Simply press go – Google shows us its self driving car prototype

When Google first talked about self driving cars in October 2010, there was a lot of the skepticism around the project. Since then not much has been said about the progress of the project — until now.

Google has posted on its blog about the continued development and production of a prototype vehicle that that is completely self-driving. The self-driving prototype has no steering wheel, accelerator pedal, or brake pedal… because they don’t need them. Google’s software and sensors do all the work, all the passenger does is hop in and press go!

Google has kept the design of the vehicles basic in terms of design, comfort and function, because the company wants to learn more from the prototypes without wasting time on creature comforts; that said, the car still has a couple of seats, arm rests and room for a few bags, but they’re pretty basic.

This marks an important step toward improving road safety and transforming mobility for millions of people. Personally, being a disabled person who has yet to get his license, this could persuade me to reconsider getting my drivers license, purely because it will allow me to drive without having to get modifications done to any vehicle I purchase and use daily.

Google have posted a video (below), showing how the prototype vehicle has been going in live tests and it certainly warrants a check in my book.

It will be interesting to see if Google can bring this feature and certainly the actual vehicle itself to the marketplace, but we will have to wait and see. You can head over to their blog to keep up to date on the project milestones as well as upcoming news.