The this time, it’s our self-driving cars, powered

The first iPhone was a technological breakthrough whichchanged the way we interact with our phones. More than a decade later, technologyis well on its way to make an impact in our lives yet again. This time, it’sour self-driving cars, powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI). As UK transportminister Johns Hayes once said, “ driverless cars offer huge benefits tomotorists such as reduced delays and more reliable journey times” (GOV UK, 2017), but are we ready for this change? No doubt it is the future, buteveryone has to play a part to tackle the pressing issues in order to fulfilthe true purpose of driverless vehicles.             Withtechnological giants across the globe like Google & Apple testing their ownform of autonomous vehicle technology, Singapore is no exception.

A committeewas set up by the government back in 2014 to research & develop this technology(MOT, 2014). Just last year, ride-hailing company Grab & nuTonomy announcedtheir partnership to bring eco-friendly driverless taxi rides to the public, bystarting an invite-only trial (Annabelle, 2017). We can see this initiative asa good effort to promote the usage of public transport for road users, and to reducethe number of car owners on the road.             Butwhat about safety? A recent study by US-based non-profit Eno Centre forTransportation showed that if more than 90 percent of the cars on Americanroads were driverless, the number of accidents will decrease from 5.

5 millionto 1. 3 million (Annabelle, 2017). Reducing the risk of accidents is certainly astep in the right direction, with AI being programmed to be safe and lawabiding on roads.