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Showing posts with label ALPHABET. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ALPHABET. Show all posts

Google self-driving car shakes fist at Palo Alto drivers



Google has published its monthly report on the self-driving project, detailing any updates, advances, and accidents that have happened.
In the month of April, two accidents occurred involving the self-driving Lexuses. Both were minor incidents, which apparently stemmed from the other party hitting the self-driving car.
The first accident dinged one car’s side mirror, and happened while the Lexus SUV was stationary. The second involved the offending driver bumping into the side of the car, which – like any good teen-aged new driver – Google claims was not their fault.
Passengers in the self-driving cars were not harmed in the accidents.
See Also: Apple joins autonomous vehicle land rush in Silicon Valley
Google has been transparent about accidents for a few months, since news of several crashes emerged. They’ve even fessed  up about a recent accident by posting video, showing the self-driving car at fault during a crash with a bus.


It’s all Palo Alto’s fault

Despite the crashes, which number in the dozens now, Google insists that self-driving will lower the amount of crashes by over 50 percent. It claims that 94 percent of crashes are due to human error, which a fully autonomous world would fix.
Google is adding 100 more cars — Chrysler Pacifica minivans to be exact — to its fleet in the next year. Bringing variety to its self-driving project may give the company more understanding of how different sized cars should interact on the roads, which may lead to less scuffles.
The cars are tested in four locations: Kirkland, Washington; Mountain View, California; Phoenix, Arizona; and Austin, Texas. Both of the accidents were in Palo Alto, a 12-minute drive from Mountain View, where Google is headquartered.
The accidents might put some lawmakers off removing restrictions, but attitude towards self-driving cars has become less hostile in the last few months, as more investment comes in from traditional automakers.

Google “Sidewalk Labs” and see Alphabet’s plans for smart cities



Alphabet subsidiary Sidewalk Labs is meeting with several top executives to discuss plans for a rejuvenation project in an existing city. The plan involves billions of dollars in investment to make the city high-tech, automated, and vibrant.
While details are scarce at the moment, The Information reports that Sidewalk Labs CEO Dan Doctoroff will meet with Alphabet CEO Larry Page to receive a green light on the “Sidewalk Project.”
See Also: Are smart citizens being lost in rush for smart cities?
If the project is approved, Sidewalk Labs might solicit bids from states or cities in need of rejuvenation. Similar to Google Fiber, Sidewalk wants the state to remove regulations on utilities, parking, and city design to give the company more autonomy over the re-design.
That might scare off some cities that are not willing to ceed control to a corporation, though others that require a major upheaval might accept these terms if it means billions in private investment, turning the city into a tech epicenter.
Alphabet already has a few high-tech divisions working on products that are useful in a smart city. The self-driving car, Project WingMakani, and Project Insight — which came from X Labs — could all be implemented in a controlled smart city environment.


Alphabet working its smart city network to rebuild American cities

Add to that Alphabet’s potential partnerships with other smart city companies and it might be the perfect opportunity for cities or states that require a major rejuvenation to bring residents and companies back.
No cities were mentioned in the report and for all we know Sidewalk Labs might have to go out and persuade downtrodden cities or neighborhoods to let them re-build, before they get any offers.
Rejuvenation of an entire city is hard and much harder when you remove its historic value in favor of high-tech and low regulations. While the city might look fancy, as the WSJ points out, it might lack the vibrancy of cities that were able to naturally grow into super-cities.