Tesla on the wrong tracks with Fail Self Driving, Senators worry A pair of US senators is asking the federal traffic safety agency to look into Tesla's self-driving software in response to complaints that it fails to stop for trains at railroad crossings. The electric auto firm has had a checkered history with its Full Self-Driving (FSD) software, which is designed to assist with driving …
Never race trains to crossings, if it's a draw, you lose...
But in seriousness, this is why "true" self driving cars are still years away - autonomous vehicles have been able to do 90% of what they need to for a couple of decades now, then maybe added another 5% since the early 2000's, but now comes the final 5% and boy are those last few problems a bitch to solve...
I doubt that that is possible.
The human brain is absolutely extraordinary when it comes to audio analysis. In a room full of people chatting (more or less loudly), you can still concentrate on what the person you're talking with is saying. Your brain can sort the wheat from the chaff, as they say.
I don't think a computer can do that. Sure, it can record an audio stream, but I do not know of any product that can take an MP3 and seperate the piano from the trumpets, for example.
Asking a Tesla to pay attention to audio is just asking for more trouble.
And there is a simple reason: You use ears AND eyes. You match what you hear with the lips movement, and presto, you understood "The whale wor dismay Austria!" - "What?"
Tesla relying on only one input is the dumbest decision ever, with the push-too-hard-in-wrong-direction management style on top.
Similar here, two eyes, but also two ears. Until recently, was driving about 50-60,000 miles per year over the last 30 years, and not had any accidents. What's your point? Is it the lack of one ear that caused your 3 accidents? What sort of distances do you cover? How long have you been driving?
When I worked for a major UK insurer, one of the "legends" of claims was the >£10,000,000 claim which arose after the Selby train crash. We insured the car.
As I heard n gossip, "Why knew trains cost that much ?"
We palmed it off onto our reinsurer. And they spent a lot of money taking quite a few people to court before they were forced to pay up. Turned out that it wasn't a foreseen incident, so the safety barriers were not inadequate.
Any US lawyers have have that for free.
Yes, we rather lost interest when it was palmed off to the reinsurer (you know those companies that have "RE:" at the start on their stock exchange listings ?)
The is a lot of minutiae around UK motor insurance law. Another case (we lost) was a payout on 3 (from memory) quadraplegic teenagers who went ofr a joyride with one of our insured. They had taken out a "black box" policy, only never had the black box fitted. This meant the insurance was invalidated.
HOWEVER there is a small section in the RTA that makes the "last insurer of record" liable for injuries - even if the policy is voided. This resulted in an even bigger payout.
For fans of scandal I was present at a meeting (as an proper expert in telematics, not a sales droid) where it was noted that it would saved the company a lot of money if we'd hired a hitman and removed the errant teenager from the scene before he crippled his mates.
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although the other one had the car stopped at right angles to the crossing.
The screen showed the cameras were interpreting the individual train carriages as giant Tesla cars, that kept warping in shape and size. Likewise it seemed to interpret the flashing red crossing lights as just red traffic lights that kept moving.
.....did no-one program in a way for the car to recognise a rail crossing, given they're a little more binary in rights of way than normal road junctions?
did no-one program in a way for the car to recognise a rail crossing
It wouldn't be easy since some have gates, some just have lights, it is not uncommon for them to be angled, etc. One hopes that the maintenance is good on them but there are probably some situations where you have either the lights or the bell not operating so a self driving car will need to be able to "hear" the bell even if the light isn't flashing or is perhaps blocked by driven snow (LEDs suck for melting snow off, that was never a problem with incandescent lights)
It is also common to see trains that are "near" the crossing (i.e. stopped up the tracks a bit to unload) will trigger the lights and bell but the correct move is to stop, look both ways, then cross. Sometimes crossing with gates even do that - the lights and bell are going but the gate is up. I'm not sure exactly how that works, maybe the train is able to command the gate to be raised if it is going to sit around in the area without blocking the crossing.
Sometimes in situations like that the train will be moving, so the lights and bell will be flashing/ringing, then stop, then start again as the train moves around up the way a bit perhaps to push a few cars off onto a siding and/or add a few cars.
