TAE's Utopian Daydreams, Part 1: Cars That Drive Themselves

I wake up in the morning. My Motorola "Droid" alarm app has recognized when I am in a light sleep cycle and conveniently awakens me during this, simultaneously sending a wifi signal to the coffee pot to go ahead and brew. In the bathroom, the lights turn on. I stumble into the bathroom, and mutter "shower". The shower kicks on. An LED thermometer in the showerhead lights up, and turns from blue to red as the water heats up. Once red enough, I step in and take a shower. After my shower, I dress and go to the kitchen. The local newspaper has been downloaded to my Kindle, as has the New York Times. I skim headlines as I sip coffee. I push a button on my keychain and here the familiar noise of my truck starting outside. I send off a couple texts real quick to a friend, then put on my coat and head for the door. The front door unlocks when I am (my phone is) within a certain proximity, and as I exit my house it locks itself back up automatically. The lights inside also turn off, as my wife is still sleeping.

I climb into my truck, and open up the console (where steering wheels used to be). The console shows a map, my location, nearby landmarks, and includes options like satellite view, traffic updates (usually boring and uneventful), weather/road conditions, etc. I hit the "work" shortcut key and close the console. I sip some more coffee. My truck clicks into drive and pulls itself out of my parking space. I sit back and read my Kindle. I glance out the window at the sun coming up. "Radio" I say, then "AM 980", and the news comes on. I scan more headlines, as my truck smoothly navigates down roads towards work.
My reading is interrupted by a "ding ding ding..." "mute" I say to the radio, and I open the console. The truck informs me that a vehicle has broken down on my normal route, and it is automatically diverting me two blocks east. I clear the update and with an "unmute" go back to reading. The guy on the radio mentions the broken down vehicle, and informs commuters that their commute should be increased by an average of 8.3 seconds due to various diversions.
When I arrive at work, my truck drops me off at the door. The console informs me that the truck needs to go get gas, and since I got paid yesterday, I also tell it to get an oil change and tire rotation. I tell it to go to the car wash, but to not spend more than $7.00 on the wash. I climb out of my truck and it smoothly departs. I go in to work.

At lunch time, I receive an email from the maintenance place, informing me that the truck arrived, the oil was changed, tires were rotated, and my truck is en route back to me. The email also tells me that the maintenance shop estimates my truck has 15,000 miles left on the current tires, which agrees with what my truck console suggests. Twenty minutes later I receive a text that my truck spent $6.50 at a nearby drive-thru car wash. My bank account auto-updates around this time each day (and auto-downloads the data to Quicken) and I see a $35.73 charge to my account from Quiktrip for gas.

At 5 pm, I send a text to my truck informing it I am leaving in 15 minutes. I pack my things, say goodbye to my co-workers and depart work. My truck, which has been parked somewhere (it really doesn't matter to me where it parks), pulls up at exactly 5:15. I climb in and punch "home" on the console. Halfway home, I realize I should grab some groceries. "Destination change" I speak loudly. The truck console opens, and I say "HyVee". A map shows the nearest HyVee grocery stores, as well as ones nearby my home. I choose my normal HyVee, and hit "Go." The truck smoothly alters the route, and shows me my time of arrival (estimated time of arrival is a thing of the past). At HyVee, I grab a few groceries, pay with a swipe of my cell phone, and climb back into my truck. "Home" I say, and the console updates my destination. In minutes I am home.

In the five years since my wife and I turned over the keys to an Automated Driving System, we have never had an accident, or ticket. Our insurance premiums dropped from $190.00 a month for our two cars to $18.00 a month ADS car insurance purely covers catastrophic mechanical failure leading to vehicle collisions...no other accidents exist). We received a $1,300.00 tax rebate from the government for volunteering for the system, and because the autopilot is a more energy efficient driver than I or my wife ever was, we save approximately $145 dollars in gas per year. So in five years, we've saved over $12,000. We used this money to pay for the automated driver system ($1,300 total), my truck ($6,500) and the rest went to pay down my student loan debt.
My truck has had no mechanical failures. Twice, the ADS crashed, at which point the truck simply went into autopilot, pulled over, and rebooted. Two minutes later, it was back in action. One of those two times, I didn't even notice it happening until I received an email later informing me the manufacturer was looking into it. My wife no longer frets about going to a new destination, she simply puts the desired destination in her console and relaxes. That alone justified the ADS in her car!

Do I miss driving? Sometimes. I miss aggressively switching lanes, I miss laying on the gas and feeling my body slammed into my seat-back. I miss the control. Despite the obvious safety, I sometimes get nervous that if something went wrong I'd have no ability to get myself out of it using some sweet (though imaginary) driving trick. Some people still fight the system, they feel like their freedom has been impinged. But how can they say their "freedom to drive" outweighs the 40,000+ vehicular fatalities that occurred every year in this country before the ADS network was put in place? What about those people's freedom to be alive?
A few people have said the system is too dangerous, that terrorists, be it domestic or foreign, could hack the network and cripple the entire nation by halting travel. But in five years, 200,000+ Americans who would have otherwise died from vehicular collisions and drunk driving accidents haven't died, there hasn't been a terrorist incident, and life goes on. Would it really have been smart to not implement this system that guarantees American lives protected...just because some terrorists might delay our commutes some day?

Later that night, Mrs. TAE and I flop, more than a little tipsy, into her car. I mumble for it to take us home from a crazy night at the bars, which it does, safely. Safely for us, and safely for everyone else on the road that night. Would I have had the freedom to get that tanked had I been required to drive? Seems like the ADS actually is giving me more freedom, fiscal and social...rather than less.


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