Where driverless cars brake for golf carts

Molly Jackson, an 82-year-old retired nurse, was sitting in the back seat of a self-driving taxi when the vehicle jerked to a halt at a crossing as its computer vision spotted an approaching golf cart.

When the vehicle, a modified Ford Fusion developed by a start-up named Voyage, started to inch forward, it abruptly stopped again as the golfers pressed ahead and cut in front of the car.

Jackson seemed unfazed by the bumpy ride. As a longtime resident of the Villages Golf and Country Club, a retirement community in San Jose, Calif., she knew all about aggressive golf cart drivers.

“I like that; we made a good stop there,” Jackson said. “I stop for them. They say we don’t have to, but I do.”
Voyage is starting to expand its driverless taxi service beyond a small test in the Villages, a gated community of about 4,000 residents where the average age is 76.

Retirement communities, with their tightly controlled roads, can be an ideal proving ground for autonomous vehicles.
In the Villages, there are 15 miles of roads where autonomous vehicles can learn how to navigate other cars, pedestrians, golf carts, animals, roundabouts and many other obstacles.
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