What would you do with an extra 2 hours a day?
Recently I was considering the many benefits of working in a virtual company, and right at the top of my list was avoiding the daily commute. Travelling downtown each day in Calgary used to take up at least an hour each morning, and an hour each evening. That’s two hours a day, five days a week. Even at a four week month that’s a whopping 40 hours a week spent in traffic: an entire work week lost!
With a virtual set up, that time can be spent being active in the business. But what about those who can’t do a virtual set-up. How can that time be recouped? Leave it to Google.
Like something straight out of a movie, Google has developed technology for cars that can drive themselves. Not only have they developed that technology, but they’ve been testing it- their self driving cars have been making their way all over California, with over 140,000 miles logged so far.
According to Google, their “automated cars use video cameras, radar sensors and a laser range finder to ‘see’ other traffic, as well as detailed maps…to navigate the road ahead.” Citing safety as their top priority, the cars are never unmanned. During testing there is both a driver behind the wheel (ready to take over in case of any mistakes) and an engineer in the passenger seat to monitor the software. The only accident to date? One of the vehicles was rear-ended at a traffic stop – human error!
Google is optimistic that the technology will not only improve our efficiency, cut energy consumption, and increase the volume of traffic that can navigate the roads, but will also help to reduce the number of traffic accident related deaths, which according to the World Health Organization equals more that 1.2 million lives lost each year.
You won’t see it on the market any time soon. Even if the technology is perfected, there are many legal hassles that will slow down it’s launch, not the least of which will be completely revising traffic laws, which are based on the premise that a human is at the wheel. But the potential is there.
So what would you do with an extra few hours of productive time? Research? Watch videos? Maybe take some time to just relax and listen to some tunes? I’d suggest Brad Paisley’s “Welcome to the Future”. Ok, now I feel old.
