From a Telegraph article by Jeevan Vasagar about Germany automaker’s plans to gradually sway drivers into giving up the wheel:

“Devised by a team at the Free University of Berlin, the self-driving VW Passat is a highly advanced autonomous car, capable of navigating a safe path through unpredictable city traffic.

It sees the world through a spinning silver cylinder mounted on the roof, a laser scanner, which generates one million data points per second to give the car’s computer a real-time map of its surroundings.

Cameras and radar sensors provide a further wealth of detail, alongside an ultra-precise GPS based on the navigation systems used in aircraft.

It will be many years before a car this sophisticated is commercially available. But Germany’s luxury car makers have begun introducing an array of autonomous features which enable some of their leading models to drive and steer themselves.

Rather than the sudden advent of robot vehicles, car makers believe autonomous driving will be introduced gradually.

Daimler, which owns Mercedes Benz, predicts that at low speeds – such as in traffic jams or parking – cars will operate with full autonomy ‘in a matter of years.’ At higher speeds, several manufacturers plan for highly automated driving within the structured environment of the motorway.”

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The great Peter Stormare, representing Deutschland: