Let's do a small road trip around CA starting and ending in SF, avoiding the tolls and seeing some nice scenery.
Head north over the Golden Gate Bridge, immediately losing cell service. Decide at that time (no cell service) to make a stop at the Nike missile launch site, passing through the long single-lane tunnel w/o crashing into an oncoming car. Head back to 101, continue north, driving through 3 trees: Chandelier Tree, Shrine Tree, Klamath Tree. Yes, actually drive through each tree. Go back south to Redwood National Park, and then head east on Bald Hills Road, half of which is a gravel road. Pass through Hoopa. Make an unscheduled stop at the overlook to the original Hoopa campsite. Head to Weaverville, pass by the trailhead to Mount Lassen, then to Reno and on to Lee Vining. Stop at Mono Lake, in the dirt "parking lot", for one of the canoe trip tours. Head back north to Topaz Lake, then head west down US 4. Try not to get run off the 1.5-lane road by a logging truck. Head to San Jose and then north up to SF, neatly avoiding the bridge tolls.
For bonus points, do this when the state mandates snow chains for Lassen and/or US 4.
>For bonus points, do this when the state mandates snow chains for Lassen and/or US 4.
If anything that will be easier for the AI. People are the hard part. Fewer people around = easier.
If the AI is tasked with "go there" in deep snow, sand or whatever, it'll do better than your average person because your average person has no idea how to drive on anything but clear pavement whereas the guys writing the code are gonna get the input of experts as well as a bunch of testing and refinement.
People are nothing special. They operate objects that you must avoid. Sometimes they jump in front, and you make an effort to not squish them, but there is a limit to how crazy the person can be before you aren't liable.
Snow is tough. You have to infer where the road is from hints like mailboxes, trees, the occasional plant, and tracks left by other cars. In that area, sometimes you get poles that are installed to guide the snow plow operators, but there are seldom any curbs. This is a really tough machine vision problem, with things like lane markings and even road width needing to be inferred. Visibility distance can be severely reduced due to falling snow, and headlights will make it glint back at you. It is important to predict slipping before it happens, lest you slide off a cliff.
Of course, we combine the two. You must predict when other drivers are at risk of sliding into you, then avoid being there at that time. For example, a driver descends a hill on a road that intersects your road, and he faces a 2-way stop sign. You are free to proceed right through because you don't have a stop sign, but this could be a fatal move.
Or any other location in the US also! Try a Boston winter, or Houston's unending road construction. It feels like we're creating self driving cars that are experts at driving in SF.
