2017 was a great year for self-driving cars to hit the streets, and Finland joined in the fun with an autonomous car designed for icy roads. These self-driving cars require no human at the wheel, and the decision to let these vehicles on the open road has been met with harsh debate.
The biggest concern is whether or not these cars will pose a threat to other cars on the road. Certainly, programming a car under controlled conditions isn’t too questionable. However, putting them out on the open road with human drivers (and passengers) has been met with some criticism.
Some have argued that unpredictable weather patterns could compromise an autonomous car’s performance. It is a lot easier for anyone to drive on perfect roads. However, even the most experienced human drivers can have problems on icy, snow-covered roads.
Not many countries know more about icy, snow-covered roads than Finland! Researchers at the VTT Technical Research Centre have been working on Martti, an autonomous driving system that can navigate snow-covered, public roads.
Martti is build on a Volkswagen Touareg, fully equipped with sensors, laser scanners, cameras, and antennas to help analyze its surroundings. Although the prototype is promising, we won’t be seeing Martti out on the market for quite some time