Emergency Lane Departure - False Positives

[sixela]

I was disappointed that the LD feature was not include in 16.2 for my MS, but then relieved after reading these reports.

LDA is fine, especiall in the "warning" setting. I don't mind if the steering wheel vibrates when it thinks I'm going out of a lane. If I wasn't planning to I get a reminder to check more closely, and if I know what I'm doing I treat it just the way it feels: like driving over a ribbled dashed or solid line that I expect to drive over.

ELDA is another matter. When I'm crossing into a bike suggestion lane in the Netherlands when I have to --to safely cross a car coming head on-- I don't want to be nudged into the other car just because it gets scared of a tree close to the road. And closer to home, I don't want it to "avoid" a bus stop that juts into the road only for AutoSteer then give up and send me into the median strip's lamp post. I didn't exactly wait to see if it would jerk me back onto the road to avoid the lamp post...I am as interested in experiments as any other man (or even more so), but there are limits.

And when there are road works and two sets of conflicting lane markings (permanent but stale white ones and temporary but valid yellow ones) there's no way to tell exactly what it'll do --it got it wrong in one occasion--, so I'd like to be in control, thank you.

You can disable AutoSteer easily with the lever when you think it might get confused, but you can't get rid of ELDA without navigating a few menus (and acknowledging a disclaimer!), something that you'd rather not do if it's planning to steer you into a real obstacle to avoid a fictitious one.

 

[SammichLover]

This Tesla issue is on a different level to the example I'm about to give. In many ICE cars they have the engine stop/start function where it shuts the engine off once you are idle for a few seconds and then automatically restarts when you let the foot off the brake. It is super annoying but it is a way the OEM's try to reduce emissions and fuel consumption.
In some vehicles there is a physical button to turn it off, in others it might be in a menu in the infotainment system and finally some vehicles this cannot be disabled at all. So the idea of an intrusive option being ultimately controlled by the OEM isn't new, problem is the example I gave is just an annoyance you have to deal with, this new Emergency Lane thing is outright dangerous from what people are saying and should have from day one been 'opt in' and remember your last setting.
Everyone with this option really needs to make some noise about this to Tesla and have them change it to opt in and make the setting stick.

The way I look at it, this is out of character for Tesla's overall deign philosophy of AP. I think that's why it strikes me as so off. Most other places the design is "human has the veto to override the car's choices", this appears to be the computer overriding the direct human steering wheel input. I say "appears" because that's what it has felt like, in the two times now I've seen it. I wasn't expecting this at all the first time, so had a hard time being confident. The second time, after I forgot to disable ELDA after putting the car in drive (d'oh), I was a lot more sure it was messing with the steering. But I'm not sure exactly what it was doing, and how much.

I actually have seen this to an extent in other vehicles that have "lane keep assist" type features. And I always turn them off. Part of it is because if they kick in at he exact moment I decided I'm too far over, then you get a multiple effect leading to overcorrection. The other part is at times I'll have a damn good reason for being at the edge/over the lane. Avoiding a hazard or whatever. The last thing I want to be doing at that point is trying to also compensate for what the vehicle might also be doing, because I'm probably in something of a tense spot already and have need of a good deal of precision aiming the vehicle.

 

[curry684]

What I truly don't understand is how these severe issues never got noticed in Shadow Mode. You would expect that the feature has been there for a while yet, quietly churning in the background: "oh wow this is really dangerous, you should steer to the left like uhm NOW, oh the driver didn't do that and we still live, let's tell Tesla how incredibly wrong I was here!". And then correct the algorithms or geofence it before global rollout.

It would seem the feature was rushed and completely bypassed shadow testing...

 

[ammulder]

It would seem the feature was rushed and completely bypassed shadow testing...

I don’t take it that way... I take it more as Tesla tested enough to make sure the feature covered 99% of cases... and is now discovering the extent of the variety in the other 1%. I speculate they didn’t test on the bike/bus lanes in the Netherlands, for instance. Maybe didn’t encounter enough construction zones, flaggers on the road, mail trucks half in the lane, and etc. There’s going to be a lot of exceptions revealed now.

I’m guessing this feature is itself ‘shadow testing’ for the next. A serious predecessor to city driving on AP (coming this year, right?). This is a chance for the car to try to find and follow lanes at all times while a human is in control, and see what breaks — before the car is actually responsible for the driving.

