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Will self driving trucks hit the roads with nobody on board or will they keep a human supervisor? (lemmy.world)

submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

45 comments fedilink hide all child comments

According to the news self driving trucks are about to hit the road with no driver on board.

But according to this book that is not going to happen. The author says that the real purpose is to get rid of the skilled drivers and replace them with underpaid button pushers.

Will they really do that? What's going to be the situation few years from now?

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Different companies have different plans. Arizona has had auto-driving trucks on freeways off and on for a couple years now as part of test programs. Always with a driver in the cab though.

A few years ago I would have though robo-convoys would be where things landed because three or four companies where working toward that. That's where the front truck has an operator and all the other trucks follow that leader driverlessly.

Now I feel like I have no idea where any of it is going. Step 1 in driverless should have always been to adopt an industry-wide mesh-network for all vehicles with level 3 (or higher) autonomy. If I'm on the road with (or inside of) an autonomous vehicle, I want it to be able get help from every other nearby car if its sensors suddenly die or start feeding it bad data. Especially after they've been on the road, poorly maintained by their owners, for a decade or more. If there are autonomous cars where will eventually be autonomous jalopies that drive like a drunk toddler because they sees lidar echos.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago (3 children)

robo-convoys

You mean like trains?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Can't get a train track to every single depot and loading dock in the country that receives shipments (which is like, practically every big box store and warehouse there is). There has to be a handover at some point.

Edit: also not a big fan of the train system in the US, since the vast majority of rail is privately owned. The operators have too much control. They'll charge towns extra to put automated crossing guards on their rail and then keep charging them for its maintenance. The jurisdiction can't use their own third party workers to maintain it. The railroads are legally only required to put up a sign. It's extortion if you ask me.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

Trains are only a good idea in tubes now. There was a memo about it a few years ago.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Only less efficient.