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Transportation Programming United States

Locals Reportedly Are Frustrated With Alphabet's Self-Driving Cars (cnbc.com) 277

Posted by BeauHD from the road-rage dept.
More than a dozen people who work near Waymo's office in Chandler, Arizona, have complained about the self-driving cars to The Information. "One women said that she almost hit one of the company's minivans because it suddenly stopped while trying to make a right turn, while another man said that he gets so frustrated waiting for the cars to cross the intersection that he has illegally driven around them," reports CNBC. From the report: The anecdotes highlight how challenging it can be for self-driving cars, which are programmed to drive conservatively, to master situations that human drivers can handle with relative ease -- like merging or finding a gap in traffic to make a turn. Waymo has been testing its vehicles in the Phoenix suburbs for little more than a year and is widely seen as the furthest along in the self-driving car space, but its safety drivers have to take control of the vehicles regularly, people with direct knowledge of the issues tell The Information.

A Waymo spokesperson said its cars are "continually learning" and that "safety remains its highest priority" during testing. The spokesperson also said that Waymo is using feedback from its early rider program to improve its technology, though it declined to comment specifically on the intersection complaints mentioned in The Information story. The company has previously said that it plans to launch a commercial self-driving taxi service before the end of the year, but that its service will still include a Waymo employee in each car as a "chaperone."
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Locals Reportedly Are Frustrated With Alphabet's Self-Driving Cars More

Locals Reportedly Are Frustrated With Alphabet's Self-Driving Cars

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  • Try that in NJ... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by slasher999 ( 513533 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @08:45PM (#57221730)

    Try driving conservatively here in NJ, NYC, or any major city and you'll be an obstacle to be run over. Self driving cars, to be successful, need to adapt to the drivers around them instead of being an outlier when it comes to driving habits.

    • Re:Try that in NJ... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by 0100010001010011 ( 652467 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @10:08PM (#57222114)

      "I demand self driving cars violate the laws" How about you follow them?

      Jack up insurance in NJ and NYC for "human driven cars" and drop it for autonomous vehicles, the problem will fix itself.

      • Jack up insurance in NJ and NYC for "human driven cars" and drop it for autonomous vehicles, the problem will fix itself.

        The insurance rates are already jacked up here in NJ. If they jack them rates for human driven cars and lower them for autonomous vehicles, I predict a new reef will be built off the coast of NJ. We have a lot of forklifts, and people that know how to use them.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        How about you follow them?

        Spoken like someone who has never driven a car in a major American city. Good luck with changing the behavior of millions after millions of drivers. Your fantasy world has 0% chance of ever happening, so self-driving cars are going to have to adapt to the ambient traffic patterns, just as humans do.

        • Actually what will happen is that over time self-driving cars will replace human drivers. At some point insurance companies will start to give self driving car legal targets (either the owners, manufacturers or software companies, i.e. the people that can be sued) discount rates because the self-driving car always follows the laws. That will be the tipping point that will really push the balance. Eventually only self-driving cars will be allowed on the interstates.

          Once self-driving cars dominate even human

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by pnutjam ( 523990 )
            Yeah, that's exactly what happened with "smart" guns.

      • "I demand self driving cars violate the laws" How about you follow them?

        See this is why self driving cars will never work. If you don't have hands how can you lean one on the horn while flipping the bird with the other? I gather this is a more or less mandatory part of driving in NYC.

        • I'm sure the google engineers can come up with a servo operated arm to "flip the Bird". In most of the country it will activate only occasionally and totally at random. In NYC it will be on a continuous up down cycle as long as the car is in operation.

          The horn is just a switch much easier to automate.

      • Whose problem ? The humans have no problem in those cities. And humans are in charge of insurance rates, not self-driving-cars.

        • The humans have no problem in those cities.

          Are you seriously arguing that humans never cause accidents in those cities? HAHAHAHAHAH..... Humans cause thousands of accidents DAILY in these cities, most of which are due to incompetent driving. One of the primary motivations for self driving cars is precisely because humans have proven that they are quite bad at driving safely. Over 40,000 fatalities [usatoday.com] in car accidents a year in the US alone last year.

