Google is pitching in almost every possible field. Be cloud, augmented reality, or mobile, it is everywhere. And now comes the automobile sector. Following its experiments of driver-less car, the hot news is that Google’s self-driving cars have completed 300K miles without accident, and are ready for public commuting. It conducted the experiment with a dozen of cars that completed this long journey under computer control, and did not get a single scratch! Google has added Lexus RX450h hybrid car to its self-driving car family, and is also planning to soon let some of the team’s members drive the cars solo for their daily commutes.

“One day we hope this capability will enable people to be more productive in their cars,” said Chris Urmson, Google’s engineering lead for this project, in a blog post today, “For now, our team members will remain in the driver’s seats and will take back control if needed.” There have, of course been some accidents that involved Google’s self-driving cars in the past. All of these, however, happened while humans were in control of the cars.

While this is of course a positive news, the company informed that the cars still need to learn how to handle snow-covered roads, for example, and how to interpret temporary construction signs and other situations that could throw its systems for a loop.

The Story Recapitulated

Google started experimenting its self-driving cars back in 2010. The initial experiments had drivers behind the wheel just in case something goes wrong and an engineer watching at all times. Still, for the most part the cars drove themselves. Earlier this February, Nevada supported Google’s intentions by unveiling their intent to draft legislation that will make them the first state in the United States to approve autonomous, self-driving cars. The legislative process began last June when the state passed a bill that required the Department of Motor Vehicles to draft rules concerning regulations on self-driving cars. Later, the Nevada DMV approved those regulations allowing the autonomous vehicles onto public roadways.

“Nevada is the first state to embrace what is surely the future of automobiles,” Department of Motor Vehicles director Bruce Breslow said in a statement. “These regulations establish requirements companies must meet to test their vehicles on Nevada’s public roadways as well as requirements for residents to legally operate them in the future.”

What’s going to Change?

Self-driving cars may bring lots of changes on the planet Earth, but not too soon. Perhaps in the next one decade. It will affect almost everyone – people, environment, automobile industry, employment industry, cabs and taxi companies, insurance vendors, and almost everyone. See, when there will be accidents, no cars will be crashed and people won’t need new cars. This will affect the automobile industry in their production facilities. Companies won’t need drivers for long truck hauling, which will make shipments cheap, but result in loss of employment for many. No parking services required as these cars would park themselves. No accidents, and no deaths caused by cars too. Perhaps, cars will become cheap as well, as there would be no need of insurance and security components. Aah…lots of changes! These might sound over-futuristic as of now, but we might see them in the coming few years.

[Image credit: Self-driving car photo via Zack Sheppard/Flickr]