If he's from the future, why is reading a newspaper. Shouldn't it be an iPad or something?

There is a tendency for critics of autonomous vehicles to evaluate the technology based on self driving vehicles and standard vehicles sharing the road together. They should not share the road. Because it is the human element that creates the uncertainty in driving behavior. Just as we had to make a cut off date for standard TV, we have to set a cut off date for humans driving. Automonous vehicles will improve energy conservation, efficiency of our roadways and safety. Eliminate human drivers and we could have automonous vehicles on the road today.

I sure hope so. I don't know how we tolerate 100 people dead every day.

Just the same way we teach our kids how to change a tire, they should learn to drive a car just in case . . . . . oh wait, no one does that any more either, they call a 'road service' guy to do it nowadays . . .

I've mentioned this topic to my teenagers recently, that the physical driving of cars may be limited in the next ten years or so but that may be rushing it. Of course, their response is what you'd expect, lol. And no doubt, they're not alone. This topic is complicated. Politics aside, technically, I'm not so sure it has to be done only one way. We have no idea what a.i. in a vehicle will be like ten or twenty years on. Perhaps humans will be able to share space with driver-less vehicles or share in some places but not others. With the help of networking between vehicles, they could tell each other to "look out for the human", hahaha. Obviously, it won't work for everyone at the beginning and it won't work well everywhere. And obviously, it's something that could be ripe for exploitation both politically and economically. It has a lot going for it though if lives could be saved. Just thinking out loud. To answer the original question - hard to say. We may be rushing things a wee bit.

To get to true autonomous driving, we would need to maintain our roads like the Germans do the Autobahn. American roads, for the most part, are crap in comparison.

There will have to be automated zones that work kind of like controlled air space. There will need to be a handoff process to determine which vehicles enter the automated zone.

Kids still learn how to change tires and kids 18 years from now will probably still have to learn how to drive. I honestly don't see self-driving cars for at least 30 years. By then, I probably won't care, but you can have my wheel when you pry it form my cold, dead fingers.

I'm very glad that leaders agree that everyone should continue to learn to drive. _No_ automated vehicle should ever be made without a steering wheel and pedals. For the future, it would be great if all free way driving was automated. It would reduce traffic times immensely. @Helios: Breakdowns of the automation would likely be common, especially during ramp-up, and self-drive would be mandatory. Software can be tweaked for this and it would still increase throughput of traffic by a good bit. I was watching Demolition Man the other night and thought the autonomous vehicles there were designed just right, allowing for manual control when necessary. SanAngeles is coming, folks. (A single large city composed of all areas between Santa Barbara and San Diego. Scary, wot? ;)

Right now, the law puts the driver ( the one behind the steering wheel) in charge and at fault, if necessary. Given the pace lawmakers work at, the self drive car makers will have plenty of time to get their systems right, so you better teach your kid to drive and have good knowledge of road rules while we are waiting.