      • Jack up insurance in NJ and NYC for "human driven cars" and drop it for autonomous vehicles, the problem will fix itself.

        Insurance rates aren't there to enforce the law. They're there to cover the cost of coverage plus a reasonable profit. No insurance agency is going to unilaterally jack up rates on drivers, because that would put them at a competitive disadvantage, and they're not going to do so in concert with other insurance agencies, because that's price fixing, which is a federal crime.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by b0bby ( 201198 )

      I am in the process of teaching my kids how to drive, and they are probably a lot worse than these self driving cars. They speed up and slow down erratically, including braking mid block when I tell them they are going to be making a turn ahead. They drift over to the other lane without checking their blind spot. In one case, we crossed the double yellow on a rural winding road, leading to (rightly) angered oncoming drivers. Despite our "Student Driver" sticker, people get pissed off when they are behind us

      • I'd be interested in knowing how quickly your kids get better versus these Waymo cars. I'm assuming you expect them to stop making these mistakes some time in the next five years.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by thomst ( 1640045 )

      slasher999 observed:

      Try driving conservatively here in NJ, NYC, or any major city and you'll be an obstacle to be run over. Self driving cars, to be successful, need to adapt to the drivers around them instead of being an outlier when it comes to driving habits.

      I'm sorry, but this story strongly activated my clickbait bullshit filter when I first read it - the original article, straight from The Information's website, I mean.

      First off, nobody else is reporting this. Secondly, The Information appears to be a startup that's utterly desperate for visibility. Its website makes the proud boast that it doesn't accept advertising - but it does rather desperately plead for likes and reposts of its articles to social media. Thirdly (and most importantly

      • It doesn't mean that what many people had feared isn't coming true; that these companies care not for the other drivers on the road and care too much about their profits.

  • Is this the same group of locals who were complaining yesterday [slashdot.org], or is this a whole new group?

  • "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." --Thomas Watson, IBM

    Self-driving vehicles are inevitably the future, should the human population of Earth continue as Alpha species, which seems quite likely.

    Early technological setbacks are simply part of the evolution.

    • Re:Growing pains (Score:5, Insightful)

      by green1 ( 322787 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @08:56PM (#57221764)

      I don't think there's any doubt that self driving vehicles are the future. The issue is that it's become abundantly clear that they are not the present.

      People seem to think that self driving cars are almost here, only a couple of years out. The truth is that they are way further away than people want to believe. Driving is not an easy problem to solve, there are just too many edge cases. I am very much looking forward to self driving cars, and I really hope we manage to get there within the next 30 years or so when I expect I won't be able to drive myself any more. But realistically I think that 20-30 years is far more likely than 2-3.

      • Re:Growing pains (Score:5, Insightful)

        by rmdingler ( 1955220 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:09PM (#57221818) Journal
        Since self-driving delivery trucking is clearly, on the order of crystal, more profitable for your online-goods-provider-overlord, perhaps it comes down to insurability. Once your automotive insurance companies collectively determine it is in their actuarial interest to back nonhuman automobile pilots, the lobbying effort will be insurmountable.

        • Re:Growing pains (Score:4, Insightful)

          by green1 ( 322787 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:49PM (#57222008)

          Except, as we keep seeing, no insurance company will take that bet in any near future imaginable. Not until we know these cars can handle the most basic of driving tasks like rain and snow, construction zones, cops directing traffic, etc. Not a single one of which can be even remotely handled by any existing system. I do think we'll get there, but it is still a long way off.

          Insurance companies are extremely risk adverse. Until self driving cars are proven safer in all conditions and over millions and millions of miles, the insurance for them is likely to be far higher than the insurance for me. And so far, this is simply not the case. Humans may be horrible drivers, but we're still way better than any autonomous system out there, and it's by orders of magnitude.

          • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

            by Terry Carlino ( 2923311 )

            Self driving cars don't need to be better or even as good as all drivers. They just need to be better than 50% of drivers. Considering how bad most people drive that isn't that high a bar.

            Most of the time in really averse weather conditions the first thing that local government does is tell people not to drive. Most of the time people ignore this and end up in the ditch, stalled out in a puddle, or even washed away in a flood. You're right. Self driving cars won't handle that. People don't handle that well,

            • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

              by bingoUV ( 1066850 )

              Did you count the number of humans that did not end up in a ditch ? Those that reached their destination , albeit taking more time than usual ?

