The Question of Self-Driving Vehicles

On March 18, 2018, 49-year-old Elaine Herzberg was struck and killed by a self-driving Uber car. No one is to blame, but we all should take responsibility, since we all knew it would happen eventually. Ms. Herzberg stepped off a median in Tempe, AZ, pushing a bicycle well outside the crosswalk late at night, when she became the first pedestrian killed by an autonomous vehicle. It was a Volvo SUV, traveling at 38 mph, which apparently didn’t even brake. The need for self-driving cars is real and spotlights our national pedestrian-safety problem. In 2017, pedestrians were victims of about 15%