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Transportation Intel

Intel's Mobileye Begins Testing Autonomous Vehicles In New York City (theverge.com) 32

Posted by BeauHD from the notoriously-congested-roadways dept.
Mobileye, the company that specializes in chips for vision-based autonomous vehicles, is now testing its AVs in New York City -- a difficult and rare move given the state's restrictions around such testing. The Verge reports: The announcement was made by Amnon Shashua, president and CEO of the Intel-owned company, at an event in the city on Tuesday. Shashua said the company is currently testing two autonomous vehicles in New York City, but plans to increase that number to seven "in the next few months." New York City has some of the most dangerous, congested, and poorly managed streets in the world. They are also chock-full of construction workers, pedestrians, bicyclists, and double- and sometimes even triple-parked cars. In theory, this would make it very difficult for an autonomous vehicle to navigate, given that AVs typically rely on good weather, clear signage, and less aggressive driving from other road users for safe operation. But Shashua said this was part of the challenge in deciding where to test Mobileye's vehicles.

"I think for a human it's very, very challenging to drive in New York City," Shashua said, "not to mention for a robotic car." While other states have become hot beds for AV testing, New York has been a bit of a ghost town. Part of the reason could be the state's strict rules, which include mandating that safety drivers keep their hands on the wheel at all times and requiring state police escort at all times to be paid for by the testing company. A spokesperson for Mobileye says the company has obtained a permit from the state to test its vehicles on public roads and is currently the only AV testing permit holder in the state. The spokesperson also said that police escorts were no longer required.
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Intel's Mobileye Begins Testing Autonomous Vehicles In New York City More

Intel's Mobileye Begins Testing Autonomous Vehicles In New York City

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  • Worst traffic in the country (like the article says), or worst traffic in the world (like the summary says)?

    Aaron Z

    • In the country? Probably.
      In the world? Probably not. Have you ever seen videos of road traffic in Russia and India?!

      • I am in China and it's pretty bad but I hear it's a picnic compared to India.

      • In the country? Probably not even there. People who've driven in both cities almost all say Boston is way worse than NYC. The streets don't meet at right angles, a "block" has anywhere between 3 and 6 sides, and the locals treat driving like it's a contact sport. The traffic may be worse in NYC but the Boston driving environment is almost certainly more challenging for both humans and AIs.

        • Don't forget the ungodly narrow lanes.

          From my armchair research it's 12' standard everywhere else, Boston went with 10'.

          - Yo Grark

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Aczlan ( 636310 )

        In the country? Probably.
        In the world? Probably not. Have you ever seen videos of road traffic in Russia and India?!

        I agree 100%, even some parts of Argentina have worse traffic than NYC in my experience...
        One nice thing is that NYC is (from what I have seen driving through it) fairly well laid out on a grid vs Boston where the roads in the city appear to have been laid on where the cowpaths used to be (at least that's how it felt the few times I drove through it).

        Aaron Z

    • Something that I have found to be a general trend, tasks that are difficult for a human to do, are often much more programmatically easier for a computer to handle, while tasks that humans do effortlessly are often a complex task for a computer to handle.

      Cities with bad traffic often give AI some advantages.
      1. Slow traffic, gives the AI a longer reaction time to plan ahead.
      2. A lot of lights and strict driving rules. This gives the AI extra information on what other traffic most likely will do and also it

      • Wow, that sounds really great! Computers are obviously perfect for driving, we should have self driving wrapped up by next week!

        • I never had implied that at all.

          Just Busy City based AI has the ability to do a lot processing that is easier for a computer than a human. Not all aspects are accounted for, but for Intel to jump in and say show success in City Driving, isn't a big win, until the AI, can do rural and suburban driving as well.

      • 3. Heavy traffic allows you to follow the leader. The car in front of you has already avoided obstacles, so just do what it did.

        ...until of course that lead car is moments away from falling into a gigantic road-size sinkhole or even over a cliff.

  • another example of writer overreach (Score:5, Informative)

    by nokarmajustviewspls ( 7441308 ) on Wednesday July 21, 2021 @06:26AM (#61603863)

    As someone who's been to some of this planet's REALLY congested cities (New Delhi, Bangkok) it's obvious that New York City DOES NOT have "some of the most dangerous, congested, and poorly managed streets in the world", not even remotely close. I used to drive in Seoul at a time when the number of daily traffic deaths in the city were shown on a digital sign board on a major bridge; due to the insane level of drinking and driving then it was in the triple digits. As someone who's spent a LOT of time in traffic in Bangkok, (which is not even the worst in S.E. Asia that would be Jakarta) I can tell you that hours to go less than an a mile in rush hour is common. In India..., well that's another world entirely. I mean c'mon at least New York City has many working traffic lights (I remember when Phnom Penh had ONE) and we aren't even considering the urban disasters that I've heard of in Africa.

    In fact, the article it links to doesn't even make that claim, it says "The New York City area officially has the worst traffic in the country, according to the latest survey for Texas A&M’s Transportation Institute.".

    As an American, speaking to (presumably) another American, don't assume the biggest or best or baddest or worst in America is it for the world. (Like Los Angeles does not have the largest number of Koreans outside of Seoul or stuff like that).

    So for me the true test of a self driving car will be when it can even find the courage to MOVE in the swarm of humanity riding motorbikes sprinkled with cars (driven by people with fake licenses) that is Ho Chi Minh City (the city formerly known as Saigon). Many foreigners who come here, when needing to cross the street are paralyzed with fear unable to step off the curb (they don't know that even the sidewalk won't save them from motorbikes who often drive on it). Some pretty famous people visiting Vietnam have died/been seriously injured trying to cross the street (like the MIT professor Seymour Paypert), The key is to swallow hard and, in a tiny break in the traffic, just step off the curb moving resolutely forward WITHOUT regard to oncoming motorbike traffic (avoid cars like you normally do). I've actually tried this with my eyes closed; unless this is the afterlife, I survived.

