Driverless cars promise to save lives by driving better than constantly-texting, easily-distracted, sometimes-even-intoxicated humans, but – like any married couple knows – the cars can’t reach their true potential if they don’t communicate with each other.
Human senses are still better than the radars, lidars and cameras in driverless cars when it comes to things like classifying objects, edge detection, lane tracking and visibility range, according to a new report out of the University of Michigan’s Sustainable Worldwide Transportation research team.
The study concluded human drivers are still better at reasoning, perception and overall sensing while driving compared to today’s driverless cars.
The best potential replacement for a human driver is employing a combination of two things: different types of car sensors, or what’s called “sensor fusion,” and connected vehicle technology. The latter allows cars to communicate things like roadway conditions or obstructions to other cars over a network.
:To really have the best possible integration of an autonomous vehicle you need to have the connected DSRC involved so the vehicles can talk to each other instead of sort of having to see and sense their way through the world,” Brandon Schoettle, project manager at Sustainable Worldwide Transportation who authored the study, said in an interview with Jalopnik.
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