AUTONOMOUS BICYCLE VEHICLES & PEDESTRIAN PUBLIC SAFETY - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

AUTONOMOUS VEHICLES & PUBLIC SAFETY

LINDSEY HAJDUK BICYCLE PEDESTRIAN ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEMBER

CONTEXT: PEDESTRIAN/BIKE DEATHS ARE RISING WITH DIGITIZATION OF AUTOMOBILES

• Pedestrian fatalities are up 48% since 2008
• 6,000+ pedestrians killed in 2018
• 4,000 children killed in car crashes annually
• Anchorage’s auto-centric infrastructure already is dangerous:
• One person injured per day in car wrecks
• One pedestrian hit every three days
• One bicyclist hit every three days

AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE TESTING HAS BEEN LIMITED TO MOSTLY DRY, SUNNY CLIMATES

• Autonomous vehicle companies don’t have

disclosure requirements regarding testing, but public reports suggest testing has primarily occurred in dry, sunny climates (CA, AZ, FL)

• Camera technology has trouble perceiving

depth viewing white

• It will take hundreds of thousands of hours

testing (at least) in icy, snowy environments for autonomous vehicles to be safe

• Alaskans shouldn’t be the guinea pigs

SILICON VALLEY EXECS BLAME PEOPLE, NOT THEIR OWN CAR TECHNOLOGY

Industry won’t protect public. So we’re depending on government.

ASSEMBLY MUST ACT TO PROTECT PUBLIC SAFETY

Anchorage Assembly should prohibit use

• f autonomous vehicles operating

without human driver until and unless they have been operated safely in similar conditions in winter cities Silicon Valley model of “iteration” i.e. testing by trial and error works fine for some applications but not operations of vehicles that will kill people in the experimentation process