Every time we hit the road, we’re faced with tradeoffs: Should I spend 30 bucks, or 30 minutes of my time? Should I run that red light and shave a few minutes off my trip, or hang back and be safe?
These are small choices, but they create some of our biggest problems. That’s because there’s an inherent tension between what’s good for us and what’s good for the world. We know that taking the bus would be better for the environment — but on a Friday at rush hour, saving the planet just doesn’t seem worth missing dinner with our kids.
But what if we didn’t have to choose? What if we could create a different transportation system entirely — one that is safer, better and more affordable for us, for our cities and for our planet?
Earlier today, we shared what we think could be possible and unveiled the first step toward that vision. We call it the Cruise Origin.
To understand where we’re going, you have to understand where we came from.
Fifty years ago, cars looked like, in a word, cars.
These cars were driven by human operators and came stuffed with a whole lot of equipment for that human operator to use: a steering wheel, pedals, knobs, and dials. And, of course, a fossil fuel-burning engine up front and a gas tank in the rear.
Over the last five decades, we’ve achieved unprecedented technological advancement in everything from computers to medicine. But the automobile? It looks pretty much the same.
All that stuff from the old-school car has stayed put — the steering wheel, the controls, the gas tank — leaving precious little room for each passenger.
Fifty years, and all we’ve gotten is one incremental change after another. We’re still cramped in a tiny space. We’re still burning fossil fuels, polluting our cities and destroying our planet. We’re still spending hours out of our day stuck in traffic, inventing new swear words. We’re still dying at a rate of more than 3,000 people per day.
At Cruise, with our deep partnerships with GM and Honda, we have roots in the automotive industry. But we didn’t just want to improve on the car. We wanted to reimagine transportation as if the car had never existed.
So, we removed the engine. We removed the driver — who, more often than not, is tired, distracted, frustrated, and rushed. We removed the equipment that’s there to support the driver , including the steering wheel, pedals, rearview mirrors, windshield wipers, and cramped seats.
Please click here to view the full press release.
SOURCE: General Motors
