Car manufactures BMW, Uber, and Ford has pledged to make self-driving cars available half a decade from now, albeit working only in a severely limited set of places. Ford states that its set of self-driving vehicles to be launched in 2021 will not have the standard steering wheels, and would be compatible with driverless taxi services. But the ambition, however, of having a car drive for you without any restrictions and limits as to where you can go is a reality which is deemed to be distant, still.
This is because it is believed that the driverless vehicles of 2021 would be very limited in terms of where they can go. A few urban areas are places where the self-driving cars would become a reality first.
It was not explained, however, as to how restricted locations would be, and how soon these location restrictions would loosen up. These limitations in terms of where they could drive users are due to the challenge of making software see the world the way humans would.
The key to solving this particular issue is to know as to how to let sensors restrict safe driving conditions of a vehicle, and this is perceived to be one of the most important things to fix for successful autonomous driving. The situation on roads are often unpredictable, and therefore, a lot of trials have to be undergone to make sure that the cars would handle various driving scenarios, both common and uncommon.
One of the difficulties driverless cars face would be the unpredictability of weather. The lidar sensors which heavily rely on lasers find it difficult to manoeuvre on rainy, snowy, or hail-stricken days, as these hamper their ability to track the environment and the surroundings effectively in 3-D.
See Now: OnePlus 6: How Different Will It Be From OnePlus 5?
