It's not an overstatement to declare that autonomous vehicles will drastically change the way we drive, and that it's only a matter of time before we can let go of the wheel. Or that self-driving technology has the potential to drastically reduce problems such as death and injury from car accidents, time and fuel wasted from sitting in traffic, and the increased emissions that result from human drivers being in control. And that it could also change highways and other traffic infrastructure as we know it.

Of course, we'll have to wait years to find out—at least until there are enough self-driving cars on the road. Most automakers have said they won't have fully autonomous vehicles on the market until at least 2020. But an ambitious project Volvo is undertaking in Gothenburg, Sweden could provide a glimpse of what our self-driving future will look like.

I got a chance to see this firsthand from the passenger seat of a fully autonomous Volvo S60 as it sped along the highway among human-driven vehicles in the automaker's hometown, and heard from one of Volvo's partners discuss how the city's and country's highways could also dramatically change.

The S60 is part of Volvo's "Drive Me—Self-Driving Cars for Sustainable Mobility" pilot project, which will involve 100 autonomous vehicles using public roads in everyday driving conditions around Gothenburg. The first real-world, large-scale autonomous car study and a joint initiative between Volvo and various Swedish government agencies, Drive Me will examine how self-driving vehicles interact with normal traffic and roads, and how normal people interact with self-driving cars.

The full-scale test isn't scheduled to kick off until 2017, when select Volvo customers will drive the vehicles on about 30 miles of designated, common commuter routes around Gothenburg that regularly experience congestion. In the meantime, Volvo is engaged in what it calls the customer research and technology development phase of the project.

Riding in the S60, it's amazing how normal the feeling of the car taking over is after Stefan Solyom, a Volvo Autonomous Drive technical expert, pushes a button on the steering wheel. It's the same feeling I had when I was in auto supplier Continental's self-driving Volkswagen in Chicago last year.

As with the Continental vehicle, the S60 test mule uses technology that's already available on production cars, including cameras and sensors that enable such driver-assist features as Volvo's City Safety and Pedestrian Detection with Full Auto Brake and Lane Keeping Assist. Coming on the all-new Volvo XC90 by the end of 2014 is the next layer: Adaptive Cruise Control with steer assist, which allows for automatic following of the vehicle ahead.

Will Autonomous Driving Go Mainstream?

The new XC90 is also the first vehicle developed on the Volvo's Scalable Product Architecture that, like the 100 vehicles that will be used in the Drive Me pilot project, allows for the addition of new technologies that will eventually enable autonomous driving. But Volvo and one of its government partners pointed out that the traffic infrastructure will also need to be as adaptable to realize the full benefits of autonomous driving once it becomes pervasive.

For example, since autonomous cars won't require the same amount of space as non-autonomous vehicles, lanes could be narrower to increase the volume of traffic on a roadway. So a highway with four lanes could possibly be converted to five. In the meantime, dedicated lanes and special on-ramps and off-ramps could help better integrate autonomous cars into existing traffic infrastructure—without slowing them down to wait for a human driver to, say, make a decision on when and how to merge. (The vehicles in the Drive Me program will automatically change lanes and merge into traffic on their own.)

Of course, this kind of extensive—and expensive—change to roadway infrastructure may be easier to implement in a smaller and more prosperous nation like Sweden than in a large and cash-strapped country like the U.S. Regardless, Matts-Ake Belin of the Swedish Transport Administration said during a presentation that the advent of autonomous cars will require a new kind of collaboration between transportation authorities and automakers.

"The design of cars and the roads need to go together, and this will be a challenge," he said. "Regulators are struggling with new technologies, although Sweden has a different perspective based on the safety aspects."

Then in a major understatement on the impact of autonomous cars will have on drivers, roadways, and society, Belin added, "It's kind of a revolution going on."

(Photo credit: Doug Newcomb)

Further Reading

Cars & Auto Reviews