A special interest group called Consumer Watchdog is telling the California Department of Motor Vehicles that it must not allow Google and others with a stake in developing driverless vehicles “to push the DMV into issuing rules regulating the public use of robot cars on highways that are inadequate to protect public safety.”
“Most importantly, a driverless vehicle must allow a licensed driver to assume control when necessary,” wrote John M. Simpson, Consumer Watchdog Privacy Project director in a letter to DMV Director Jean Shiomoto. The observation comes at a time when automakers and their suppliers that are actually doing the development work are moving at ever increasing speeds toward driverless vehicles.
DMV regulations for testing driverless cars on California highways took effect on during September 2014. Testing regulations say that there must be a test driver in the driver’s seat who is capable of assuming control of the car.
California SB 1298, which directed the DMV to write rules covering driverless vehicles, required the department to have regulations for the public use of the robot vehicles in place by Jan. 1, 2015. DMV – dealing with complicated new technologies – missed that deadline and is still working on driverless car public use regulations.
“Despite Google’s public relations campaign and statements that it hopes to have robot cars for public use operating on the road within five years, it is important to understand what its vehicles cannot do,” said Simpson. “Recognition of the Google driverless cars’ shortcomings should help inform the DMV’s ‘autonomous vehicle’ public use rulemaking process.”
Consumer Watchdog’s letter noted a long list of shortcomings of Google’s driverless car technology, including:
— Weather. Heavy precipitation interferes with the vehicle’s sensors and they do not work in the snow, nor in heavy rain.
— Human hand signals. The robot cars cannot interact reliably with hand signals given by the human driver of another vehicle, or a police officer using only hand signals to direct traffic.
— Sunshine. If the sun is behind a traffic light, it can interfere with the driverless car’s ability to determine the traffic light’s color.
— Changing road conditions. The sensors do not recognize large potholes and would not detect an open manhole. If a traffic light were installed overnight as in the case of a road construction site, the car’s driverless navigation system would not expect it.
— Pre-mapped roads. Google’s robot cars rely on detailed sensor mapping of routes before the robot car travels the road. If a Google driverless car tried a route that had not been specially mapped, probably even a large parking lot, it would not know what to do.
— Humans. The driverless cars’ video sensors cannot reliably distinguish between a tree branch blowing in the wind and a pedestrian.
“The decision on whether to allow a particular manufacturer’s driverless cars to be offered to the public should be informed by the results of safety testing that is being done under the DMV testing regulations now in effect,” Consumer Watchdog said.
