The EVolution #19: Look Ma, no hands!

An overview of the "self-driving" capabilities of Tesla and others

“You can just sit back and this thing will drive itself, right?” Multiple friends have had this misperception about my Tesla Model 3. This stems not just from the real technical advancements Tesla has pioneered with driver assistance and autonomy features, but unfortunately also from confusing marketing and irresponsible usage by a minority of Tesla drivers.

This week, following years of headline-grabbing accidents, the National Highway Transportation Safety Association (NHTSA) announced a deepening investigation into the company due to "an accumulation of crashes in which Tesla vehicles, operating with Autopilot engaged, struck stationary in-road or roadside first responder vehicles tending to pre-existing collision scenes."

Not your automatic pilot

First, though, there is a critical misconception to clear up. Despite the name, Autopilot does not drive the car for you. Beyond standard safety features (e.g. emergency braking, blind spot monitoring) Autopilot is merely Tesla’s name for their cruise control system, which has two capabilities:

1. Adaptive speed: adjusts your driving speed slower or faster to maintain a minimum distance between you and the vehicle in front of you, never exceeding the max cruising speed you select

2. Lane control: keeps you in your lane on highways and well-marked major roads

That’s it. These are features not unique to Tesla nor electric vehicles. In my experience they have been safe and quite useful at reducing driver workload and fatigue on longer trips. The system regularly checks that pressure is being applied to the steering wheel and provides visual and audio warnings when insufficient force is detected. If the warnings go unheeded, it will deactivate.

Since 2019 Autopilot has come standard with every new Tesla. It is very different from the premium feature called Full Self-Driving (FSD), which I and most Tesla drivers do not have.

Betas in the wild

FSD, which sells under a “beta” label, currently costs an additional $12,000 (a price that has increased over time and reportedly will continue to do so). Its unfinished status has drawn much scorn from Tesla critics, particularly due to years of overconfident, erroneous pronouncements by Elon Musk.

DEC 2015: I think we will have complete autonomy in approximately two years.

MAR 2017: I think we are less than two years away from complete autonomy, safer than humans, but regulations should take at least another year.

FEB 2019: The car will be able to find you in a parking lot, pick you up, take you all the way to your destination without an intervention this year. I'm certain of that. That is not a question mark. It will be essentially safe to fall asleep and wake up at their destination towards the end of next year.

Some critics go further, arguing that “beta” software should not be tested in public by ordinary civilians. Nonetheless, Tesla has continued to roll out incremental upgraded capabilities to FSD owners. They currently have the ability to automatically drive on highways, change lanes, take exits, stop at traffic lights, and more.

An entire genre of YouTube videos is Tesla FSD footage in time-lapse or real-time format. Some of these are honestly remarkable.

Attack of the clones

FSD’s capabilities and ambitions set Tesla apart from major automakers, but Autopilot doesn’t. While Tesla has been a lightning rod for criticism over cruise control abuse, others in the industry are starting to tread that ground.

The closest Autopilot rival is “Super Cruise” by General Motors. It is available on several Cadillac models, the upcoming Hummer EV, and the Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra pickup trucks. During the past NFL season, I was startled to see a recurring ad for the Sierra which showed drivers leaving their hands off the wheel just to clap along to “We Will Rock You” while on a bridge and while driving on the wrong side of the road to pass a truck.

As far as encouraging unsafe behavior, this seemed to me to be rather brazen. (Sure enough, later airings of the ad scrubbed most of the offending footage, but the version above saved by a YouTube user reflects what I remember.)

Next year an even more advanced “Ultra Cruise”, powered by Qualcomm, will debut. The competition doesn’t stop there. Mercedes is working on its own version (in partnership with Nvidia), while formidable Intel-subsidiary Mobileye is providing the magic behind programs by Ford (“BlueCruise”), BMW, Nissan, and others.

What to make of it all

A lot of the technology and driver assistance features being rolled out are genuinely useful and can increase safety on the roads. It’s a shame those benefits have been obscured by inattention to adequate controls and by irresponsible marketing decisions.

I think about how, a year ago, I was a passenger in a car that was t-boned by an impaired, speeding driver who was weaving across lanes and then ran a red light and struck us. My partner and I were taken in an ambulance to the emergency room, me in a stretcher. Thankfully, we were both extremely fortunate to avoid serious, life-altering injuries.

I don’t want to play video games in my car, and I don’t want drivers napping instead of paying attention to the road. Car companies shouldn’t position their technology this way. But when radar or cameras trigger a warning that prevents you from colliding with something in your blind spot, when lane-keeping on an hours-long stretch of highway keeps drivers fresh and alert, and when drowsy or drunk drivers’ erratic behavior is detected and they are encouraged or forced to pull over, that’s a win.

Let’s do this responsibly, y’all.