Your questions answered: driverless cars

Driverless vehicle technology is developing rapidly. Numerous semi-autonomous systems are already available in cars today and fully self-driving models are being tested in locations around the world. But will these vehicles remove the need for a human driver (or at least supervisor) altogether and what are the barriers — technological and legal — to this happening?

For the latest in our series of reader Q&As, we put your questions on driverless car technology to a panel of experts including:

What is the current ‘state of the art’ in self-driving car technology that has been installed in test models but not necessarily made it to the roads yet?

Tim Edwards: All the key technical aspects required for self-driving cars have previously been demonstrated in some form since 2004. Within the last 12 months we have seen most of the major automotive brands now showing some form of self-driving vehicle. The limitations that exist with current demonstration vehicles tend to be related to cost, packaging and reliability. However, there is still significant work to be done to improve the automated vehicles’ ability to handle the full range of complex traffic and environmental conditions they might encounter and to do so without prior knowledge, special infrastructure or human driver intervention.

Michael Fausten: Bosch is developing a number of driver-assistance technologies that form part of the effort to move towards fully automated driving. ‘Automatic Park Assist’ allows a car to be parked remotely using a smartphone app and is likely to be available from 2015. ‘Traffic Jam Assistant’ will step in when the vehicle is moving at speeds between 0 and 30mph and is expected to enter series production in 2014. Further functions will follow to cover ever-faster speeds and more complex driving situations up to a highway pilot, making fully automated driving a reality. Finally, Bosch has successfully trialled highly automated vehicles on the German autobahn and on US highways, which gather data using an array of sensors, including radar and video cameras, as well as a roof-mounted laser scanner (LIDAR) that generates a detailed 3D map of the environment.