Randall O'Toole and traffic automation

Taking the Driver Out of the Car
Why robocars, and not high-speed rail, could revolutionize transportation in the next decade
By RANDAL O'TOOLE

'Your grandchildren will snap across the entire continent in 24 hours on a new kind of highway and in a new kind of driverless car that is controlled by the push of a button," futurist Norman Bel Geddes promised in 1940. Mr. Bel Geddes designed Futurama, the most popular exhibit at the 1939 New York World's Fair, which in many ways inspired the construction of the Interstate Highway System.
Driverless cars have so far remained the stuff of science fiction. Seventy years after Mr. Bel Geddes's promise, they are finally close to reality.
Consumers today can buy cars that steer themselves; accelerate and brake to maintain a safe driving distance from cars ahead; and detect and avoid collisions with other cars on all sides. Making them completely driverless will involve little more than a software upgrade.
Yet the potential for advanced personal mobility is being ignored in debates over surface transportation. These debates come to a head every six years, when Congress hashes out how to spend federal gas tax revenues. Congress has increasingly diverted the funds—$40 billion a year by last count—from highways to transit.
The Obama administration and House Transportation Committee Chairman James Oberstar (D., Minn.) want to go even further in the next reauthorization, now scheduled for 2011. The administration has focused on a new national high-speed rail system, as well as streetcars, light rail and other projects, to reduce driving and congestion.
Yet driverless cars could render the hand-wringing over roads versus rail needless. Driverless technologies were demonstrated in 1997 on a California freeway when eight cars without drivers successfully operated just one car length apart at 65 miles per hour. In 2007, six cars negotiated the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Urban Challenge, following all traffic rules in an urban environment with other vehicles.
Volkswagen says enhanced global positioning systems can keep cars within two centimeters of their desired location on streets and highways. This summer, the company will demonstrate its technology by running a driverless Audi at racing speeds up the twisty Pikes Peak road.
At the 2007 event, General Motors vice president of research Lawrence Burns predicted that completely driverless cars would be on the market by 2018. He added that the primary obstacles were legal and bureaucratic, not technological.
Driverless vehicles offer huge advantages over current autos. Because computer reaction times are faster, driverless cars can safely operate more closely together, potentially tripling highway throughput. This will virtually eliminate congestion and reduce the need for new road construction.
Toyota's recent recalls naturally lead to worries that computer glitches could cause serious accidents. Since each car will be independently controlled, a failure in one would simply lead others to avoid that car. Modern cars already have numerous built-in computers that do things, such as anti-lock braking, far more reliably than humans, even those who are not texting or inebriated. Any serious problems could be quickly corrected through wireless software upgrades.
Driverless cars and trucks will be safer. They will also be greener, first by significantly reducing congestion, and eventually because vehicles will be lighter in weight due to reduced collision risks.
Perhaps most important, driverless vehicles will bring mobility to everyone, not just those able to pass a driver's test. While many people will still choose to own a car, increased numbers may rely on car sharing. Outside of ultra-high-density areas such as Manhattan, driverless cars will render urban transit and intercity passenger trains even more obsolete than they are today.
The American automobile fleet turns over every 18 years, so if Mr. Burns's prediction that driverless cars will hit the market by 2018 comes true, we could have a completely driverless system by 2036. State highway officials could accelerate this timetable by working with auto manufacturers to set standards and a transition path. State and local highway agencies could install wireless communication systems at major intersections and highways—a much less costly undertaking than building new roads, much less high-speed rail.