21st Century Skills InnovatIon LIbrary EMERGING T h e c Self-Driving Cars Cherry Lake PubLishing ann arbor MiChigan by Lauren Newman
EMERGING TeCh Chapter 1 No Driver Needed I magine zooming down the road in a car with no one driving Everyone inside is relaxing and hang ing out while the car does all the work No this isn’t something from a science-fiction movie It is the world of self-driving cars a rapidly growing area of tech nology A self-driving car is an automobile that can operate with little to no help from a human driver It is also sometimes called a driverless car or autonomous A Mercedes-Benz F 015 driverless concept car is displayed at a 2015 car show 44
In most modern cars drivers must manually control many of the vehicle’s actions vehicle Many experts predict that these incredible cars will be widely available to the public within the next few decades In fact most cars available today are already partially autonomous The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration organizes all automobiles into five different levels of autonomy Level Zero describes cars that are completely driven by humans The driver is responsible for all workings of the car such as brak ing steering and gear-shifting Only very old cars fall into this category 5