There is a lot of nuance to crossings beyond "if the lights are flashing and the gate is down you have to stop" that a self driving car will have to deal with. You don't want to program one to always stop for flashing lights and bells because in some places it might end up sitting there for a few hours while angry drivers honk and are forced to drive around it.
"(LEDs suck for melting snow off, that was never a problem with incandescent lights)"
Incandescent lights suck at melting snow in 10 seconds.
Other car makers are using microphones to listen for emergency sirens and I expect they would also be able to hear train crossing bells and loud AF train horns. With un-gated crossings and crossings that don't have flashing lights and bells there are still signs indicating the crossing. Many have signage on the road as well as the signs. If the cars are being taught to recognize speed limit signs and stop signs, why couldn't they also add railroad crossing signs?
Incandescent lights suck at melting snow in 10 seconds
Yeah I guess I was thinking of traffic lights where one light is lit at all times, versus railroad signal lights where it is off until you need it. Regardless the point still stands that listening would be the only way for a car to identify an oncoming train in certain conditions. Having a car programmed to stop just based on audio alone would provide a great way to FOOL an autonomous car into stopping, which would be handy for thieves or kidnappers...
It's almost as if light makers have never heard of snow...
Oh,, no they have temperature and humidity sensors, so they can detect when they're likely to be covered in snow, and turn on a little heater to keep themselves clear.
It means a little additional energy usage during storms, still no worse than the old bulbs, but with better visibility and massively reduced usage the rest of the year (most of it).
they have temperature and humidity sensors
They CAN, but none of the traffic lights where I live appear to have it. It is rare to have the sort of storm that will completely block them, but they get partially blocked at times during the winter. There will be some snow sitting in the bottom 1/4 or 1/2 that just stays there for days in the depth of winter if it is cloudy or the lights face north.
Dunno about rail crossings, but I expect the same is true.
"Having a car programmed to stop just based on audio alone would provide a great way to FOOL an autonomous car into stopping, which would be handy for thieves or kidnappers..."
The audio would be one component being fed into the Kalman filter. The car would also need to have some other clues. A super loud train horn could mean a really close train so if the car has tracks in its maps, a loud horn and being positioned on the tracks would be big clue.
I'm not for single tripwire systems. This was proposed to allow police officers to apply a kill switch in cars to avoid chases. My expectation is that the day after the first car shipped with that, somebody would have the code(s). An entire large city could be held hostage with the threat of disabling loads of car on major roads. It wouldn't have to be all that many to create complete gridlock. If somebody takes the police on a high speed chase, maybe the penalties should be very harsh rather than just dropping the charges and making them attend driving school. Too often from watching YT videos the person already has their driving privileges revoked so that's not a useful penalty. Better to get them into an apprenticeship program for metal stamping, specializing in license plates.
In rural areas, crossings with just signs (no gates, no lights, no bells) aren't unusual. You have to pull up to the stopping line, STOP, look both ways, listen, and then if there's no sign of a train, proceed across the tracks.
A Tesla: "Was that a sign? Eh, couldn't have been that importa<CRUNCH>"
>” STOP, look both ways, listen, and then if there's no sign of a train, proceed across the tracks.”
Given how quiet modern trains are, listening only helps when the train is only 50~100M away (West Coast mainline trains running at 40~50 mph are particularly quiet), crossing the tracks requires great care and best done quickly. Friends who have a private beach access across the West coast mainline (contract condition from when the land for the railway was originally purchased), boost of having a personal Whistle sign due to the restricted visibility - beats having a “gated drive” :)
For most of the journey beyond Exeter line speeds are low. Whilst the speed limit is 60mph, on the “English Riveria” section I’ve not seen trains doing more than 50mph.probably because of the need to mix through and stopping services on the same tracks. Interestingly it was the local all stations service that was the most noisy, probably because it was older stock without modern suspension.
Trains will blow their horn approaching a crossing, so that's what you're listening for not the engine or the rumbling. If the train has a quiet engine, doesn't blow its horn, and you can't see well because of blinding rain/snow you may still FEEL it if it is close unless it is only a few cars. At least that's the case where I live, where there are no passenger trains so they are almost always very long and heavily loaded.
I live about a quarter mile from tracks where at least a half dozen trains a day run. If I'm laying quietly in my bed I can feel a slight vibration from a passing train, even if my windows are closed and I can't hear it. With my windows open I can easily hear the engine noise and the rumbling/squeaking of the wheels on the tracks, and I can hear the horn very clearly even though the nearest street crossing is at least a mile away.
