About to undertake a long holiday drive to see relatives in a distant state? Already thinking of the traffic? Next year really could be better–thanks to some auto-focused supergeeks changing the world at Google. “We’re going to be spending the holidays zipping around our test track, and we hope to see you on the streets of Northern California in the new year,” writes the Google Self-Driving Car Project at Google+. That’s right, Google just announced its self-driving car is really ready to go.
Commenters like Francisco Saravia “can’t wait to work and travel at the same time.” Work? Okay. Other people are thinking about sleeping while Google drives them. Still others, as ever, immediately considered another type of bedroom activity. (Ask a limo driver, if you must.) Eric Limbeck has very high hope for a brave (and safe) new Google-driven world: “The driverless car will be the biggest change since the Internet. Not only will the #1 killer of Americans ages 4-34 go away, this will have major cost benefits for all of us.” Chris Urmson, Brian Torcellini, Dmitri Dolgov and company have been driving the project, so to speak.
