Beating the traffic
The roads get busier, the traffic queues get longer, and humanity spends more and more of its time sitting in little tin boxes. Is technology giving us any alternatives?
We've all seen sci-fi films such as the scene in I Robot in which cars drive themselves, and for years the motor companies have been working on systems to allow cars to autonomously drive nose to tail and pack more cars onto the highway, but we have yet to see these become a reality. Until now. The state of Nevada has licensed the first self-driving vehicles, and the cars concerned are Google's fleet of self-driving cars. To alert other drivers that the car is computer controlled, the cars will have a red number plates with white lettering.
Meanwhile, in Spain, Volvo has just completed a successful test in which three cars drove themselves for 125 miles, following a lorry along a public motorway. Whilst Volvo has previously performed similar tests on test tracks, this is the first time such cars have driven themselves on a public highway in the presence of other road users.
If the self-driving car isn't frightening enough, what about another staple of sci-fi, the flying car? It still sounds like sci-fi to me, but the EU is splashing in excess of four million Euros on MyCopter a project at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology to investigate technologies for "Personal Air Vehicles", by which it seems to mean battery-powered and computer-piloted personal helicopters. The premise of this project seems to be that the only way to ease traffic congestion is to take to the air, and create car parks for fleets of helicopters on the rooftops of office blocks. At the moment though, it seems to consist of little more than an artist's impression so our air is safe for a little while yet.
For a totally futuristic idea, have a look at this great fun video made by Volkswagen. Sadly, its all CGI effects, and they haven't really built a hover car.
As fun as some of these ideas are though, you have to ask if they are the right solution to our problems. Yes, our roads are congested, but do we really want autonomous vehicles which can make them even more congested, and should the EU be spending four million Euros of our money on ways to make our air just as crowded and dangerous? Wouldn't we get better value for money and less of a carbon footprint per person if we looked at ways to improve public transport instead?
We should also question the need for hugely expensive projects such as HS2 rail link which will cost a minimum of £33 billion and rip through precious countryside. It will shave 15 minutes of the journey time between Birmingham and London and simply result in an even bigger commuter belt. Wouldn't it be better to change our mindset and stop thinking that the world must revolve around capital cities like London? In this digital communications age, when we can do more and more things at a distance, why do so many government departments, big businesses and every financial institution feel it is necessary to have their head office in the city?
30th May 2012
This article comes from the SKILLZONE email newsletter, published monthly since January 2008, and covering topics related to technology and the internet. All articles and artwork in the SKILLZONE newsletter are orignal content.