Recently, a fleet of driverless trucks rolled through Europe like something from the movie Bladerunner. The event was marked as a major win for technology, but for truck drivers and the Australian economy, it means big changes and even bigger worries.
Safer, cheaper, faster
Driverless trucks have a slight advantage on us, they don’t need to eat, drink coffee, or sleep.This makes getting from A to B suddenly faster, cheaper, and more efficient. This, plus the rise in safety standards that the technology gives, makes for a strong case. According to the Road Policing Assistant Commissioner in Victoria, this year alone, we may see up to 300 lives lost due to road accidents involving trucks. That’s 300 lives too many for a robot truck.
Big changes all around
Like anything to do with change, a lot of businesses will feel the effects. Just think, every business that props up our industry will also run into trouble – convenience stores, service stations, road cafes and motels; these small businesses will all struggle without drivers powering their sales. With a $200 billion transport and logistics industry, it’s not just us valuable drivers that’ll take a hit, it’s the whole Aussie economy.
Technology gets better, but so do we
Last November, our friends in South Australia hosted the country’s first trial of self-driving cars on public roads, while WA’s Pilbara mines recently implemented driverless technology in their mining trucks, with workers controlling them for 1200km’s away. The cool technology we saw in films as a kid is right around the corner. Change isn’t easy, but it also isn’t all bad. Humans have evolved through so many developments in technology since the beginning of time – when the car was first invented, horse-carriage drivers fell out of a job, but landed other opportunities. Thankfully, we currently see trucks evolving for the benefit of the driver, with greater communications and better technology around comfort and safety.
There are enormous costs associated with adopting driverless vehicles into the aussie market from government and business, plus huge new risks around safety coupled with the sheer size of our country (have you ever driven to the back of Bourke and tried to get reception!). We don’t see this technology taking anyone jobs in the near future, so let’s keep on keeping this countries economy moving!