The problem with that Volvo pedestrian detection system is that it doesn’t work. There are quite a few high profile fails documented online:
or this insane test by Slovak journalists:
When Volvo rep was contacted about that, they were blaming it on the system being “used incorrectly”, the car being driven “too slowly” and similar BS.
So if the rep in the original article was claiming that the extra paid option would have prevented that he should have been shown the door.
If the feature isn’t there, and the persons were attempting to “demonstrate” something that wasn’t included in their “test car”, yes. This is the very definition of the system being used incorrectly.
Volvo announced later today that future versions of the self-parking system would slow the car by using the brakes, rather than by slamming into pedestrians until it came to a halt. “Obviously, using available external objects such as crash barriers, other vehicles and small children to reduce the car’s speed during parking reduces wear on the brakes. That’s a big plus for cost-conscious Volvo owners. However, we found that this feature tested poorly in focus groups, so we’ll be looking at alternatives.” At press time, Volvo was reported to be considering a system in which giant spiked metal grapples would be fired out of the back of the car.
It looks like they’re actually doing this at a dealership. There’s a big “Volvo” on the building, you can see it upside-down at the 21 second mark:
Boundegar, I think you should look into getting the optional “squirrel detection” upgrade 
The people inside the car are safe. It’s the people outside of the car in danger.
From TFA:
Last week, a gossip blog based in the Dominican Republic called Remolacha published a disturbing video of what it said was a “self-parking car accident.” A group of people stand in a garage watching and filming a grey Volvo XC60 that backs up, stops, and then accelerates toward the group. It smashes into two people, and causes the person filming the video with his phone to drop it and run. It is terrifying.
Apparently, when I was not paying attention, the threshold for “horrible” and “terrifying” fell through the floor.
Watching the video below, it seems that the self parking feature needs to be activated, and then the person has to drive around to look for a spot at which time they are in complete control of the car. When the car detects a spot that the car can fit in, the driver approves the self parking mode activation and then is supposed to look for objects around the car, and keep their foot on the brake. Other videos suggest that the car can stop in case of an obstruction or pedestrian getting in the way, but this is not the same as the active pedestrian detection system that is designed to operate while the car is being driven at city street speeds as was the case in the original video.
In other words, if the driver in the original video was trying to test the self parking feature, they were doing it all wrong, and if they were trying to test the pedestrian detection system, they probably should have made sure they had that system - which they should know, since it’s a $3000 option.
If I had to guess what happened here, it’s that the person who bought the car probably got the parking assistance feature and was told by the salesperson that it could detect pedestrians, which the driver assumed meant that it had the pedestrian detection system designed for the street which it clearly does not. And once the driver wrote the check, the dealership just gave them the keys and sent them on their way, without any sort of instruction.
I think we’re going to see a lot more of these problems in the future, as cars get more automated and people assume that means they can just tune out or not bother having to control the car because it’s got “adaptive cruise control” or “self-driving features.” The time between the fully manual and the fully self-driving cars is going to be one fraught with confusion and accidents.
This is so -IN THE FUTURE-, all I can think about are self parking Zeppelins.
Why do you have this bag of bowling balls and terrarium of scorpions?
Yeah, the car doesn’t look like they are TRYING to “self park”: it’s just driving forward. My understanding is that self parking is self PARALLEL parking (because Maryland drivers)
Did you actually watch the video? I guess not.
The two cars in the journalist test in my post did have the system installed. In fact, those two cars were demo cars from the local Volvo reseller used to show how the system works. You can even see it activating in the dashboard shots in the few cases when it did actually activate - there is an indicator coming on when the car brakes.
The gruesome car crash movies, I’ll just say they didn’t work for me. The one about LSD did, though. When that girl’s hot dog turned into a trolley doll, I was scared away for life.
There’s more subtext in that it invites thought that robocars might not have pedestrian detection either! …which is absurd, but it’s lurking there between the lines.
Not positive, but I was just recently looking at buying a Volvo without that feature and I’m pretty sure they don’t bother to install the radar in the car if the pedestrian detection isn’t purchased.
Everything was going great, until somebody got hurt.
I think the problem is that they were using Google Street View for the pedestrian avoidance system… that guy wasn’t standing there on Google Street View…
I believe there is a camera mounted inside the windscreen as well (and presumably some image analysis processing) , so there is a fair amount of hardware that goes in to it. $3k is steep for a customer to justify though. That’s more than 3x what my current car cost…
AFAIK, there is a camera in the car and two radars (one per side) under the front bumper or in the grille. The radars are also used for adaptive cruise control and automatic braking in front of obstacles (e.g. to avoid rear-ending a car in front of you in a traffic jam), but those are separate options/systems. The pedestrian detection is mainly through the camera behind the windshield and then it uses the radar to confirm it or something like that.
It seems to me that a cardinal rule of autonomous vehicle design should be that if the vehicle is moving and guiding itself without driver intervention, pedestrian detection should be a mandatory. And this should be the case no matter what the vehicle is doing, whether it’s driving on the street or parking. Offering self-parking functionality without some form of “pedestrian detection” seems beyond stupid to me.
