Driving could be outlawed by 2050 as autonomous vehicles match or exceed human safety by 2024, according to a new IDTechEx report by Dr. James Jeffs.
The report, Autonomous Cars, Robotaxis & Sensors 2022–2042, also found that by 2024 self-driving vehicles will grow quickly—at a CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 30 per cent. The report primarily covers safety and regulation, which it considers to be a key barrier for adoption.
“By the 2040s, they will be capable of fulfilling the world’s mobility needs without a single collision,” said IDTechEx in a news release. “So why should humans be allowed to continue driving?”
The company said clean air zones in certain countries are controlling the type of vehicle allowed in cities, and that as the maturity of self-driving vehicles increases, “it is conceivable that these zones could become autonomous-only, to improve inner-city pedestrian safety.”
Governments could also roll out this initiative to include entire cities with the use of a mandate, where travel inside the city can only be conducted by autonomous drivers. Furthermore, IDTechEx said manual driving could become illegal on public roads for safety reasons, and that manual driving may be relegated to sports activities such as racing and track days.
As for why the company believes 2050 will be the year driving is outlawed (at least in the United States)—IDTechEx said it analyzed autonomous disengagement from the California DMV, which in turn revealed the maturity of current self-driving testing.
“The top players such as Waymo and Cruise are currently traveling approximately 30,000 miles (48,280 kilometres) between disengagements, a number increasing by a factor of two each year,” said IDTechEx. “If this growth is sustained, by 2046 autonomous vehicles will meet the total mobility demand of the U.S. (3 trillion miles) without a disengagement.”
By 2050, the company said the U.S. could meet the world’s transportation needs with fewer than one collision per year.
More details about the IDTechEx report by Dr. James Jeffs can be found here.
