"I've no idea why they use an electronic hood latch in the first place though."
Because it's one more thing that can fail that they can charge too much money to fix/replace. I'll bet this design "feature" came directly from the marketing department.
"OMG! The company that made an app that takes my information and sells it, took my information and sold it!"
I agree with you, but technically FaceBook didn't sell it this time.
Best advice I've heard was to remove your helmet and do your best to land head-first.
My first thoughts on reading the headline was "WTF is artificial wind?", then "Ok, how about artificial wind energy?, then "Wow, that was poorly worded."
Either way, it sounds interesting, and I hope the engineering challenges can be resolved in such a way that it will be built to last.
To be honest, as ugly as it is, it would be interesting if someone designed a building like this with no elevators (or perhaps only those reserved for freight and people with handicaps or other health issues). Provide a covered path for inclement weather, and force everyone to walk up/down the big ramp with green space to reach their level. After the employees got used to it, the exercise would help prevent depression far more than just having the trees.
I think you're being too generous. Most people would become very irate if asked to give up even the smallest convenience. So it's not that they don't care... They actively care way too much about things that are bad for the environment (like their SUV's).
I would much rather have the 250/10 as long as it's at the right price point. There are other advantages to electric, and I'm not just talking about environmental ones.
It's not like I would ever need to charge it away from home unless I was driving cross-country, and even then I wouldn't mind having to stop once every 3-4 hours to stretch my legs while it recharges. Having to stop once every 1-2 hours would be painful on a long trip, but not once every 3-4.
""Often, it's not the EV tech that's problematic," says Anita Lam, CR's associate director of automotive data integration. "It's all the other new technology that could show up on any car -- new infotainment systems, more sophisticated power equipment and gadgets -- that often gets put on new EVs to feed a perception that they're supposed to be luxurious and high-tech.""
Where's Hitler when you need him to design a car? I'm waiting for the EV version of the original VW beetle. Axe anything sophisticated, KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid), focus on decent powertrain/range/charging, slash the price, and you may end up with the next car that sells like hotcakes world-wide for decades.
LOL, good one.
Maybe pedestrians should start carrying pool noodles: https://qz.com/1620913/the-bes.... An e-scooter gets too close, just whack him with the pool noodle as he goes by.
Anyone else interpret that title as "It turns out a lot of people are too stupid to drive an e-scooter safely"?
I agree, but I would like to add some comments...
I don't think it will be feasible to ban IC engines for a very long time (if ever) in the US. Ever lived in an apartment complex where the parking lot was often too full for you to park close to your own apartment? Or how about cities like New York where some people have to parallel park on local streets? How do you think locations like that would deal with every vehicle needing to plug in? If we get to the point where a car's battery pack can be charged in a few minutes, this may become a moot argument, but right now it is still crucial. Not everyone can afford their own home/garage.
I foresee IC engines disappearing the way film cameras did. A tipping point will be reached when fully electric is cheaper and superior (in some ways, but perhaps not all), but it will take some time. My daughter recently took some photography classes in high school, and she had to buy a non-digital SLR camera (which she ended up having to buy used on eBay), and a mix of black-n-white and color film (which was really hard to find). We found 2 stores left that still sold what she needed for that class in the metro Atlanta area.
As with old-fashioned film enthusiasts, I believe there will always be classic/antique car enthusiasts around for a very long time, but as better and cheaper alternatives replace IC engines, over time it will become more and more difficult to find gas stations, mechanics, replacement parts, etc. because the enthusiast market simply won't be large enough to support a lot of them.
True, but that was much earlier on in their road tests. They had to built up confidence before speeding it up.
If you watch the video linked in TFA, it seems to drive like an average Florida driver. That would be annoyingly slow to an Atlanta driver like me, but I don't think anyone really wants automated cars that drive like Atlanta drivers.
It's all relative, and YMMV. I was pretty impressed by what I saw in the video, though.
"Also, at least when Google was testing cars around Mountain View, the driving behavior was extremely conservative."
That makes perfect sense. In Google's case, Google was 100% liable for anything at all going wrong. In Tesla's case, they passed the buck on to the drivers by saying "While using Autopilot, it is your responsibility to stay alert, keep your hands on the steering wheel at all times and maintain control of your car". They basically made their customers beta testers for them. With that in mind, which company do you think is going to move more slowly/carefully than the other? Which one is going to rack up miles more quickly?
Forbes claims that Tesla's autopilot is "almost" as safe as driving without:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/b...
Forbes also points out that Tesla's auto-pilot is limited to highway driving because city driving is much more difficult, and has an accident rate 3 times higher. OTOH, Google seems to excel at fully autonomous city driving while still having impressive safety stats. In this case, I would rather bet on a company that safely gets close to solving the city driving problem with 0 fatalities and almost no accidents where its cars were at fault over a company that recklessly rushes out a half-assed solution for the much simpler highway driving and with multiple fatalities caused by its autopilot.
Having said that, neither company has solved all of the problems. Tesla is being more reckless, but they may reach the finish line first for that very reason. They don't mind breaking a few eggs to make this omelet, and while it's kind of sleazy because those eggs are people's lives, that doesn't mean they won't get there first.
IMO the answer is obvious.
FTA:
Taken together, the company says this represents “over 500 years of driving for the average licensed US driver,” citing a 2017 survey of travel trends by the Federal Highway Administration.
Summary:
So it has 500 years of driving experience with 18 minor incidents (nearly all the fault of the other driver) and 0 severe injuries. And that 18 counts minor "bumps" with no damage. I've been bumped by other cars behind me not paying attention about half that many times, and I've barely been driving for 30 years. The main caveat is that so far it has still been under under limited conditions. IIRC, it doesn't do as well in rainy conditions, which is why most of the tests are done in very dry parts of the US. They also have strictly limited the range because it's more difficult to be 100% certain that the maps are perfect over larger areas.
According to doctors, there's no way to know. I caught covid on July 4, and I'm still having symptoms today despite multiple negative tests, and whenever I ask doctors if there's a way to be certain I'm no longer a contagion risk, they say "No, we don't know enough about patients with long-term symptoms yet."
Research is to see what everybody else has seen, and think what nobody else has thought.
