Tesla Autopilot steers around rogue barrier at construction site with ease

Tesla’s Autopilot continues to get more refined with each new update, and if a recent video from a Model 3 owner is any indication, it appears that the driver-assist system is getting more capable in recognizing and reacting to unexpected incidents on the road. Take, for example, a rogue construction cone strangely placed in the Tesla’s lane. 

Chris of the Dirty Tesla YouTube channel was conducting one of his “Tesla Challenge” videos when his Model 3, which was running 2019.40.1.1, encountered a construction site. The area was lined with numerous construction barrels, some of which started cutting off the Model 3’s lane. This proved to be no problem for Autopilot, as the driver-assist system simply moved to the next lane without missing a beat. 

As with many things in the freeway, something unexpected happened. At the end of the row of construction cones was a barrel that was actually in the Model 3’s lane. Hands ready at the steering wheel, the Tesla owner prepared to take over just in case the Autopilot does not react properly. But it did. As could be seen in the footage, the Model 3 avoided the stray construction cone before moving back to the center of its lane. 

This is quite an improvement in Tesla’s driver-assist system, as the Model 3 ended up almost crossing into the next lane when it maneuvered around the rogue construction barrel. A look at the footage from the vehicle’s built-in dashcam showed just how close the Model 3 was to crossing into the adjacent lane during its evasive maneuver. The vehicle did not reduce its speed either when it avoided the construction zone. 

Unfortunately, Chris’ Model 3 is still equipped with Hardware 2.5 and thus, the construction cones on the road were not rendered on the vehicle’s center display. Had the car been equipped with HW 3.0, it would have likely depicted the exact location of the rogue barrel as Autopilot evaded it. This seemed to be the case, as Navigate on Autopilot’s blue line actually curved when the Model 3 was avoiding the construction barrel. 

These incidents hint at the subtle Autopilot improvements that Tesla has been releasing to its fleet with each new software update. With each improvement, the electric car maker is stepping a bit forward towards Elon Musk’s goal of releasing a feature-complete version of Full Self-Driving to the company’s early access users by the end of the year. With references to inner-city driving being found in Tesla’s source code, and with Navigate on Autopilot becoming more and more robust, Musk’s optimistic target may prove to be feasible after all. 

Watch Dirty Tesla‘s encounter with the stray construction barrel in the video below. 

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Tesla Autopilot steers around rogue barrier at construction site with ease

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Does the Tesla Cybertruck inspire a vision of the future that people want?

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One week after its reveal, I’m not sure there’s much left to be said about Tesla’s first foray into the truck world. The specs are obviously impressive, and the design has mixed reviews with the predictable players taking their predictable positions. I hadn’t planned on talking much about Cybertruck in my weekly newsletter column since, at this point, literally everyone with something to say about it has done just that. But something has been bothering me about the discussion.

I don’t like the divide the Cybertruck’s design is creating, and I don’t blame Elon Musk or Tesla. I blame the part of the Tesla fan base that is responding very poorly to criticism of a product that was expected to draw that very same criticism.

On one end, there’s the steady Tesla crowd ready to buy anything the company produces that their budget can afford. On the other end, there’s the average consumer who is paying attention to what’s going on in the green car movement and imagining how one of the latest electric cars would fit their life and style. After all, the decision to buy a car has numerous factors (literally) driving it, and an electric car has even more factors built-in thanks to the fact that the industry is still new. For example, home charging isn’t an option for a lot of people, and filling up is already a chore when it takes 5 minutes, much less 30+ minutes at a Supercharger. There would need to be several reasons for the average consumer (read: someone that’s not part of the Tesla fan base or electric car crowd) to make the decision to buy one.

Tesla Cybertruck stainless steel rear hatch (Photo: Arash Malek)

That being said, if someone doesn’t like Cybertruck’s design, they’re not going to want to buy it unless there’s literally no other vehicle that meets their needs and wants with a more appealing design. And that’s okay. It doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with their opinion. It doesn’t mean they’re a boring person that’s part of a dying culture that will cease to exist in 50 years. It doesn’t mean Tesla will fail at their mission because its radical truck design doesn’t appeal to people that aren’t into radical truck designs. It just means that they don’t like it. Frankly, I don’t like it, either. I also didn’t expect to like it. I also expected to maybe like it but not want to ever buy it.

The Cybertruck isn’t just about thinking “outside the box” by creating a truck that looks like an odd box. It has a design that says something about the personality of the owner, and unlike a lot of conventional car designs, its message is overwhelming and distracting. If that’s your personality, great. If it’s not, great. Pushing this idea that if you don’t like the Cybertruck, or rather, you don’t like dystopian science fiction from the 80s and 90s, there’s something wrong with you… It’s feeding into a stereotype about electric cars that is annoying if not outright rude, dismissive, and very unhelpful for the green car movement.

Actually, what it starts to do is remind people (like me) of this long-term dystopian vision that they really really really don’t want that tech people are always pushing for as “cool” or “the unavoidable future.” Elon Musk might watch Blade Runner and love the designs it inspires, but I watch that movie and shudder to think of such an awful world to exist in. It’s one thing to like the artistic side of science fiction, but there are big glaring warnings about the worlds it represents. In Total Recall, for example, many like the whole Mars colonization thing it’s based on, but the back story is this company using mind control and manipulation while causing God-awful deformities in the people living there. Instead of focusing on that part, we wear shirts with “Get Your Ass to Mars” as a rallying cry for a mission to the red planet.