              • I wish I had mod points. I doubt he didn't count the humans that drove successfully that day. However, if one Google car makes a mistake we know for a fact they all are.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Ken_g6 ( 775014 )

              Self driving cars don't need to be better or even as good as all drivers. They just need to be better than 50% of drivers.

              This is absolutely wrong. It might be right if the car is just driving goods around, like delivering your groceries to you. But if the car is driving a person around it needs to be a lot better.

              If I drive myself around, I put the responsibility to drive well on myself, and I accept the consequences if I don't. A self-driving car driving me around takes the responsibility to drive well from me, so it needs to avoid the consequences as well as possible. It needs to drive like a well-trained and experience

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by bsolar ( 1176767 )
            Insurance companies usually don‘t take bets until they have enough data to statistically determine the odds. The risk doesn’t need to be low: it merely needs to be known. The price of the insurance will be calculated from that.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by eepok ( 545733 )

        Yep, I live in an area and work among people who are die-hard futurists by career choice whereas I'm an operations person who needs to invest in tangible and plannable products.

        I attended a conference earlier this year focused on vehicle electrification (currently available, but hard to facilitate), ride-hailing (here, but implemented in an exploitative manner), and autonomous cars (very far off). It was a two day conference and people were just fawning over the speakers who droned on about how "they're alm

  • And I'm frustrated with them too (Score:5, Insightful)

    by RhettLivingston ( 544140 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:05PM (#57221798) Journal

    As a generally law-abiding driver who drives the speed limit, comes to full stops, waits until both lanes are clear before pulling into traffic because you never know when someone will switch lanes into the one you'd like to enter, etc, I identify with the Waymo. The vast majority of drivers seem to drive with contempt for the law and safety.

    I constantly see people crossing solid lines near stop lights, changing lanes during turns, turning right on red when not in the outer lane, weaving through traffic, never leaving the 1 second per ten miles per hour gap to the cars in front of them, not using blinkers, driving while looking at their laps, passing cyclists as close as a couple of feet to them without slowing instead of giving them the rights of an equal vehicle, etc.

    Just today I had somebody honk their horn at me when I pulled in front of them to get out of the way of a fire truck and ambulance in my lane. They were driving along as if nothing was happening, apparently in full ignorance that they were supposed to be slowing or pulling over and yielding to any other vehicles that need to move to allow the emergency vehicles by. They should have cameras on the emergency vehicles recording all blatant failures to yield and hold hearings to revoke their driving privileges. Lives are often at stake.

    I've said for a while that we should require full instrumentation of every new vehicle with the same sensors as self-driving cars for a few years before we go full bore on the self-driving cars. During those years, we should both use that to collect all of the data and true, reliable statistics on how bad people really drive while evolving a system of full automatic enforcement of the traffic laws. After that, deployment of self-driving technology should be a cinch. Nobody will want to drive themselves if they have to do it legally. It is too boring.

    • Re:And I'm frustrated with them too (Score:4, Insightful)

      by jittles ( 1613415 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:35PM (#57221942)

      As a generally law-abiding driver who drives the speed limit, comes to full stops, waits until both lanes are clear before pulling into traffic because you never know when someone will switch lanes into the one you'd like to enter, etc,

      Where the hell do you live that this is even an option? You must cause all kinds of ire. Look buddy. It's illegal to change lanes in an intersection. If your lane is clear, you can turn into that lane safely because no one should be entering into it. You are probably causing all kinds of road rage. Where I live you would likely sit at that intersection for 30-40 minutes before you ever got a chance to turn unless you were stopped at a red light, and not an intersection where you have a stop sign and they do not.

      . The vast majority of drivers seem to drive with contempt for the law and safety.

      Do you ever drive slower than the speed of traffic in the left hand lane? Because that's also against the law and studies have shown that people who do that are more dangerous than people who speed.

      I constantly see people ... weaving through traffic

      Probably because people are illegally blocking traffic by driving slower than those around them in the left hand lanes. I usually drive to work in the far right hand lane because it's wide open while the left hand lane and carpool lanes often have cars going lower than the speed limit.