 

[curry684]

Fine with all that except for the fact that it is right now tugging at my wheel to ram cars driving in the opposite direction. They made the red light detection warn only for now, so they can learn and improve before it actually brakes. Why not the same for ELDA?

 

[dloop]

I don’t take it that way... I take it more as Tesla tested enough to make sure the feature covered 99% of cases... and is now discovering the extent of the variety in the other 1%. I speculate they didn’t test on the bike/bus lanes in the Netherlands, for instance. Maybe didn’t encounter enough construction zones, flaggers on the road, mail trucks half in the lane, and etc. There’s going to be a lot of exceptions revealed now.

I dunno, those exceptions could have been revealed in shadow testing as @curry684 mentioned.

 

[Msjulie]

So the idea of an intrusive option being ultimately controlled by the OEM isn't new, problem is the example I gave is just an annoyance you have to deal with

I agree, though this particular example appears to me to be a *solution* to a problem ICE cars have and is thus *required* by law to increase fuel economy and reduce emissions, something in theory I can get behind.

In the Tesla case, when I bought the car these things (which I am complaining about) did not exist but now they do which I feel is a different situation. In the above ICE car situation, a person can decide the car is not for them on the basis of that behavior and not buy it vs having chosen a car and then have it's behavior changed w/o your permission.

Tricky biz this smart-phone on wheels may be.. interesting to see how Tesla will handle this situation

 

[SammichLover]

What I truly don't understand is how these severe issues never got noticed in Shadow Mode.

I'd put it down as a small bit of evidence that Shadow Mode is only a hypothetical possible, a myth that Tesla is using it.

 

[curry684]

I'd put it down as a small bit of evidence that Shadow Mode is only a hypothetical possible, a myth that Tesla is using it.

Given my experience as a software engineer I'm 100.0% confident that it isn't as it's blatantly impossible to get autopilot this good in such a short time frame as it is now.

 

[SammichLover]

Given my experience as a software engineer I'm 100.0% confident that it isn't as it's blatantly impossible to get autopilot this good in such a short time frame as it is now.

Development 2.0. They put a lot of effort into manual curating of learning materials for their NN. And they do actually respond and work with owners that report issues, I've seen posts here by people doing this.

The real Shadow Mode is very likely people. Same as it always was.

 

[SureshV]

I am on this software release but I can't even find the specific setting called 'Emergency Lane Departure Assist', I see lane departure warning still but that is it.,

And what moron is in charge at Tesla (they could be called a lot worse) when a feature like this which appears to be very dangerous is pushed to cars as an 'opt out' function and always enabled by default.

 

[rich0]

This is just more of the same but I've also had situations where the emergency lane assist made a call I wouldn't have.

Nothing quite as bad as some of these stories, but I've had cases where there are hazards on the side of a narrow lane and no oncoming traffic so I drive a bit over the center line. This seems way safer than driving inches from parked cars that some kid might coming running from in between.

The car just sees a yellow line and keeps pushing be back towards my lane.

Stuff like this will be a challenge for any kind of self driving, and for the lawyers. Often the safe thing and the legal thing aren't quite 100% in agreement so I'd hate to be the person who had to design the rules the car actually uses, because no matter what you do people will second guess you.

And those issues persist even if the AI can figure out confusing lane markings.

 

[JakeTrilla]

I reported this to Tesla Support today. Spent almost an hour with them on the phone. I dowloaded 2019.16.2 last night. The car panicked several times on my way to work this morning. A couple were downright scary. All of them, in my opinion, were false positives, but the most distressing thing is that I have no way to disable this feature. Yes, you can scroll through the menu and disable every time you put the car in drive, but it resets itself back to 'enabled' every time you put the car in park. I'm begging them to find some internal control that tech support can set in my car to permanently deactivate Emergency Lane Assist.

To clarify, this is not the "Lane Assist" feature, I have that turned off. This is clearly the Emergency Lane Assist. I was not using any auto steer or cruise control at the time.

1st time: driving on a narrow two way country road at 45mph. I passed some trash bins near the curb on my passenger side. My Model 3 panicked as if the bins were a car, and yanked the wheel to the left, and I slightly crossed over the center line (INTO ONCOMING TRAFFIC) (Fortunately the oncoming car was quite a ways back). This was a very unnerving feeling, that my car is going to jump at its own shadow. I immediately remembered the software update, pulled over, and disabled the feature.