The inspiration to live on other worlds is something I love. What I don’t love is pushing the whole movie as the ideal future. That’s what I see in Cybertruck. I like it as a cool, movie-inspired design that will appeal to people who really like that style. I don’t like it as a representation of a full-on future that I have to like or I’m an idiot or a hater. In my opinion, throwing those types of stones at people who don’t like Cybertruck’s design feeds into the notion that if you’re not on board with the dystopian world it was inspired by, you have no place in the world’s future.

I like the Victorian touches of the mid-century A-frame I’m building, and the micro-controller watering and monitoring system I’m working on that will help with my gardening fuse the traditional with the new. I still don’t see a place for an angular, military-style truck in my driveway. It’s not my thing, and I really hope it stays as just a thing that some people like and not representative of a future that will dismantle my farm dreams in favor of robots vs. humans defending their right to live. Sheesh.

That’s one perspective the (typed) shouting matches about Cybertruck push. Another one is full of eye rolls and comments about Kool-Aid drinking. I honestly thought the point of the design was probably that Musk finally had the opportunity to do a vehicle that he knew would have a small market appeal but did it anyway because he just wanted to do it. He’d already done conventionally in the Model S, 3, and Y, pushed the limits a bit with the X and Semi, and was working on a sports car masterpiece with the next-gen Roadster.

I didn’t think that Cybertruck was supposed to upend Ford’s or Chevy’s or Toyota’s hold on pickups, so when that argument started making the rounds and doubters shouted down… I was surprised. If there’s one way to be seen as a “Tesla bro” or not be taken seriously by the very consumers you’re trying to win over, that’s it. Also, 250k people putting down $100 on a truck that they don’t have to fork over the full cash to buy for at least another couple of years doesn’t prove that the design is a mainstream hit, either. It’s an encouraging sign for sure, but not as encouraging as the 350k Model 3 reservations in that same one-week timeframe that required $1,000 to make.

In summary, the Cybertruck might win people over in the mainstream, and it might not. The specs combined with the gas savings might pull in commercial customers and start a new movement in that direction on a design level. It also might not. Tesla could just revise its design a bit while keeping the specs and appeal to a much broader base (which I’m hoping for), but it still might not.

Perhaps yelling at people that don’t like it that they’re dumb and have no taste might win them over eventually. It also might not. Being obnoxious about the Cybertruck to people on the fence about electric cars might cull a new consumer base.

But again, it might not.

Does the Tesla Cybertruck inspire a vision of the future that people want?

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Tesla source code reveals Autopilot for city streets and Asia markets in focus

Tesla appears to be laying the groundwork for the rollout of upcoming Full Self-Driving features, as well as a more widespread release of Autopilot’s more advanced features in Asia. The updates were included in the electric car maker’s recently-released 19.40.1.1 update and shared on Twitter by Tesla owner @greentheonly, who has been analyzing the company’s driver-assist system for years. 

The Tesla owner-enthusiast noted that the recent update included a very interesting code. This code was “CityStreetsBehavior,” which is reportedly new in Tesla’s driver-assist system. The function of this code remains unannounced by Tesla, though its name does suggest that it relates to automatic driving in city streets, an upcoming feature for Tesla’s Full Self-Driving system. 

https://twitter.com/greentheonly/status/1200263640307380224?s=20

Additional features of Tesla’s Full Self-Driving system have been mentioned by Elon Musk, with the CEO previously stating that he believes the company’s FSD suite would be “feature-complete” by the end of the year. This timeframe is closing in fast, though the addition of this new code in Autopilot suggests that Tesla is expediting its FSD rollout. It should be noted that Elon Musk has also mentioned that Tesla will likely conduct a limited early access release of FSD’s feature-complete version by the end of 2019. 

Also included among the changes included in Tesla’s recent update include several improvements such as license plate routing for the Chinese market and improved guidance view for China and Korea. Unfortunately, Autopilot also received some updates for the Japanese market that limits the driver-assist feature, similar to how it is employed in the European region

https://twitter.com/greentheonly/status/1200232181022498821?s=20

The inclusion of Autopilot improvements for the Chinese market is particularly notable, considering that Tesla is expected to expand its presence in the Asian country soon. With the completion of Gigafactory 3’s Phase 1 zone, Tesla is now ready to sell the Model 3 en masse in China. So far, the company has received a mass manufacturing license for Gigafactory 3 and is only now waiting for its final permits to start deliveries of the Model 3 to the region. 

With this in mind, there will likely be a massive influx of new Tesla owners in the Chinese market, and since Gigafactory 3 will be producing the Standard Range Plus Model 3, practically all of these vehicles will be equipped with basic Autopilot. License plate routing and improved guidance view would then be incredibly useful features for China-based Model 3 owners. 

Other key features included in Tesla’s recent update are improvements to Tesla’s charging features. The Model 3 Standard Range and Standard Range Plus, for example, are now capable of charging up to 170 kW, while the Mid-Range version has been improved to 200 kW. The company’s automatic wipers have also been improved, thanks to data gathered by the Neural Network.

Tesla source code reveals Autopilot for city streets and Asia markets in focus

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