      They should have cameras on the emergency vehicles recording all blatant failures to yield and hold hearings to revoke their driving privileges. Lives are often at stake.

      We really ought to be more restrictive about who drives in the US. It's much harder to get a license in Germany. People obey the laws regarding rights of way, driving in the correct lane for their speed, etc. And they have a lot fewer accidents in Germany even though many sections of autobahns have few, if any, restrictions on speed. They typically only limit speeds in populated areas and where major roads come together.

      • Where the hell do you live that this is even an option? You must cause all kinds of ire. Look buddy. It's illegal to change lanes in an intersection. If your lane is clear, you can turn into that lane safely because no one should be entering into it. You are probably causing all kinds of road rage. Where I live you would likely sit at that intersection for 30-40 minutes before you ever got a chance to turn unless you were stopped at a red light, and not an intersection where you have a stop sign and they do not.

        You misunderstood me. I mean pulling into a four lane road from a side street. The lines in the lanes of the four lane road are not solid and people are driving 45+mph relative to you.

        Do you ever drive slower than the speed of traffic in the left hand lane? Because that's also against the law and studies have shown that people who do that are more dangerous than people who speed.

        All of my driving is city in Florida. These are boulevards with frequent left hand turn lanes, not interstates. There is no fast lane. Besides, Florida doesn't have or enforce a slow traffic stays right policy.

        Probably because people are illegally blocking traffic by driving slower than those around them in the left hand lanes. I usually drive to work in the far right hand lane because it's wide open while the left hand lane and carpool lanes often have cars going lower than the speed limit.

        No. The incidents I've seen (almost every day) are people driving 70+ through heavy traffic going around 50 on a boule

        • All of my driving is city in Florida. These are boulevards with frequent left hand turn lanes, not interstates. There is no fast lane. Besides, Florida doesn't have or enforce a slow traffic stays right policy.

          Florida does have a law making it illegal to drive slower than the traffic on your right on an interstate / highway. It’s just never enforced. I’ve watched an FHP officer turn on his lights for someone blocking the left lane, move him all the way to the right lane, and then turn off his lights and go around him. But I seriously doubt the idiot had any idea why the cop did that. And let me be clear, I am not advocating for people to weave in and out of traffic, either. It’s just that t

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by mysidia ( 191772 )

        It's illegal to change lanes in an intersection. If your lane is clear, you can turn into that lane safely because no one should be entering into it.

        In most states it is legal to change lanes in an intersection, unless its a crossroads with solid lines between each lane. If you turn suddenly in front of a vehicle changing lanes, that is one of rare situations where you can be found at fault, since you made an illegal turn in front of a vehicle -- even if the collision is you getting a rear-end collis

      • It's illegal to change lanes in an intersection.

        That is actually not 100% true as it varies from state to state. In Texas, it is completely to change lanes in an intersection, so long as it is safe to do so. Source [texashighwayman.com]

      • ? Because that's also against the law and studies have shown that people who do that are more dangerous than people who speed.

        The danger comes from the dpeed difference, not going slower per-se.

        Probably because people are illegally blocking traffic by driving slower than those around them in the left hand lanes.

        I notice how you save your ire for people going slow, but never for those going fast. You sonud like one of those entitles asshat drivers to me.

        • I notice how you save your ire for people going slow, but never for those going fast. You sonud like one of those entitles asshat drivers to me.

          I never have a problem with people going fast because I drive in the correct lane and they never have to pass me on the right. Why should I ever be angry at someone for passing me on the left? The law specifically indicates that it is the correct way to pass. From my perspective you sound like you feel entitled to drive in whatever lane you wish and that is most certainly not true.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by TheSync ( 5291 )

      I've recently acquired a car with radar-adaptive cruise control.

      I love it, but I realize that now that the "physics problem" of not hitting the car in front of me is taken care of, I realize how much I concentrate on the "psychological problem" of what those nuts out there are thinking about doing. Is he really going to cut across all those lanes of traffic? Is she just going to start walking across the road?

