
Driverless lorries to be trialled in UK - sjcsjc
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-35737104
======
hacker_9
Well as someone who uses the motorway to go to and fro from work everyday; I
welcome these 'driverless' lorries, as the human lorry drivers really do not
know what they are doing most of the time and I have to constantly watch out
for them.

~~~
lmm
As a cyclist using a main road I feel a lot safer around lorries than around
cars. Their drivers tend to know what they're doing and give you plenty of
room. For one incident that was entirely my fault the lorry driver slammed the
brakes, got out of the cab, checked I was ok and gave me a cheery "don't do
that mate, you'll die". Contrast that with car drivers who will speed off even
after hitting you.

~~~
IshKebab
Yeah it is different on the motorway though. It's much more boring driving and
lorry drivers get tired, do other things, etc. I see them swerving a lot more
than cars.

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yxlx
Driverless lorries might be more susceptible to hijacking IMO, because the
risk for the attackers will be lower, both with regards to the act itself
since they won't meet opposition from another human and also if they're caught
because theft of an object is a crime less severe when the attackers didn't
cause direct (physical or emotional) harm or threat to a human.

~~~
iofj
One can only hope so. Or that they have some other major disadvantage. This is
going to prevent a large amount of people from earning a living. Additionally
it's going to kill a decent segment of SMBs who do truck driving and cargo
transport on roads.

One more low-skilled job disappearing without replacement.

~~~
RobinL
Tech moves on and usually displaces labour but so far hasn't created mass
unemployment. Instead it's made us richer. At any point in time people are
concerned by the job destruction caused by progress, but after it has happened
rarely want to rewind and go back to the old ways.

I'm curious - if you think this is a bad thing, are there technological
innovations which have already happened which you would want to undo? How many
jobs do you think it would create? GPS could provide be a good thought
experiment.

~~~
clort
> Instead it's made us richer.

some of us, anyway

    
    
      http://www.cbsnews.com/news/census-data-half-of-us-poor-or-low-income/
    

I wonder what it means when half of the richest country in the world lives in
poverty..

~~~
RobinL
There are clearly serious problems with wealth and income distribution.
However, the size of the pie and the distribution of it are different problems
(although not independent).

It doesn't follow that by prohibiting technological progress things would be
more equal. I'm not sure what the relationship is between income distribution
and progress; I think there are probably arguments both ways.

For example, would income inequality be rising even if technological progress
was not happening? Probably yes, from my reading of Pikkety. Those with
capital would probably continue to accumulate more. But it would affect
returns to capital so perhaps it's not so clear cut.

Is income inequality increasing as a result of technological progress? Maybe,
I guess? I'd be quite interested to see some real evidence either way because
I don't think the answer is intuitive either way.

------
neom
[https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-
goin...](https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-going-to-hit-
us-like-a-human-driven-truck-b8507d9c5961)

Hmm. :o

------
sschueller
I like this underground autonomous cargo system better [1][2] (sorry in
German, but you get the idea from the video images) It's autonomous, clean and
inexpensive to build.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSSO_QPgQTw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSSO_QPgQTw)
[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r11X-zMF_pc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r11X-zMF_pc)
[3] [http://www.cargosousterrain.ch/de/](http://www.cargosousterrain.ch/de/)

~~~
harigov
That definitely looks expensive to me. All those underground tunnels need huge
amount of money and effort.

~~~
brbsix
Maybe not, if they're able to borrow RAND's NTBM (nuclear tunnel boring
machine) from Area 51.

~~~
IshKebab
Why would a TBM need to be nuclear? That makes zero sense.

~~~
brbsix
At least from all the preliminary studies I've seen, electric power is not
really practical for all but the smallest diameters. FYI I'm referring to the
use of a rock-melting penetrator rather than a traditional cutting head. This
is maybe just science fiction at this point, but it came to mind as the sort
of technology that would make these sorts of projects economically feasible.

[http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/4687637](http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/4687637)

[http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/4444905](http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/4444905)

------
arasmussen
I think the term "self-driving" is preferable to "driverless" because it's not
like there's no driver, the car is the driver. It's also less scary-sounding
which could help speed up adoption. :)

~~~
richardwhiuk
These aren't really driverless either, as their is a driver in the leading
truck. It's almost like they are articulated with software

~~~
sandworm101
Some jurisdictions have rules to restrict convoying, many trucks following
each other as a group. I'm not sure I want to see road trains just to save a
few bucks on that second/third driver.

~~~
DanBC
It's not just saving the cost of a couple of drivers (although that's a
significant cost). It's more fuel efficient, and it's safer.

~~~
sandworm101
>> It's more fuel efficient, and it's safer.

Not having a driver in the cab supervising the robot is safer? I don't see any
call to remove pilots from airplanes. And I doubt the extra 200lbs of driver
makes much different given these are trucks.

~~~
DanBC
The robots drive closer to each other. This provides "slip stream" advantages.

~~~
sandworm101
Again, how does having or not having a driver in each cab affect this?