    It takes courage but the Vietnamese* have that in spades. No wonder why they won the war!

    *I'm not Vietnamese but I do have a VN gf :)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by nagora ( 177841 )

      Yeah. 10 minutes of driving in Cairo makes NYC look like wide open plains.

      I'm not Vietnamese but I do have a VN gf

      Pictures or it never happened!

      • You would be surprised how easy it is to date Asians outside of America. Basically any schmuck teaching English by jumping around like a monkey can find one in China, South Korea, and all of Asia minor. I heard it's not so bad in Japan either but who knows maybe it's quite the challenge in North Korea. I speak from experience, as I am just such a schmuck and I date a Chinese girl in one of the most traditional regions in China.

        The only things pics help with are judging how hot she is but the Vietnamese diet

    • The article definitely exaggerates, but it is true that the US will be the first and primary market for most non-Chinese self-driving car companies. Driving in New York City (particularly Manhattan) is by far more difficult than nearly anywhere else in the US for the reasons listed in the summary, not to mention hoards of pedestrians who will casually walk in front of moving cars to cross busy roads without giving it a second thought.

      • Don't know much about other American cities (except L.A., comparatively a drivers paradise) but I think Boston is worse than NYC (having driven in both cities and many cities abroad, see parent post).

        Boston, which is where I learned to drive, is pretty insane due to its, in places, narrow streets (the oldest parts of Boston were settled way before the invention of cars during the colonial era). Over the centuries there also seems to be no effort to gridify these older (until recently poorer?) neighborhood

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Maybe those places are not quite as challenging as you might think though. People there are much less concerned about minor bumps and scrapes to their vehicles where as in the West it's an expensive insurance job to return the paintwork to perfection. Speeds tend to be a lot lower as well because it's simply not safe to go fast.

    • Not been to NY, but I have been to various parts of India and Bangkok, etc.

      I don't think I have seen worst traffic anywhere else, then in India. With animals wondering around the roads suddenly (cows, goats, chickens, etc), people dashing across the roads, very few traffic lights, if any (most of the bigger towns got maybe 1 traffic light, smaller cities may have a handful), no signalling habits, with most vehicles not having side mirrors (either taken away by the vehicle owner to keep them safe, stolen or

  • This is slightly off topic, but I absolutely hate that we used to use the word automobile, which led to the shortening into auto. the common, shorter word, 'car' is more than enough, we did not need auto to refer to car.

    If we had never used that, then we could call the autonomous vehicles 'auto', and everyone would know what we meant. Now we can't shorten autonomous car to something simple and obvious.

    • Now we can't shorten autonomous car to something simple and obvious.

      Deathtrap? Nightmare? Waste of time due to the existence of rail?

      • There are plenty of valid criticisms of the current state of autonomous cars, but saying that they're made irrelevant by the existence of rail is like saying that the pursuit of a Turing-complete computer was a waste of time because you already had a really fancy mechanical adding machine. If realized, full self driving would change the world.

        • If realized, full self driving would change the world.

          Yeah, for the more stupid. Honestly, the future would be better served with PRT on elevated rails.

    • The solution is obviously to call them "autocars", no confusion there!

    • This is part of a bigger problem with folks' use of English language, where a compound name is typically of the form . Then, when it is shortened by common use, only the initial part is used: , which then ruins that for other things. E.g., "transistor" for "transistor radio," "poly" for "polyethylene" or any other plastic, even "uni" for "university."

      • Damn, this stupid thing deleted stuff between less than and greater than signs. Try again using brackets:

        This is part of a bigger problem with folks' use of English language, where a compound name is typically of the form [adjective][noun]. Then, when it is shortened by common use, only the initial part is used: [adjective], which then ruins that for other things. E.g., "transistor" for "transistor radio," "poly" for "polyethylene" or any other plastic, even "uni" for "university."

  • That people dont get the answer is to avoid to travel. Commuting is a stupid solution for so many people that can or could work from home. Another example is large companies that send employees instead of the closest office or branch or site to something much further. Thats insane. The solution is companies should be forced to pay employees for their commuter time. THis would save pollution, save the need for a lot of road, tunnels, highways etc and it would give people more TIME, the most precious thing w
  • Then they shouldn't get any autonomous vehicles when they're ready.
  • It has been my experience that people drive differently when the fuzz is present. This might skew your results a bit. Taxi drivers are unlikely to directly cut you off, or consistently blow red lights when they see the blue and white.

  • If it'll work here, it'll work anywhere!

  • I've lived and driven in New York, Chicago and Philly. By far Philly has the most dangerous drivers. I'm talking people randomly driving 100+ mph through 45 mph congested traffic just for fun. Stop lights and stop signs are mere suggestions for many. They drive like life is cheap in Philly. On the other hand, traffic LOOKS crazy in NYC, but for the most part the drivers aren't on a suicide mission to shave 45 seconds off their commute. Everyone knows sometimes you're all just gonna have to wait and drive sl

  • Shashua has done great work in computer vision. He is no idiot, nor a bean counter. AI cannot currently successfully navigate NYC streets, nor the streets in most cities, and I'm sure he is acutely aware of that.

    The most likely idea here is to use the testing to do AI learning in the most difficult environments to avoid the pitfall of learning in easy environments like Phoenix, that will then fail miserably in more difficult conditions.

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