      • I have adaptive cruise control. It's great, I love it. But there have been a couple situations (all rainy ones) where I had to slam on the brakes because it was clearly not going to stop. It causes me to ask myself if I am stupid for using it, because I am just temping fate. One day it won't stop and I won't catch it in time. It's not like my auto vendor is going to take the blame for that.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by thomst ( 1640045 )

          fluffernutter confided:

          I am just temping fate.

          Which one? Klotho, Lachesis or Atropos?

          And, out of curiosity, are you "temping" her while she's on vacation - or is it maternity leave ... ?

    • What gets me is the car stopped suddenly during a right turn and another driver complained they almost hit it. Well shit, your 8-year-old ran out into the street in front of my car and I had to stop suddenly; I almost hit it!

      Maybe you should be in control of your vehicle in case you have to stop suddenly.

  • Too much caution is dangerous (Score:3)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:08PM (#57221804)
    My first accident was caused by it. I'm driving down a major thoroughfare (5 lanes, it's a small town) and I see someone trying to do a left from a stop sign start to just go. So I slow down. Bear in mind she's at a dead stop and I'm doing 45 on a major street. So she stops and I, thinking she sees me, speed back up to be about my way. She floors it and t-bones me.

    Later when I asked her why she said she saw me slowing and thought I was going to stop. In the middle of the street. A 5 lane street.

    Now, the girl was a ditz, it's true. But had I not slowed down she never would have gone.

    • Regardless, the accident was clearly her fault. People who are compromised in any way (including simple driving incompetance) will hopefully be amongst the first to decide that self-driving vehicles are for them.

      I was taught to never pull out when it isn't my right-of-way and isn't clear - even if someone stops and waves you out. There are people in the world who will wave you out and then floor it to hit you as an insurance scam. Hopefully, self-driving vehicles aren't being taught to take the statisticall

      • People who are compromised in any way (including simple driving incompetance) will hopefully be amongst the first to decide that self-driving vehicles are for them.

        Mr. Dunning and Mr. Kruger say no.

        • Mr. Dunning and Mr. Kruger say no.

          Very true. But a fact that can be corrected when we no longer have as strong an incentive to allow either physically or judgmentally compromised people to drive themselves and put others at risk. When self-driven vehicles arrive, it will become reasonable to develop zero tolerance laws that permanently take licenses for things like drunk driving as well as to create real driving tests that dig into precision, reaction times, attentiveness, and awareness and give them repeatedly throughout life. We won't nee

      • Doesn't matter whose fault it is when they are switching of your life support machine, or that of a loved one.

      • I was taught to never pull out when it isn't my right-of-way and isn't clear - even if someone stops and waves you out. There are people in the world who will wave you out and then floor it to hit you as an insurance scam.

        I was taught the former part (not the latter). I odn't stick by it, because in London, having some nice stranger let you out is about the only way of exiting some junctions this side of Christmas.

      • I don't care whose fault each individual accident is. Creating an accident-causing situation over and over and not fixing it is plain ignorance. If I leave my front door open and tell everyone when I'm not home it's my fault when my house gets robbed even though the thief goes to jail. It's common sense that you shouldn't be ignoring a dangerous situation.

    • She t-boned you because you didn't then have the experience to avoid an idiot.
      My first week on a motorbike I was right turned (left in the US) because I didn't avoid an idiot,
      broken collar bone and bike.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sad_ ( 7868 )

      I'm driving down a major thoroughfare (5 lanes, it's a small town)

      5 lanes, small town? wow... you should see how many lanes people outside the US get to their major cities.

    • Being "nice" is also dangerous. Once I was preparing to turn left and the oncoming car stopped and waved for me to turn ahead of him. If I had done so, I would have gotten creamed by the guy in the other lane who didn't stop!

  • give the technology about 10 more years (Score:5, Interesting)

    by schematix ( 533634 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:12PM (#57221836) Homepage
    I was in Tempe about 2 weeks ago and these things were all over the place. Twice i observed them driving erratically. One time it was trying to change lanes, but seemingly couldn't decide what to do. It moved halfway over, before reaching an intersection, then moved back over, applying the brakes unnecessarily, and then trying again. The first attempt it was wide open to make the move, the second one was a little dicey and i had to back off because i thought there was going to be an accident in front of me.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mikael ( 484 )

      Sounds like the same behaviour that a driver would have when in an unfamiliar road network. I remember there was a documentary on police cops. There was a major freeway that had seven lanes. These split off in three or four directions at some point. You had to know exactly which lanes to use because there was no logical connection to the geographical destination. So drivers new to the area would frequently lane hop between all possibilities in order to read the signs, then shoot off to the far lane because

  • Could this lead to (Score:4, Funny)

    by Blinkin1200 ( 917437 ) on Wednesday August 29, 2018 @09:33PM (#57221932)

    Could this lead to a new version of cow tipping?

