Reflecting on the Dream of Automated Vehicles. Visions of Hands Free Driving over the past 80 years / Überlegungen zum Traum vom automatisierten Fahrzeug. Visionen selbsttätigen Fahrens aus den letzten 80 Jahren

Abstract

A number of corporations around the world are promising that self-driving cars are just around the corner. They aren’t simply building, testing, and refining vehicles, however. They are also seeking to shape our expectations, goals, and values surrounding the technology. They are telling us what automated vehicles will look like, how they will be integrated into society, what problems they will solve, and how our lives will change. If we as citizens, consumers, or the general public would like to entertain other possibilities, we need to consider and reflect on alternative ideas. This article looks back at 80 years of visions of automated vehicles in the United States for examples of alternative ways to think about the technology. It highlights automated vehicles from four different time periods - the late 1930s/early 1940s, the 1950s, the 1990s, and the early 2000s - examines the futures that were promoted in those efforts. It analyses each of these future visions by exploring three questions: What does the technology look like? Why should it be built? And what organizations should help to create it? By exploring different visions of an automated vehicle future we can better see the paths that are currently not being presented to us and decide for ourselves whether visions from the past might be a better roadmap to the future we want to build.