Transportation Scenario 2015
Next Exit: Tomorrow
Driving is set to change in many ways. By 2015, onboard sensors will help to guide motorists out of harm's way. Automated travel on special lanes may be possible. Entertainment and information will be tailored to driver preferences, location and real-time needs. Here's a personal look at what it might be like.
One mile ahead, vehicles equipped with multiple sensors signal a sharp reduction in speed. This location-specific information is transmitted to a service provider and broadcast. When processed by a vehicle's navigation system, the informationif relevantis passed on to its driver, along with revised instructions for reaching a destination. Meanwhile, a passenger surfs the Web for real-time information on local restaurants that fit a customer's preferences, as stored in the driver's bluetooth-connected PDA
I'm a salesman. Medical equipment. Big ticket stuff. I travel a lot. The customersthe senior ones especiallystill prefer a real, rather than a virtual face-to-face. I like it too; and besides, the company just handed me this great new car. After the biometric security stuff was downloaded, all I had to do was get close to it with my WristAssista kind of PDAand everything would be set according to my style: The Internet medbiz digests from the virtual radio, my favorite announcing voices, my customer database, favorite hotels, even my favorite waitresses! The car and the PDA recognize each other from the word go. And talk about "go," all I have to do is say "Kettering Medical Center," for instance, and the car's synthetic voicea perfect copy of my girlfriend'ssays "Honey, do you mean 3535 Southern Boulevard in Kettering, Ohio?" That's it. I give her a thumbs upliterallyand the dashboard camera recognizes the gesture, the navigation system checks traffic and weather conditions, locks in the best route, and that great voice tells me she's ready to roll.
Anyway, Kettering's where I'm headed today. It's a great section of Dayton, Ohio. Big houses, wide streets; about 35 miles north of where I live. But first, I'm off to Linda's Dr. Betz to everyone else. She's the newest member of our sales team and lives just a couple of miles down the road from me. She's great with the clinical stuff.
Getting over to her place is no problem. Not only does the navigation system tell me how to get there, it takes all kinds of other things into account. This morning, for instance, it took a route that surprised me. Why? Turns out an ambulance was headed for a house two blocks away and the system is programmed to give emergency vehicles priority.
Once we hit Interstate 75 for Dayton, the BlindSpot sensor tells me I can squeeze the car into the right-hand lanes. That's where it's still possible to zip in and out of the slower-moving traffic. Granted, it would be more relaxing to just slide into the far left lane, activate the adaptive cruise controlan all-weather vision and radar systemand just let the car drive itself. But that lane is dominated by trucks, and frankly, I still get a buzz out of operating the pedals and the wheel myself.
Thanks to video and radar sensors, tomorrow´s cars and trucks will be able to avoid many of today´s accidents. Near-distance (24 GHz) and Far-distance (77 GHz) radar will make ataptive cruise control (ACC) possible, and, when fused with video information, will lead to vehicles with 360°"total awareness." Such vehicles may be capable of automated parking and driving in limited areas(Source: Siemens VDO)
In the mean time, Linda is talking to the passenger display terminal about a suitable restaurant for our customer, the hospital's Chief of Surgical Robotics. The navigation system checks my PDA for his preferences, compares them with restaurants that can be reached in under 15 minutes from the medical center, and comes up with a place called "Time Out" that advertises "Virtual dining in the time of your choice." Linda settles on a low-cal version of the menu enjoyed by George Washington and others on the day they signed the Declaration of Independence, complete with period music.
Years ago (I won't say how many!) when I was still new to the business, there used to be loads of accidents. People would nod off at the wheel. Some never woke up. That's not too likely to happen any more. Little camera in the dash watches your eyes. If they close too often or too long, the radio produces a bone-jarring clatter from the direction the car is headed in. In some of the Japanese models, the steering wheel shakes like a belly dancer.
And remember all those rear-end collisions? They're history now. In a real emergency, most carsand all truckswill actually hit the brakes for you. And I mean instantly. Besides, if a vehicle does brake suddenly, the message will be channeled through its navigation system and on to its Internet service provider. Within a split second, everyone else who could be affected by it gets a voice message.
Unfortunately, that's exactly what's happened up the road. "Sorry sweety, but traffic is slowing to 21 miles an hour one mile ahead," the voice tells me. The navigation system is already blinking an arrow in the HUD (head-up display) indicating that the next exit offers an alternative route to the medical center. We take it and within 15 minutes we pull up at the hospital's garagejust in time for our appointment.
Fortunately, there's a new underground section for vehicles equipped with "autopark." Thank goodness the company gave me that option! I give a verbal O.K. as the sultry voice says "Honey, permission to park in level 3, slot 127?" As we head for the nearest elevator I look over my shoulder in time to see the car gliding down the ramp into the garage.
Arthur F. Pease