Hindsight · review build · data not yet validated
Intelligent roads are in use, primarily for long-distance travel. Once your car’s computer guidance system locks onto the control sensors on one of these highways, you can sit back and relax. Local roads, though, are still predominantly conventional.
Grader A: miss
No highway with guidance sensors that cars lock onto was in service in 2009 or by 2014. The US Automated Highway System demo ran once in 1997 on I-15 and the program ended. Investment moved to sensors in the vehicle, not in the road.
Test: Share of long-distance highways with vehicle-guidance infrastructure in use: zero by 2014.
Grader B: miss
No highway had guidance sensors that let cars drive themselves, in 2009 or by 2014. The US National Automated Highway System Consortium held a technically successful demo on I-15 near San Diego in 1997. Investment then moved to self-contained autonomous vehicles instead of instrumented roads. SARTRE (from 2009) was a research test, not a deployment.
Test: Mainstream test: 20% of long-distance highway mileage or travel on automated highways. Actual: 0% in 2009 and 2014; the only activity was demos and research projects.