Mercedes-Benz announced the launch of the features last week Autonomous driving level 3. It will release them in the second half of this year in selected models for the United States and will be a breakthrough in this type of technology.

The automotive industry is still immersed in the revolutionary process of developing the cars of the future. Smart, connected, eco-friendly and autonomous, they’ll look little like those of decades past, except on four wheels. The end of the “combustion era” is approaching as a necessary commitment to reduce pollutant emissions, but this is only the tip of the iceberg.

Technology is central to the automotive industry today and beyond the scope of classic infotainment systems, it provides solutions for communication, information and general control of all kinds of parameters. Also cameras, sensors and radars needed for an autonomous car and charging systems for electric batteries or hydrogen fuel cells for an ecological car.

Levels of autonomous driving

The maximum expression towards the “smart” car basically suggests the point where the machine can “decide” for itself for the safety and comfort of the driver. While there is no universal definition of what an autonomous car is or is not, there is a widely accepted scale, a list of criteria for six levels of autonomous driving published by the International Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE).

All the major manufacturers have autonomous driving projects in the pipeline at various levels, such as the Mercedes-Benz Drive Pilot system, which gave us the opportunity to explore them; Tesla Autopilot; Ford’s BlueCruise; HDA of Hyundai; General Motors Super Cruise and more. But what does each of them mean and where are we now?

level 0

It cannot be considered a true level of autonomous driving, even though it is cited as a default resource for others. It includes all current cars that do not have autonomous driving features or are present to a very limited extent. However, they may include some assistance, such as blind spot monitoring, lane departure warning or emergency braking systems, which are standard on almost all new models coming to market. At this level, the infotainment system does just that, it informs and entertains, but it doesn’t interfere in any way.

Level 1

The car will start making decisions on its own, but very limited. According to the UAE, this level must include characteristics that drive, brake or accelerate the car without user intervention. With these capabilities, the car “decides” (via a series of sensors) whether to stay centered in a certain lane or maintain a certain distance from other vehicles.

It is important to note that for a car to be classified as Tier 1, it must have at least one of the listed characteristics, but not all at the same time, which would place it higher on the list. Features at this level have been in the industry since Toyota introduced them in the 1990s and can be seen in automatic lane keeping assist or laser/radar cruise control.

Level 2

It includes the same capabilities as Level 1, but is determined by the organization systems must work together. The driver is still in full control of the vehicle, but functions such as lane keeping, adaptive cruise control or traffic sign recognition make driving easier, especially on long journeys, and improve overall safety. Others, such as intelligent high beam control, analyze ambient lighting and identify the lights of other vehicles on the road to automatically switch between high beam and dipped beam.

It should be said that the UAE considers levels 0, 1 and 2 to be “driver assistance functions” and not truly “automated” functions which we will see in the following. Level 2 cars are the most you can get in a production car today, and as they become more connected and advanced (especially during the transition to electric vehicles), features at this level are likely to become commonplace in the coming years. Even with the aids, this level requires constant driver supervision.

Level 3

It is the first level that the UAE is considering car “can drive itself”. The driver is still in place, but the car can stop, start, and even change lanes in traffic based on what its sensors tell it to do, without driver intervention. In terms of safety, today’s pre-collision systems have advanced to the next level and are effective in detecting pedestrians or cyclists and preventing accidents.

That level is in its infancy, and it’s one that Mercedes Benz is debuting in the United States this year in select S-Class and EQS Sedan models. The technology used is similar to other vehicles using this level in the future. The exact position (with a range in centimeters) is determined by a high-precision positioning system much more powerful than conventional GPS systems. In addition to anonymous data collected by LiDAR, camera, radar and ultrasonic sensors, the digital HD map provides a three-dimensional image of the road and its surroundings with information on road geometry, route characteristics, road signs and special traffic events (such as accidents or road works).

Your request will not be completed yet and will be limited to daytime driving, speeds of less than 40 miles per hour and selected sections of roads that have been previously mapped. Under these conditions, with Drive Pilot on, the cars will drive themselves. It must be said that this is a testing phase, as only a small number of states have given the green light to the use of this technology.

Levels 4 and 5

These levels define fully autonomous cars. With level 4, the car will be able to drive itself completely in the given environment. This would include autonomous taxi services, where neither a human driver nor essential components such as steering wheels, brake or throttle need be present. There are no commercial models yet, though companies like Cruise and Waymo are testing taxis.

As for level 5, it’s the stuff of science fiction at the moment, as it’s reserved for vehicles that can navigate themselves anywhere, without any human driver intervention, in any environment. At this level, it is a vehicle that makes decisions with complete autonomy and does not require any type of driver intervention to control the car once the route starts. Here, the person will be put in the background, because the machine will be able to make decisions on its own after evaluating all the parameters.

There are still decades to reach the highest level because In addition to the technology, a regulatory framework is needed to enable this. There have been several car accidents on “autopilot” and lawmakers are cautious about approving the use of individual levels. It might seem that full assistance deprives us of the joy of driving, but technology can be a big help here, allowing us to do other things during the trip, such as watching a movie, working or playing small games, and especially improving the general safety of cars and traffic.