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Google's driverless car team recently decided that they will begin using robot cars on their commute to work, but for most of us such luxuries are still a ways off. In the meantime, Michigan has announced its own test of an automated traffic safety system.
The test system is called Connected Vehicles and was launched by the University of Michigan's Transportation Research Institute and the U.S. Department of Transportation. Connected Vehicles will allow 3,000 cars in the Ann Arbor area to communicate with each other via Wi-Fi to avoid accidents and improve the overall flow of traffic. Manned by volunteers driving buses, cars, and trucks, the warnings will include alerts sent to vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communication devices that will detect impending collisions and lane changes made by vehicles moving into the blind spots of other vehicles.
The pilot program is scheduled to last for one year and will be used to determine the possible rollout of a larger system by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in the future.
An electric car that is able to park itself and come to the driver when "called" has been unveiled at the Ceatec 2012 show in Tokyo. Nissan's NSC-2015 is only a prototype, but its name suggests the carmaker aims to have it on the market by 2015. Many car companies have been working on autonomous technology, with a number of driverless cars unveiled in recent months. But one analyst warned that the mass use of such cars was a long way off.
The NSC-2015 is a modified version of Nissan's Leaf model. It relies on sensors, cameras, computers and 4G communication technology for wireless links to navigate, and robotics to turn the steering wheel, change gears and brake. When demonstrated at Ceatec, the car drove itself at about 3mph (5km/h) in a straight line forward and in reverse, and was able to turn. It was shown that the car could recognise road markings and was able to stop at a crossing.
A Nissan representative also controlled the car from the outside, making it drive towards him as he pressed some buttons on his phone. "After the driver exits the NSC-2015, it starts to park itself automatically, following the instructions given by smartphone," the company said. "The vehicle looks for a vacant parking space while identifying its surroundings; once it detects an open parking space automated parking begins. "The driver can also use smartphone commands to make the NSC-2015 vehicle leave the parking space and return to the place where he or she is. "While parked, the car's security camera system automatically works with a camera installed in the vehicle. If the system detects suspicious behaviour, the driver is alerted automatically by a report to his or her smartphone."
However, Tooru Futami, engineering director at electronics engineering development division at Nissan, told Forbes that the car was not yet able to self-drive down the street or park itself in any space. He said the demo version could only self-park in an area equipped with sensors and restricted to other robotic cars to avoid the risk of collision.
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