Google's Self-Driving Cars Ready To Hit San Fransisco Roads At a Brisk 25mph

Google is ready to take the self-driving cars it designed onto public roads. Reportedly the cars will hit the streets starting this summer, at a brisk 25mph.

According to Google these cars have logged nearly a million autonomous hours on the road, which is nearly 10,000 miles spent driving a week. The amount of time spent by these autonomous cars equals 75 years of typical American adult driving experience.

The Internet-search giant plans to put a "few" of its small cars on roads in Mountain View, California, this summer, graduating from the test track, Chris Urmson, director of the self-driving project said Friday in a blog post.

Initially, these vehicles will be capped at 25 miles per hour (40 kph). In the next phase of testing drivers will be able to remove the steering wheel, accelerator pedal and brake pedal.

"It's an important step in that it is their own vehicle," said Susan Shaheen, co-director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center at the University of California at Berkeley. "Google X works on innovation and disruption, and I think the automated vehicle has a lot of those features."

"We're looking forward to learning how the community perceives and interacts with the vehicles, and to uncovering challenges that are unique to a fully self-driving vehicle -- e.g., where it should stop if it can't stop at its exact destination due to construction or congestion," Urmson added.