Tomorrow's Driving Technology Available Today
Advanced systems in today's vehicles ensure your journey is safer and smarter
Ric Edelman: It's Monday, March 18th. On today's show, new tech in automobiles. I've told you about some of the really cool features that are coming to automobiles, cars that drive sideways, for example, but here's some tech that's here now. Cars now feature driver assistance systems that know the road's speed limit, how close you are to other vehicles, changes in lane markings, and that use GPS, cameras and radar to scan the road ahead. These things detect other vehicles, pedestrians, bicycles, and every other object that is either in your path or suddenly might be, and it warns you of dangers with both audible and visual alerts. And even more than that, haptic alerts, which means you feel vibration or something shaking. And if you don't react to those alerts, the car will take over. It automatically will hit the brakes, change the acceleration, even take over the car's steering.
And if you want to pass a car, just look at the side view mirror. The car will automatically change lanes. It'll also alter your speed based on traffic. And if you start to drift into another lane, the car brings you back into yours. And all those cameras, they are constantly recording, always keeping the last 40 seconds. So if there's a collision, you've got a video of exactly what happened. You can even program the car to record your entire trip. Pretty cool if you're taking a scenic drive; you can upload it to TikTok, or, sorry, since that's going to be illegal, Instagram.
Hey, at night the car automatically controls the high beams for you, and if you're getting tired, the car will know it. It'll suggest that you take a break, and if you actually do fall asleep at the wheel, the car will initiate a stop, the hazard lights will turn on and the car will make a 9-1-1 call. And when you get to your destination, the car automatically scans for open parking spaces and when it finds one, it takes you to it and parks for you. And if you drive into a narrow space, when you're ready to leave it, the car will back up for you using the exact same path that you used to drive into it, so you don't have to worry about driving backwards. And if you do this maneuver on a routine basis, like having to back out of your own curvy driveway every morning, you can have the car remember up to 10 of these parking maneuvers, so you never have to do it more than once. And wherever the car is going backwards, it's scanning not just what's behind it, but what might be coming from the sides, like a car on the street or a child on the sidewalk. If it detects any movement, the car immediately stops.
All these features are available right now on cars in showrooms today. From BMW, Mercedes, and a whole lot of others. You know, we're all waiting for self-driving vehicles, but while we are, some of these self-driving vehicle features are already beginning to emerge. This whole conversation, it's not a light switch that's on or off. It's a dimmer switch that is slowly turning on to a bright light, offering these features - a new feature here, a new feature there. By the time we have fully automated cars available, you're going to be very comfortable driving in them and riding in them.
In the meantime, you really ought to consider replacing your old vehicle with one of these new ones. There's no comparison in their level of safety, not just for you as the occupant, but for everyone around you as you tool around town. The future of cars is going to be awesome. And the cool part is that a lot of that awesomeness is already here.
On tomorrow's show, the SEC's continuing screw ups with crypto.
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