs will actually contribute to more congestion.
4. The displacement aspect. The types of SUVs and MPVs which are used by ride-hail providers, are not conducive to autonomously maneuvering. Vulnerable road users like pedestrians and cyclists should of course not become casualties of driverless taxis that can’t cope with traffic, because of its inherently complicated nature and unpredictable fluidity.
5. No Standardization in sight. There’s a winner-beats-all mindset, in which each AV developer is working on its own to bring an AV. Not good from a standardization perspective, which may be the most important prerequisite for any system that’s supposed to take over from human drivers. That requires all developers to open up and share their proprietary secrets. Fat chance that will happen any time soon.

Cheers, Ralph Panhuyzen