Building a Car? Build This!

Several weeks ago, Apple was in the news because they were rumored to be building a car.  The  rumor turned out to be false.  Everybody wants to be where people spend a lot of time.  Google wants to build completely self-driving cars.  Even the major manufacturers are working on something of their own.  Nobody asked me, but here are my thoughts anyway.  Enjoy!

First, let's start with the car to build now, with existing technology or something that can be developed in a short amount of time:

1. License Volkswagen's MQB platform.  In the same way that Tesla used Lotus' design for their first model, using an existing platform will save on development costs and accelerate time to market.  Also, the MQB is versatile enough be designed around.  Think about it: the Audi A3 and the VW Golf sits on the same platform but look very different. I'm pretty sure there is a Skoda that sits on the MQB as well.
2. Safety First.  Apart from the mandated seat belts and airbags, these additional safety features should come standard.  All of these are meant to aid the driver but not relieve him of his duties.  The car will be loaded with a ton of sensors:
• Adaptive Cruise Control - stays within 3 seconds of the car ahead of you, or the speed that you set, whichever is slower, and applies brakes when necessary; this will allow you to, literally, just sit in traffic.
• Collision Avoidance - applies brakes and increases tension to the seat belts when an obstacle is detected, and possibly, steering to the next lane;
• Oncoming Vehicle Warning - and similar to above, increases tension to the seat belts, maybe potentially accelerate or move out of the way.  The problem with today's blind spot detectors is that they beep or flash even if you are not changing lanes, or the other vehicle is going in a straight line.  With a few tweaks, it should be able to selectively warn you depending on whether you are in fact veering into their direction, or they are moving into your lane.
• Lane Departure Warning - detects if the vehicle is going wayward and out of his own lane without driver input; possibly also reading the driver's condition in conjunction with road sensors.  It may also self-correct.
• Active Headlamps - legislation needs to change on this one, but headlamps should automatically brighten, darken, turn off, turn right or left depending on conditions. 
• Heads Up Display - reduce the need to look down, display speed, and navigation on the windscreen, as well as warnings from the above features.
• Rear View Cameras and Sensors - today's cars only activate when the car is in reverse. These should activate on command.  It is still a good habit to check the rear view from time to time, and with bigger cars, or even smaller sports cars, the mirror just doesn't cut it.
3. Add these convenience features:
• The climate control system should learn the habits of the driver, and adjust the temperature and seat heaters as necessary.  It will record the settings, the driver's temperature, the outside temperature and the cabin temperature to infer future settings.  There will be no need to fiddle with the controls as you drive the car.
• Connected Car - either through Wi-Fi, cellular, or Satellite, receive traffic, music, news, podcasts, calls, and text.  It saves the location and driving information in a secure location, as well as send diagnostic information to the manufacturer.
• Voice Commands - allow more voice commands to avoid having to take hands off the steering wheel.

I do realize that a lot of these features are already in high end cars like the S-class from Mercedes, and some of Audi's more expensive offerings.  But if a tech company can make it cheaper yet reliable, I am all for it, as long as software updates are not too often and don't take 4 hours, rendering the car inoperable while in the process.

Now, in the next ten years, technology may allow us to have the following features:

1. Either go 300 miles on a single charge, or find a cheaper fuel source.  It has to preserve the "road trip" experience, meaning you can stop for 10 minutes to fill up, and be back on the road again and drive another 300 or more miles.
2. It may take the fun out of driving for enthusiasts, but more driving automation, with more of sensors and more intelligence, a car should be able to get you to your destination by merely entering (or stating) your destination to your navigation device.  The car will try to avoid traffic if you instruct it to, very much like your GPS today, but the car will actually reroute itself.  And equally as important, it will activate the turn signal early enough!
3. Beyond self-parking, self-valet should become available, either the car autonomously finds a parking spot after dropping you off, or uses signals and sensors from the smart parking garage.
4. In an ever increasingly connected world, besides smart garages, there will be smart roads that know the conditions, the speed limit, and the car will communicate with the road, as well as other cars.
5. There will be no toll booths, as your car sends its identity to the agency that collects tolls whenever you pass by their smart bridge, or smart tollway.  And the agency charges your bank.
6. And of course, with all this data available, it can personalize everything from your playlist to the ads that play in between.  It will play new music based on your past listening history.  It will choose routes based on your and other people of similar attributes' driving preferences.

I do realize two things.  All this automation may lead to the "Rise of the Machines" as foretold in The Terminator.  Secondly, it turns off the driving enthusiasts who have felt the loss of "connectedness" to the car with all the current electronic driver aids.  But for the rest of the driving masses who just need to get from point a to point b in the safest, fastest, most convenient way possible, they will trust the machine to do the work for them.