Toyota sees full-time backseat driver
Print Edition
YOUR car soon will do more to help avoid a crash. As for one day leaving all the driving to the vehicle while you relax in the back, don’t get your hopes up.
That’s the message from safety executives at Toyota, who on Thursday promised by 2017 to have collision-prevention technology installed across its US line-up, in both mainstream and luxury vehicles.
But for now at least, every vehicle the company designs and builds will require someone in the driver seat.
Toyota expects by “mid-decade” to roll out a next generation of safety systems in the US that allow cars to steer themselves enough to stay in the center of a lane. And to keep the driver focused on the task at hand — driving — the cars will also feature a camera that monitors the driver’s eyes and makes sure that hands are on the steering wheel. If the eyes drift off the road or hands come off the wheel, the car would issue a warning.
“In other words, a full-time backseat driver,” Ken Koibuchi, general manager of Toyota’s intelligent vehicle division, said at Thursday’s briefing.
Several other automakers already have lane-steering technology and driver monitoring systems, but they’re only available in higher-cost or luxury models.
Toyota’s system might eventually have the ability to warn you if your freeway lane is going away, or merging traffic could hit your car. That technology is still being developed and is limited by mapping data nationwide, the safety executives said at a safety briefing near Ypsilanti, Michigan.
The company sees a gradual shift toward cars doing most of the driving work, with each increment helping people to gain trust in the automated systems.
Toyota says the industry is more than a decade away from making a car that could drive itself, due to technology limitations and legal issues. And unlike Google, Toyota doesn’t see the day where a human won’t be needed behind the wheel.
“Toyota will not be developing a driverless car,” said Seigo Kuzumaki, its deputy chief safety technology officer.
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