Self-Driving Cars A 'Far Cry', Say Drivers

Reports suggest that automobile companies and technology giants are positive about the fact that self-driving cars will make their way into the markets in the next five years. However, the revolution involving self driving vehicles may have to face some delay.

Around 62 percent of the people who were surveyed by the auto-valuation outfit do not think all vehicles will be fully autonomous in their entire lifetime. Even more surprising was the facts that respondents who are aged between 12 and 15 years also believed the same implying that we will not be able to access fully driverless vehicles till the end of this century.

Regardless of what people have in minds about the future of self-driving cars, Ford Motor Co. has announced its plans of deploying a fully autonomous, driveless ride by 2021. The CEO of Ford, Mark Fields expressed the clear intentions of Ford's Research and Innovation facility of doubling the staff to 300. It will also expand its footprint by 150,000 square feet by the end of this year in order to face the challenge.

"This is one example of how we're thinking about expanding our business into mobility more broadly," Fields told USA TODAY. "Taking the driver out of the equation improves the economics for us as well as consumers."

The Kelly Blue Book poll surveyed 2,264 people aged 12 to 64 years (that includes people who weren't drivers yet). The poll included owners of cars with self-driving features as well. About 94 percent of the owners of such cars were satisfied with the safety levels provided by cars that do not require any human inputs.

Folks in favor of the autonomous vehicles suggest that the technology can immensely reduce the 35,000 annual national traffic deaths caused due to human error. Sixteen percent of those who were surveyed are keen on purchasing self-driving cars the moment they are available in the markets.

Few other polls have advocated the fact that 62 percent still considered driving a fun game while 80 percent of them there should always be an option to manually drive the vehicles. Fifty-six percent of people were interested in being driven around by humans instead of computers.