Beneath certain stretches of highway, GM proposed laying an electronic strip. When the car traveled over it, sensors would lock onto the signal, guiding the vehicle automatically along its lane. The driver would simply lean back, hands free from the wheel, and watch the miles roll by. Onboard amenities inexplicably included an orange juice dispenser.

Proof of concept

By 1958, the idea became a reality. On a plain stretch of highway outside Lincoln, Nebraska, it was put to the test. The state’s Department of Roads embedded a 400-foot (121 m) length of the roadway with electric circuits, while engineers from RCA and General Motors brought specially fitted Chevrolets to test it. Observers watched as the driverless cars steered themselves, responding to the buried signal beneath the pavement.

A few years later, across the Atlantic, the United Kingdom’s Transport and Road Research Laboratory undertook its own experiments. Using a Citroën DS, they laid magnetic cables beneath a test track and sent the car down it at speeds of up to 80 mph (129 km/h). Wind and weather made no difference; the DS held its line faithfully.

Autonomy emerges in the modern age

Fast forward to 1986, and German scientist Ernst Dickmanns, as part of his position with the German armed forces, began testing an autonomously driving Mercedes-Benz using computers, cameras, and sensors, not unlike modern-day cars. Within a year, it was travelling down the Autobahn at nearly 55 mph (89 km/h). That was enough to capture the attention of Daimler-Benz, which helped fund further research.

Several years later, in October 1994, Dickmanns gathered his research team at Charles de Gaulle Airport outside Paris, where they met a delegation of high-ranking officials. Parked at the curb were two sedans. They appeared ordinary but were fitted with cameras, sensors, and onboard computers. The guests climbed in, and the cars made their way toward the nearby thoroughfare. Then, with the traffic flowing steadily around them, the engineers switched the vehicles into self-driving mode and took their hands off the wheel. The cars held their lanes, adjusted their speed, and followed the road’s gentle curves without driver intervention.