Watch any sci-fi movie from the last few decades and you will have seen any number of futuristic modes of transport, from the transport tubes in Futurama and Star Trek to the gravity train in Total Recall. Back in the day, many of these technologies would have seemed improbable to the audience, but here in the 21st century, it’s not such a stretch of the imagination. After all, we now have driverless cars on the roads! OK, so they are not quite mainstream yet, and we’re a long way from ‘hover cars’, but the future might be here sooner than we think!
Let’s take a look at what the future of transportation looks like, and how soon it might be here.
Autonomous Cars
Driverless cars are already here. Google and Tesla have spent millions developing autonomous cars powered by artificial intelligence. Self-driving cars may be the stuff of science fiction, but they are almost certainly the future of transportation.
Self-driving technology has been around for years. Many modern cars come with in-built crash detection sensors that alert the driver when a collision is imminent and hit the brakes if the driver doesn’t react fast enough. The latest self-driving cars use the same kind of technology, with high-definition cameras watching out for other vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists, and other objects on the road.
The technology isn’t foolproof. Back in 2016, a Google self-driving car drove into the side of a bus, causing an accident. The vehicle detected sandbags in the road and deviated around them. Unfortunately, a transit bus was approaching, and the two vehicles collided as the Google car re-entered its lane. At the time, Google admitted its technology was at fault.
The autonomous vehicle market is worth $54 billion and there are now around 1,400 autonomous cars in the United States, with many states are testing AVs on public highways. However, public confidence remains low and 57% of people would rather drive their vehicle than hand over control to an AI.
Why is Progress So Slow?
One of the biggest problems with autonomous vehicle technology is that carmakers need data to train the AI in charge of the vehicles. Machine learning systems are taught how to control a self-driving car by watching hours of footage of real driving. This may sound simple, but the hard part is obtaining that footage – and it’s also expensive.
There are self-driving cars roaming around in some states, and it is likely that we will see many more of them over the next few years.
Still, despite doubts as to the safety of the technology, it may take a while before autonomous vehicles become the norm in the future and we can expect to see driverless Ubers and autonomous mass-transit buses before long. It might not be as much fun if you happen to enjoy driving, but on a long and extremely boring route, it could be a lot more relaxing.
Floating Trains
Trains as a mass-transit transportation service have been around for a long time. They are highly efficient at transporting passengers at high speed over long distances and passenger numbers are expected to double in the next 30 years.
In an increasingly urbanized world, trains are an efficient way to travel, especially when compared to short-distance air travel, and rail travel is one of the most energy-efficient modes of transport. In addition, rail is not just an efficient way to transport people – rail plays an important part in transporting freight over land.
Modern trains rely on electrified rails for power, with only trains in South and North America still reliant on diesel. However, we now have trains that use magnetic levitation to move from A to B.
Magnetic levitation isn’t new; the technology was first used in Shanghai in 2004. The system uses two sets of magnets: one magnet repels and pushes the train up and the other moves it forward. On medium length routes, magnetic trains can compete very favorably with high-speed trains, but high wind resistance is a problem. In addition, maglev rail systems are expensive to construct, although the trains are cheaper to manufacture.
In the future, maglev trains will probably compete with hyperloop trains, whereby train capsules move at high speed through vacuum tubes. The system would transport passengers between cities at speeds of around 970km/hour. While this probably sounds very futuristic, the technology is already being developed by Elon Musk and SpaceX, so it could be with us in the next few decades.
What Lies Ahead?
If we look beyond driverless cars and hyperloop trains, the future is very uncertain. However, some experts believe we could all have our own personal transport pod, which responds to biometric data and draws on personal data to take us where we need to go, whether that’s home or the office.
Whether that happens remains to be seen and right now, the majority of people are still a bit too nervous to imagine handing over control to an artificial intelligence. In addition, the technology isn’t there yet, and while Elon Musk might be convinced we will be jumping into a hyperloop train or relaxing in our autonomous Tesla in the next decade, in reality, the infrastructure isn’t anywhere close to supporting such technology.
But if advanced mobility concepts intrigue you, it is worth learning more about them. An electrical computer engineering master’s degree from Kettering Online covers modules such as advanced mobility. This is an exciting technology. For anyone keen to work for a company like Tesla or be involved in the development of Google’s self-driving vehicles, such a qualification will be invaluable.
One thing is certain, the planet will thank us if we ditch our diesel or gasoline powered cars for good.
In the meantime, we can probably look forward to an age where individual vehicle ownership is no longer the norm, and if we can’t to travel somewhere, we call on an autonomous AI-powered taxi cab or step into a personal transportation device.
