this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2025
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Human eyes are way better at this than any camera based self driving system. No self driving system is anywhere close to driving in Swedish winter with bad weather and no sun, yet us Swedes do it routinely by the millions every day.
Yep, winter will be the death of 100% self driving cars, we can "filter out" snowflakes easily, computers can't.
My Volvo (and I mean, if one brand makes cars made for winter, it's them) ends up turning adaptive cruise control off in snowstorms because the sensors get completely blocked by snow. Elon never had to drive in conditions where the whole front of your car ends up looking like a snowbank and it shows. Hell you might need to stop by the side of the road to clear your lights in order to continue driving! Try to make a South African living in Texas understand that!
Not only that. As a general rule road markings are hidden beneath the snow, and often signs will be covered as well. You have to make an educated guess what they say. E.g. speed limit is based on contextual clues like road width, distance to treeline etc).
Really any technology that relies on signs and markings being visible will fail. There is little indication of where the road is. Often a fork in the road is not apparent because the plow has pushed up a snow bank that you must push through (but be careful not to get stuck in it if it's too dense).
Combine this with heavy snow in the wind, road salt that picks up dirt that sticks to sensors, fog, and other cars that overtake you while spraying snow across your windshield. It's honestly crazy that humans manage so well in these conditions.
That's interesting. I've never had any problems with adaptive cruise in the winter. I'm pretty sure that my V90CC has a heated radar module.
Mine is a P3 so maybe the newer generation fixed that!
Of course it does snow in Texas. Famously even.
Elon's problem is he's just a self-absorbed dick, most people wouldn't have trouble imagining adverse weather conditions, even if they haven't personally experienced them.
Average snowfall of 0.1 inches a year in the state, the northern part of the state gets less than 2 inches on average, the place that gets the most snow is Amarillo at 17 inches a year on average.
Last month we got 31 inches over three days over here, I've lived in a city where 200 inches a year is normal.
Texas doesn't know actual winter driving.