That put me in mind of this bit from a song written by Terri Sharp and performed by Don McLean:
"When the gates are all down, and the signals are flashin'
The whistle is screamin' in vain
And you stay on the tracks, ignorin' the facts
Well, you can't blame the wreck on the train"
".....did no-one program in a way for the car to recognise a rail crossing, given they're a little more binary in rights of way than normal road junctions?"
No, because Tesla seems to be relying a lot on Machine Learning and using data feeding back from it's cars on the road, rather than traditional "programming" for specific scenarios. On the one hand the idea is that this should allow better flexibility as the FSD "software" can re-apply learned behaviour to other scenarios but on the other hand this means that scenarios that should be obvious to human and synthetic drivers alike are not in the training data, because they don't occur very often and when they do the automation is often disabled so less far less training data makes it onto Teslas servers.
Those Americans will allow anything to be called anything, won't they?
Well, good news -- introducing my latest invention, it's the Fully Touchable Fire (beta)! This fire is powerful enough to burn down your entire village (including its idiot) and one day will be fully touchable with your bare hands! For now you have to use flame-proof gloves.
Does anyone know how and why Tesla are still allowed to call it full self driving? Whenever a story like this happens, there is always some quote from a legal official about how the description is misleading and wrong. So how come they haven't been stopped yet?
Here in the UK, the legislation still doesn't allow self driving cars anyway, so it's a moot point.
Fools Self Driving: might puncture some egos;
This May Kill You (or Do Not Use This): more a darwinian selection, but it should also automatically enable the hazard lights. That's still dangerous but approaches the sort of advance warning you get of an idiot approaching with an ICE due to the absence of any kind of sound dampening in their exhaust. For the moment you cannot tell (unless they're in a Cyberdisaster, but they're not allowed on the road here);
Ludicrously Idiotic Mode: wilfully moving one step beyond being an idiot;
The Doors Will Not Unlock When On Fire: include a bit of foreshadowing;
Will Hit Children: have a look at (presumably former) Tesla fan Mark Rober's videos.
Plenty of choice, methinks..
My son spent over 2 years working on a project involving pattern recognition. The conclusions of the project were two fold:
1/ You need an incredible amount of computer power to recognise things that the human brain recognises in a millisecond
2/ Simple changes in the orientation of an object can confuse the computer e.g. a human sideways is not the same as a human face-on.
I woud not trust a "self driving" car as far as I could throw a Tesla
"2/ Simple changes in the orientation of an object can confuse the computer e.g. a human sideways is not the same as a human face-on."
The signs are often a certain shape and ratio so even if they are backlight be a setting sun, it's not that hard to distinguish between different signs. R/R signs in the US are rectangular which is rather generic so maybe a distinctive shape needs to be devised and retrofitted over time. It would be very expensive since there are all sorts of tracks that are used very infrequently in addition to Class A track that's very busy. Of course, mopping up after a major rail incident is also very expensive.
Getting rid of level crossings over time would also be handy so there are less possible chances of car/truck meets loco.
> Getting rid of level crossings over time would also be handy so there are less possible chances of car/truck meets loco.
Now I have not seen this in real life but based on TV programs, films and internet stuff I have read, doing this in the USA would seem to be dammed difficult , a lot seem to share major road junctions (I think they call them intersections)
Maybe someone from the US could confirm this?
Given the number of rural junctions (a seldom-used road crossing the tracks, with just a sign for the auto driver), it would be prohibitively expensive to get rid of level crossings. To do it, you'd either need to make the vast majority of track be raised enough to drive under (remember, trains don't handle hills terribly well, so are usually limited to 1.5% grade), or create bridges or tunnels for the cars to go over/under the tracks. Tunnels will flood, and bridges are expensive.
"Now I have not seen this in real life but based on TV programs, films and internet stuff I have read, doing this in the USA would seem to be dammed difficult , a lot seem to share major road junctions (I think they call them intersections)"
This wouldn't happen next week, but priorities can be assessed with new lines having an initial requirement of grade separation. A rural crossing of a infrequently used track would be way down on the bottom of the list. A busy intersection that sees lots of accidents would be towards the top. Standardizing a unique sign shape can be deployed over a long time. It's a very good machine readable code that takes very little to accomplish and doesn't need a plug.
