[jimb]

An article in the Wall Street Journal today reports that GM and Lyft are working towards developing autonomous taxis - based on our favorite Chevy Bolt!

http://www.wsj.com/articles/gm-lyft-to-test-self-driving-electric-taxis-1462460094?tesla=y

I wonder if any of the autonomous hardware/software will reach the retail version - maybe implemented as a driver-assist like Tesla has?

 

[michael]

I had earlier asked the question regarding whether the Bolt would have a Radar assisted cruise control. The answer given was that it wouldn't since it would require blended brakes which GM didn't want for the Bolt. I'm wondering how GM can have an autonomous taxi without the ability to maintain a safe distance from another vehicle, without the rubber banding effect shown on their video.
Can anyone help me with what I might be missing?

 

[Bazinga]

They're still working out the details so changes will most likely be made to the Bolt including the brakes. Not sure if they can start testing the Bolts within a year if the Bolt doesn't even have assisted cruise control.

 

[Raymondjram]

GM "promised" Self Parking and Retrieval when the Bolt EV was announced in January 2015. So the technology for a self-driving Bolt Ev is expected to be in every production vehicle. We have to wait until October to see if GM delivers what they promised. That system can be later hacked and modified by the owners after the warranty expires.

 

[Bazinga]

They're going to introduce the Bolt taxi in undisclosed US cities in 2017. Makes you wonder if those cities are the more loosely populated ones or if they'll go for the ultimate test and put them in New York.

 

[jimb]

I would think the former - for NYC they'll have to program a 'jerk" mode where the car blows it's horn at pedestrians crossing the street or if the car in front of it sits at a green light for more than 0.25 seconds... ;-)

 

[LightningBolt]

GM "promised" Self Parking and Retrieval when the Bolt EV was announced in January 2015. So the technology for a self-driving Bolt Ev is expected to be in every production vehicle. We have to wait until October to see if GM delivers what they promised. That system can be later hacked and modified by the owners after the warranty expires.

The promised the feature but I doubt it'll make it into the Bolt, at least not for the initial release. It's just not cost effective enough to produce on a massive scale for high output models.

 

[Bazinga]

There's so much to take into account for self driving taxis to be widespread, I just don't think we'll be seeing them anytime soon and certainly not by 2020.

What if there's a police directing traffic because the traffic lights are broken? Will the car sense that as a pedestrian and not move at all?
And insurance is going to be a pain for them along with pushing legislation through.

 

[Roth33d]

There's so much to take into account for self driving taxis to be widespread, I just don't think we'll be seeing them anytime soon and certainly not by 2020.

What if there's a police directing traffic because the traffic lights are broken? Will the car sense that as a pedestrian and not move at all?
And insurance is going to be a pain for them along with pushing legislation through.

Well you do have to consider the fact there are real humans programming the self-driving system to do what it has to, that being the case its only natural to expect it to do those things.

Plus Tesla has been reported to pull data from all its customer cars to improve on its self-driving system.

 

[Bazinga]

I forgot about the part where they're going to station a human driver in every auto car. Was thinking more along the lines of just the car and nobody behind the wheel.

 

[Electro]

Heard something like Tesla has over 300 million miles of data from their customers vehicles

 

[Dr.G]

Two autonomous Bolts were spied on the streets of SF!

http://www.autoblog.com/2016/05/18/autonomous-chevy-bolt-ev-spy-photo/#slide-3894802

 

[Electro]

Ver. 2 ... Would it be worth the wait for it though..I wonder what the difference in pricing would be too

 

[Roth33d]

The problem with technology is if you wait, you'll always wait and fail to get into something. You just have to take the plunge sometimes. This self-driving tech isn't going to blow up over night and isn't going to be perfect right from the start, so you're better off letting it improve while you enjoy the regular Bolt.

 

[Dr.G]

The problem with technology is if you wait, you'll always wait and fail to get into something. You just have to take the plunge sometimes. This self-driving tech isn't going to blow up over night and isn't going to be perfect right from the start, so you're better off letting it improve while you enjoy the regular Bolt.

My plan now (as of this week), is that I've decided I'm going to lease a Bolt and then trade up for a Tesla Model III once Tesla has had a few years to work out their issues. I won't care if the Bolt is perfect from the start because it's only going to be a short-term option for me anyway.

I'm hopeful Chevy will offer a competitive 24 month lease, but I will likely have to take a 36 month lease for the payment figures to make any sense.

 

[Electro]

The problem with technology is if you wait, you'll always wait and fail to get into something. You just have to take the plunge sometimes. This self-driving tech isn't going to blow up over night and isn't going to be perfect right from the start, so you're better off letting it improve while you enjoy the regular Bolt.

Definitely can't disagree with that. There's always going to be some sort of innovation that comes out that'll keep you prolonging yourself to achieve something.

 

[Electro]

My plan now (as of this week), is that I've decided I'm going to lease a Bolt and then trade up for a Tesla Model III once Tesla has had a few years to work out their issues. I won't care if the Bolt is perfect from the start because it's only going to be a short-term option for me anyway.

I'm hopeful Chevy will offer a competitive 24 month lease, but I will likely have to take a 36 month lease for the payment figures to make any sense.

That sounds like a good plan.. I think quite a few people will be going in that direction as well

 

[Bazinga]

Why would they cover one bolt and not the other? Taking a look at the bumpers, most of the features look the same.