2nd time: Driving through a parking lot (well under 45mph), I crossed over some white lines towards the end of a parking row. The car thought I was departing some sort of lane and yanked the wheel left and right, causing my trajectory to move left and right about half a foot in either direction. Mostly I was surprised because I didn't yet realize this feature re-enables itself (which it tells you in a notification message when you turn it off). If I had been cutting close to a parking block, I might have run over it.

3rd time: Narrow country road, two-way traffic. An oncoming car caused my car to panic and yanked the wheel to the right. Again, not the direction I want to go (with there being a steep ravine about 12" beyond the white line to the right). Not a good feeling.

Laurence.
2019 Model 3 Dual Motor Enhanced Autopilot

I’m also finding this feature to be more annoying and dangerous than helpful. I’ve experienced several false positives when I am not anywhere near a roadside and in no danger of departing my lane.

Hopefully Tesla allows me to disable this feature permanently

 

[chillaban]

This is just more of the same but I've also had situations where the emergency lane assist made a call I wouldn't have.

Nothing quite as bad as some of these stories, but I've had cases where there are hazards on the side of a narrow lane and no oncoming traffic so I drive a bit over the center line. This seems way safer than driving inches from parked cars that some kid might coming running from in between.

The car just sees a yellow line and keeps pushing be back towards my lane.

Stuff like this will be a challenge for any kind of self driving, and for the lawyers. Often the safe thing and the legal thing aren't quite 100% in agreement so I'd hate to be the person who had to design the rules the car actually uses, because no matter what you do people will second guess you.

And those issues persist even if the AI can figure out confusing lane markings.

Some of this is going to be challenging from a legal standpoint too. Technically while I would also do what you’re doing, it is a violation of state law in every state I’ve looked this up in. I got a ticket in SoCal for doing this (was told by ticketing officer that if it’s not safe to pass within my lane I’m supposed to patiently drive behind the bicycle at 10mph). Got out of it by demanding country seat and summoning him to NorCal (he didn’t show up)...

It’s one thing to do it as a human where the risk is having a pedantic cop nail you. But as a company, coding the car to systematically not follow the law is going to be much more legally challenging.

 

[ammulder]

It’s one thing to do it as a human where the risk is having a pedantic cop nail you. But as a company, coding the car to systematically not follow the law is going to be much more legally challenging.

On the other hand, what does the car care if it has to follow a bicycle at 10mph?

 

[Artax]

New to Tesla, having recently purchased M3 Dual Motor LR w/ FSD. Under 2019.12.x, I experienced red icon and audible alarm warning while on a curved road with cars parked both sides (Noel Dr, Burnaby, BC). Upgraded to 2019.16.2 last week and have experienced lane correction when drifting too close to white line on right. Also experienced hard braking when car on side road turned left in front of me (there was no reason to brake; the car turning left into my lane did so with plenty of safety margin). Have not re-tested Noel Dr yet, but will do so and report back. If city FSD is to become a reality, lots of improvements to be made...

 

[fvanson]

An alternative workaround on the 60 km/h roads in the Netherlands and on the roads in the city with dashed road marks on the side to the red bike lanes, is to use the right turn signal every time when crossing the dashed line.

 

[chillaban]

On the other hand, what does the car care if it has to follow a bicycle at 10mph?

As with most of these situations, failure to follow what other humans consider to be the “correct” behavior is what opens you to road rage. And road rage could put you at risk both due to drivers near you undertaking even more risky maneuvers or even taking it out on you.

It’s unfortunate but a reality of the social aspect of driving a car.

 

[shellderp]

And initially default to OFF when the firmware is installed.

Its weird because they usually get this right. Auto pilot disabled until you enable it in the menu, but this dangerous *sugar* is on and can't be turned off permanently? This is just insane

 

[sixela]

An alternative workaround on the 60 km/h roads in the Netherlands and on the roads in the city with dashed road marks on the side to the red bike lanes, is to use the right turn signal every time when crossing the dashed line.

As far as I've experienced that workaround is foolproof at telling LDA to shut up (but I don't use it -- I just put LDA on warning and don't mind the steering wheel shake), but if Emergency LDA detects a fake emergency (trees very close to the road are ideal for this) it still will yank you back to centre since it thinks you're "between lanes".