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The AI part of autonomous driving could have easily been handled by creating a network of roads (that is, converting existing roads) that has the appropriate markings and that is easy navigable by machines.

But that requires cooperation between governments and/with the private sector, and in 2019, God forbid that.

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That's called trains.

And isn't it interesting that even though we've had driverless trains for decades many of them still require a driver?

In London the DLR (Docklands Light Railway) is fully automatic. In Tokyo the trains are computer controlled but a driver takes over outside of peak hours, apparently for practice.

So perhaps we'll never get past a self-driving car requiring a human operator at least pretending to pay attention (so no real change there, then).

The bigger hurdle is the cost to redo roads.

2-6 million per mile of road. 4 million+ miles of road in US.

It’s not so much the roads though, it’s the other cars and other things/people/animals in the way

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