Essay Driver-less By Tony Laszlo	フレームで見る  英文をプリントする  脚注をプリントする
運転手のいらない自動車 今月から毎月第3週のエッセイコラムには、ジャーナリストのトニー・ラズロさんが登場します。 最近ラズロさんが注目しているのは、無人自動車の出現です。 縦列駐車楽になり、衝突事故が減少するなどの利点がある一方で、従来の車社会にはなかったさまざまな変化が 起こることが予想されます。

A couple of the new cars on the market feature an amazing function: They can park themselves. The driver simply pulls up next to a parking spot that's free. Using sensors to judge the distances and angles involved, the car will manipulate the steering wheel just right. All the driver has to do is pump the brakes occasionally, as needed.

Offhand, I'd say this is the best thing to happen to the automobile since the convertible. If this new feature becomes standard, millions of drivers around the world will be saved from parallel parking, arguably the single most stressful task in driving.

Think about it. No more fiddling with the pedals and steering wheel in front of you while twisting your body around as you try to look over, around or through the kids and dog in the back seat to see out the back window, all the while praying you don't hear that fateful bump, bang or scraping noise — the one that indicates you've made a slight but significant, and possibly quite costly, miscalculation.

If cars can park automatically, it won't be long before they can safely and efficiently take care of other aspects of driving, as well. In fact, in the not-too-distant future, I'll bet cars will be able to take us to any given destination, avoiding whatever obstructions might lie along the route. Other cars on the road, included.

With the emergence of such self-driving cars, commuters would be able to get an extra hour or two of sleep on the way to and from work. More importantly, the car crash — one of the top causes of mortality today — would become an extreme rarity rather than a daily occurrence.

There would be a downside, too, however. Full automation would take away most if not all of the joy of driving. Expect a lot of boos from the folks that like to cruise the Autobahn at high speeds. After all, fast cars will be a lot less attractive if the racing gloves, stick shift and other components of the "driver interface" are no longer part of the driving experience.

Frankly, however, I'm more concerned about how a fully(automated automobile would affect my life as a passenger rather than as a driver. In a world where cars can roam the roads on their own, driver-less cars and buses would pick people up and drop them off in complete silence, except perhaps for advertising and safety announcements.

When I travel, I tend to strike up a conversation with taxi drivers. We might talk about mundane things like the weather forecast, or whether traffic will let up or not. And sometimes we end up chatting about deeper subjects, such as why and how society is going to the dogs. Needless to say, the ride wouldn't be the same if the driver were an automaton.

It is difficult to tell how quickly fully automated cars will catch on. But recent developments give me the distinct feeling that taxi and bus drivers in the world's large cities will all be out of a job soon. Perhaps sometime during my lifetime. Those unmanned taxis should be very safe. But very drab indeed.

Shukan ST: April 21, 2006

(C) All rights reserved