    Asking for a friend.

  • The phrase "Little old lady from Pasadena" was, after all, coined in L.A. to describe someone who basically drives like a self driving car. In Los Angeles you are either driving aggressively or you're parked. There is no moderate option. I spent about 40 years driving there and learned the basic rule is to always drive as fast as you can. That may be anywhere between 80 and 0 mph and it's subject to change at any moment. If you attempt to leave a "safe" interval between cars on a L.A. freeway you can be pr
  • She just has to change her name to Carlos Danger. Problem solved!

  • Put a learner plate on them till they know what they are doing, enforce learner speed limits and 0% alcohol

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

      How are you going to stop a gasoline powered car from drinking? There's 10-15% ethanol in the fuel! This must be dealt with immediately!

  • If you don't want to hit someone turning right.... (Score:3)

    by johnsie ( 1158363 ) on Thursday August 30, 2018 @02:16AM (#57222870)
    If you don't want to hit someone who stops suddenly, don't be so far up the persons ass that you nearly crash into them. Always keep a safe distance from the car in front.
    • These people didn't hit the cars. It's still annoying as hell when you have to slam on the breaks just to maintain that comfortable space.

  • Indeed (Score:3)

    by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Thursday August 30, 2018 @03:21AM (#57223018)

    We can't have cars on the road that respect traffic laws or the world comes to an end.

  • One women said that she almost hit one of the company's minivans because it suddenly stopped while trying to make a right turn.

    Zero sympathy for that. People may need to make a sudden stop for any number of reasons. If you hit them from behind, you are at fault. Every day on my commute I see people driving too close to the vehicle in front of them for the speed they're going. It is, quite literally, an accident waiting to happen.

  • I only see this working one way! (Score:3)

    by SGDarkKnight ( 253157 ) on Thursday August 30, 2018 @07:21AM (#57223744)

    There is only one possible way I can see self driving cars working, if we don't want to wait another decade for them. You need to eliminate all the non-self driving cars from the equation. And like most of you out there, that simply will not happen. I don't want to give up my right to drive myself. I'm guessing it's the same for many people out there. So how do we do this? Below is the only way I can see it happening.

    First, you would need to establish a new "neighborhood", whether for commercial or residential, it would work either way. Designate the entire neighborhood as self driving cars only. Make it illegal to have a non-self driving car inside the designated area. Have a parking garage on the border for people to leave their non-self driving cars. If their can has a self driving feature, they can have it activated when they enter the designated "neighborhood", and deactivated when they leave the area.

    You need to remove the human element from the equation in order for this to work properly. And the only way I can see that happening is by having an area where no human element was allowed to take hold in the first place. No amount of programming can account for the stupidity of people.

    Like the old saying, make something foolproof, and the world will make a better fool.

    • A person being 'alarmed' by another car stopping suddenly in front of them is completely understandable. A person being frustrated with a car waiting at an intersection when they clearly could have gone three times is understandable. If the person drives around the car and still has time, there is definitely something very wrong with the Google cars.
  • Seeing one person out of ten thousand make a mistake, and then holding all people responsible for that mistake is bullshit. Seeing one Google self driving car make a mistake and holding all Google self driving cars responsible for that mistake is a reality of self driving.

  • "One women said that she almost hit one of the company's minivans because it suddenly stopped while trying to make a right turn ..."

    She almost hit the vehicle in front of her -- making her almost an unsafe driver. This is not grounds for her to complain.

    Safe drivers allow sufficient stopping distance between themselves and the vehicle ahead. Doesn't matter why the vehicle ahead stops abruptly (driver had a stroke, software crashed, doesn't matter). The vehicle behind is always responsible for not hitting

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