I would add that allowing multiple trucks to operate this way will require
some changes to the law. And the redesign of many roads. Imagine trying to
merge into traffic or onto a bridge when some vehicles are longer than merging
lanes. It sounds like a great idea but isn't practical.

~~~
DanBC
aianus mentions reaction times.

As well as that there's the lack of visibility.

    
    
        [five]> [four]> [three]> [two]> [one]>
    

Truck five, if it has a human driver, needs to leave plenty of space so s/he
can see what's going on with truck four and three. (Repeat this for all the
lorries and they end up spread out) The computers don't need that visual
space, because they're all linked with radio shuffling data back and forth.

> Imagine trying to merge into traffic or onto a bridge when some vehicles are
> longer than merging lanes

i) When the lorries pass approach a merging lane they either add some space
between each truck, or they use a different lane of the motorway (because this
article is talking about England) which allows people to move from the merging
lane onto the motorway.

ii) Lorries will already drive in an informal ad-hoc convey. They'll keep a
safe distance from each other. That safe distance isn't enough for a car to
get into if the car is trying to merge from the entrance ramp. So if this
isn't already a problem I'm not sure why it would be a problem with robot
drivers. What's changed that suddenly makes it a problem?

------
zeristor
trains A tad flummoxed by this. I know rail freight has diminished, and there
is the issue with transferring load from rail to train, but surely with
clogged roads that is a better idea.

------
SeanDav
I cringe at the idea of self-driving trucks. If a car gets it wrong, it is
probably a small bump in your door, if a truck gets it wrong, it can easily
drive right over your car.

~~~
mmanfrin
The flip side is that the cars will not be prone to exhaustion caused by
unrealistic deadlines levied on human drivers -- speed will be regulated at
the law (i.e., 55mph max).

Right now you have truckers driving for 18+ hours at 10-15mph over the legal
limit. I'd much rather the road be trucked by software that won't speed and
will defer to the side of safety _always_.

The fact that it is carrying freight, too, is a plus, as the truck driving
software can always make the decision in favor of the other drivers on the
road (whereas passenger self-driving cars will be focused both on the safety
of the car itself and other drivers, a much more difficult decision tree).

e: my references to law are to US law, which isn't exactly applicable to this
specific story, but the arguments stand (I'm sure there is a similar max-speed
limit for trucks in the UK)

~~~
sandworm101
>>> "speed will be regulated at the law."

That doesn't need robot drivers. That is and can be deployed today. Why it
isn't ... that's an open question.

>>> "the truck driving software can always make the decision in favor of the
other drivers on the road"

I've really wondered about this. Wouldn't software that acts like a jerk (ie
not letting people in etc) be more valuable if it gets from A to B faster? Why
think that the same pressures that force drivers to act like jerks won't also
be applied to software?

~~~
mmanfrin

      Wouldn't software that acts like a jerk (ie not letting 
      people in etc) be more valuable if it gets from A to B 
      faster? Why think that the same pressures that force drivers 
      to act like jerks won't also be applied to software?
    

Because with human drivers, a human is liable for failures. With software, the
company is liable. If the software thinks "this is a dangerous situation", it
_will_ be written to defer to not causing injury, because there's really no
way the contents of a truck are going to be worth more than the cost of paying
out $x millions in the case of killing a human.

~~~
sandworm101
>> With software, the company is liable.

Check the fine print on your windows license. Then check the fine print on any
aerospace autopilot. They disclaim everything. It's always the operators
responsibility, never the manufacturers unless of a serious defect.

>> no way the contents of a truck are going to be worth more than the cost of
paying out $x millions in the case of killing a human.

If that were true all sorts of other safety devices would already be on
trucks, starting with gps-enabled speed regulators. There is always a cost-
benefit analysis. That includes tradeoffs between utility and safety.

~~~
mmanfrin
You are missing my meaning. By 'software', I mean the software that runs the
self-driving trucks; both the companies building and using self-driving trucks
could and would be liable, no matter what is 'in the fine print'. There is no
operator, so blame has to go somewhere.

There are already safety devices on trucks, but since there is a human
operator, much of the onus of using or installing those is on the human, not
the truck manufacturer or trucking company; and again, you're missing my point
that with no driver, the liability falls to the producers of the self-driving
software.

~~~
sandworm101
>> with no driver, the liability falls to the producers of the self-driving
software.

Not really. The owner of the truck is also the operator. Trucking companies
are sued for damages caused by their drivers every day. If a truck company
chooses to use particular software, as they choose a particular driver, the
trucking company will be liable. They are the one that decided to put the
vehicle on the road. That's why they must carry insurance and why that
insurance attaches to the vehicle regardless of who is driving it on a
particular day. Swapping out an employee-driver for a robot won't change the
situation.

Even a truck that is stolen, a truck driven by someone the operator doesn't
want behind the wheel, can result in liability should the operator not have
taken reasonable steps to guard against theft.

------
monk_e_boy
Regarding the issue of 10 lorries blocking an exit, our exits are very long,
OK, not 10 lorries long but they wouldn't be block for more than a few
seconds. If the convoy broke up into 3 or 4 while going past an exit then
merged back together, or if they all pulled into the middle lane -- no
worries.

Lorries drive up each others asses anyway, usually you just pull alongside and
indicate and they'll make a little space for you to pull through. So pretty
much business as usual.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
The article says these will be 10-truck convoys with one driver. So I don't
think splitting is likely.

HGVs regularly have blow outs and there are parts of the network where they're
frequently rolled by high winds.

It's bad enough when that happens to a single truck. If it takes up to nine
others with it, it's going to be carnage.

Convoys may not be the best way to make automation happen.

------
sholanozie
No comments about the millions of jobs this technology will destroy in the
near future?

~~~
pm90
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11232781](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11232781)

It must really suck to lose your livelihood like that, but its kinda
inevitable. On the flipside, there will be jobs created for people to fix
these machines, write the programs that run them, all the sensors and safety
features that will be required before they can hit the road.

------
adaline
Im not sure why George Osborne is going to talk about self-driving trucks in
the Budget speech... Is he dropping phat-stacks of the budget on this
programme to make the two related somehow?

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tim333
I wonder why they need 10 truck convoys? You'd think you could test the system
fine with 2 or 3.