Standardizing a unique sign shape can be deployed over a long time
Plan for weather, defacement, wear, accidents, covering by vegetation - spend some time actually /looking/ at roadsigns and you'll see it's not just a matter of one shape. In addition, for the shape to be consistent you'll have to mandate that every sign is mounted exactly perpendicular to the road. And that's just the stuff I can think of before coffee.
If it was simple it would have been solved already. Speed signs are presently the only ones that can be recognised without too much processing because they're (a) internationally standardised and (b) generate a profit when ignored..
"What about those rural (and some not so rural) places where the train track runs down Main Street and similar?"
There's not that many of them and it was stupid that they happened in the first place. I believe that Oakland, CA is the only place where an Amtrak train travels down a city street. It goes really slow on that section. It's all a matter of prioritization. What I'm seeing from some sims being run by rail fans is that passenger service in the US that's grade separated and is running more on dedicated non-freight tracks can go much faster. Slowing down for places with level crossings, especially un-guarded ones, and having to shunt to sidings to wait on freight trains is a big problem. Otherwise, they could run close to 100mph without any modifications. If the funding doesn't get yanked and they ditch the idea of elevators in the cars, new stock would be better suited.
I expect there will be plenty of places that will be so far down the priority list that the inevitable demise of Sol will happen first.
When I was a kid, country buses were required to come to a full stop at railway crossings. The driver would open the door and his window, look and listen, then proceed across.
Every crossing. Every time.
On the basis that he got a better idea if a train was coming by stopping, looking, and listening.
It's not too much to suggest that (Supervised) Full Driving cars do the same, on the basis that the full-driving system isn't very good at looking and listening. Just stop. Force the driver to take over at that point.
"When I was a kid, country buses were required to come to a full stop at railway crossings. The driver would open the door and his window, look and listen, then proceed across.
Every crossing. Every time."
At least in the US, that's still required. It's also required for trucks hauling dangerous goods.
"At least in the US, that's still required. It's also required for trucks hauling dangerous goods."
I'm not sure of the exact circumstances, conditions and commonness/rareness, but some UK rail crossings have a phone placed well before the crossing and certain goods vehicles are required to stop and call the rail/crossing operator and ask for permission to cross.
"I'm not sure of the exact circumstances, conditions and commonness/rareness, but some UK rail crossings have a phone placed well before the crossing and certain goods vehicles are required to stop and call the rail/crossing operator and ask for permission to cross."
That sounds like a good idea for crossings where trains can't be spotted very far away and travel at a speed that doesn't allow for much time when they approach. That shouldn't be that hard to automate in some fashion rather than needing a driver to phone in.
And if the plane does something weird it is the pilots who get blamed 'cause they did not disable the auto pilot.
Tough one more thing: An 380 or 747 or even a Cessna approaching a runway, which is cleared for you (or should be cleared, (Hello VASAviation)), is a different time scale than driving and in an extremly strict controlled environment. Try flying in the civilian world unannounced, and you will learn that most areas don't take that lightly, and some areas will literally kill you if you do that 'cause well, wrong area!
"Planes have autopilots and the human pilot has to supervise it."
Yes, the details don't support the narrative, but most people equate "autopilot" with complete automation even though it's not the case.
It doesn't work to compare them as aircraft that aren't flying by visual flight rules (VFR) are being monitored and directed by Air Traffic Control (ATC). People or computers driving cars are operating independently. There are lots of report of Teslas changing lanes for no reason, phantom braking, exiting a highway (at full speed) when the route doesn't call for it, etc. Route deviations that aren't approved by ATC can get a pilot in trouble and ATC would also direct other traffic away to prevent an collision. There's no comparison for cars.
"Many freight trains in the US aren’t particularly fast moving, they will simply treat your car in much the same way your car treats a fly…."
It's not the speed, but the mass. Once a heavy train is moving, it's going to shred a Corolla stopped on the tracks. The only difference is the size of the remaining pieces and the length of time it takes, but the outcome is the same. A trash truck might do better vs a slow moving train, but not enough better to drive away.
