Google forced to add steering wheels to driverless cars
Google has been forced to add a steering wheel to its driverless cars so that a human can take over in case of a software hiccup.
Coming days after the lead software engineer Dmitri Dolgov admitted that the cars would “sometimes” exceed the speed limit, California’s Department of Motor Vehicles ruled that humans need to be able to take over physical control of the car in case of an accident or emergency.
Dolgov said that the cars were allowed to break the speed limit by up to 10mph as it would be safer to keep up with traffic when it was slightly exceeding the speed limit, than to stick to the limit and risk road rage and cause obstructions.
Google has said that 100 driverless cars would be fitted with temporary controls ahead of tests with members of the public on private roads, which are due to begin next month.
Tests on private roads will begin within two years, and at this point the cars should be fitted with a steering wheel and pedals.
Hollywood actor, David Hasselhoff recently revealed to The Drum his pitch to Google to create a Knightrider version of the self driving car.