Skip to main content

New Yorkers and Californians ready for autonomous cars – Volvo survey

A Volvo Cars survey of 50,000 global drivers found that nine out of ten New Yorkers and 86 per cent of residents in California feel that autonomous cars could make life easier. The survey, Future of Driving survey, indicated that residents of Pennsylvania, Illinois and Texas are less convinced than the average consumer about the safety benefits of autonomous driving. Only about half of Illinois respondents would trust an autonomous car to make decisions about safety, ten per cent less than the national a
July 8, 2016 Read time: 2 mins
A 7192 Volvo Cars survey of 50,000 global drivers found that nine out of ten New Yorkers and 86 per cent of residents in California feel that autonomous cars could make life easier.

The survey, Future of Driving survey, indicated that residents of Pennsylvania, Illinois and Texas are less convinced than the average consumer about the safety benefits of autonomous driving. Only about half of Illinois respondents would trust an autonomous car to make decisions about safety, ten per cent less than the national average. Similarly, only 62 per cent of Pennsylvanians think that having more autonomous cars on the road will eliminate traffic, while 60 per cent of Texans believe autonomous cars could keep their family safer compared to 69 per cent of people across the country.

Across all states, a majority supported autonomous driving. However, 68 percent of people believe that driving manually is a luxury that must be preserved.

Nationally, Americans are concerned about the pace at which lawmakers are responding to the prospect of autonomous cars. An overwhelming majority of respondents, 90 per cent, believe governments and local authorities are slow to plan for autonomous cars.

Related Content

  • March 24, 2015
    Taking the long view of ITS
    Caroline Visser believes the ITS industry must present a coherent case for consideration of the technology to become part of transport policy and planning. As ITS advisor and road finance director for the International Road Federation (IRF) in Geneva, Caroline Visser is well placed to evaluate quantifying the benefits of ITS implementation – a topic about which there is little agreement and even less consistency. She is pressing to get some consistency in the evaluation of ITS deployments through the use of
  • August 4, 2015
    Survey: Majority of UK public remains worried about global warming
    A new survey of over 2,000 members of the public by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and ICM Unlimited has found that 57 per cent of the public are worried about global warming, with 14 per cent saying they were ‘very worried’. The poll found that 64 per cent of people think global warming is already a problem now, while 70 per cent said they think global warming will be a problem in 20 years’ time. The main issues the respondents said they were worried about were flooding and sea level rises (63
  • August 30, 2017
    New study: public continues to be wary of driverless cars
    The majority of people (66 per cent) would be uncomfortable travelling in a driverless car at 70mph, according to a new study of 2,053 members of the public, carried out by ICM Unlimited on behalf of the UK Institution of Mechanical Engineers. The news follows last week’s announcement that the Government has awarded a contract to TRL to test platoons of driverless lorries on major British roads by the end of next year. According to the findings, younger people tend to be more accepting of the technology, wi
  • September 26, 2017
    Self-driving cars ‘could make traffic congestion worse’
    The University of Sydney has released the results of a survey that indicates that Australian drivers are unlikely to share their vehicles with other travellers and increasing congestion, contrary to predictions made by transport experts and the motor industry. The University’s University of Sydney Business School’s latest Transport Opinion Survey, conducted by the School’s Institute of Transport and Logistic Studies