Radar on cars already exists, you're behind the times mate.and pesky deers and stuff o nthe road.
the reality is radar on cars is needed and the google cars etc have not solved this yet.
you'd like to think you can get things to do all this but the reality.... well as an engineer I can say computers are even more thick than your average chelsea fan
they can do things like parallel park where its all controlled still objects to run a standard algorithm but.... if you've given control to a car and its got to decide can i stop on this wet road or will the guy in front stop or oh i didn't see the duck waddle out in the lane but the car in front did and slammed on.. or worse.. will i serve to avoid the pedestrian or the car coming. hmmmmm...
I think you'll agree 70mph on a motorway governed by brainless maths equations may not be the ideal experience. the aim is to pack more cars in tighter.. thats all.. not make it safer. the idea is to have the margin of error for a computer reaction so we get more vehicles in a line and the piles ups will just be worse.
The latest cruise control systems run with radar. So for example, cruise used to work solely on a set speed and relied on the driver to apply the brake if there was slower traffic in front etc, which disengaged the cruise.
The new systems have a radar sensor in the front grille and you set the required speed and the car slows automatically if a slower vehicle is detected in front, it holds a safe distance behind it and then accelerates back up to the set speed once they moved out of the way. You can set how aggressive you want this function to be to suit your own driving style, so in other words you can set a long distance in front that you want the car to react or a shorter one. So I can get in my car on an A road or motorway, set the speed and not touch the brake or accelerator again until I've exiting the trunk road / motorway as the car does the rest, all I do is steer.
The radar also controls the emergency braking function which senses if anything is in front of the car and performs an emergency stop if the driver has not reacted in time.
The road conditions are constantly monitored by the wheel sensors so you're wrong on that one aswell mate.
