I have a soft spot in my heart for children who follow in their parents footsteps when it comes to their career choices. The son that takes over dad’s hardware store. The daughter that runs the family restaurant. Families full of teachers, doctors, insurance salesmen. Or even Ken Griffey Sr. and Ken Griffey Jr. — I find the continuity comforting.
I don’t have any children yet (sorry Mom), but I know for a fact that if I eventually do have a son or daughter, they won’t wind up in my line of work. Not because they won’t want to be traffic reporters, it’s because the job will no longer exist by the time they hit the workforce. By my estimation, in about 10 or 15 years, the traditional traffic reporters as you know them, will be no more.
My career will end not because of traffic apps on your phone, the expansion of HOT-Express lanes or a majority of the population finally deciding to car pool. My career will end because of the car you drive. Not the car you have now, but the car you will have in 10 years.
In fact, it’s a car that you will own, but not drive. My career will close out with the eventual proliferation of the “driverless” car.
In 10 years, your car will drive you, rather than you driving your car. Without the X-factor of a human driver, automobiles will be able to talk to each other, not only to avoid hitting each other, but also to avoid creating traffic jams.
All you will have to do is sit back, relax and enjoy the ride.
And I’ll need to find a new line of work.
It might seem far-fetched to you right now, but the driverless car is well on it’s way to becoming the norm. In addition the work that Google is doing on it’s driverless car, current auto-makers are also exploring the field.
Remember when the first car came out with the automatic parallel parking feature? That was only the beginning.
Right now Mercedes Benz is starting to offer a “stop and go” feature on its S-Class sedan. Using 12 ultrasonic detectors, five cameras and six radar sensors, the call will drive itself in bumper-to-bumper traffic. The driver simply turns on cruise control and the car will literally drive itself in stop and go traffic. Just like the current cruise control on your car, the program stops once you hit the brake or gas pedals.
The optional feature is already available in Germany. No word if and when it will be offered in the United States.
Imagine not having to constantly having to apply your breaks during morning drive on Interstate 285 or on Interstate 75/85 heading to Turner Field during game day traffic.
There is no question that driverless cars are the future. The only real question is what are my kids going to do for a living?
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