Google builds its own self-driving car, sans steering wheel

Google's testing of self-driving cars has always generated more questions than answers. While it demonstrated the viability of such technology on public roads, and spurred major automakers to vow that their own systems would be in public hands by the end of the decade, there's never been a clear answer as to where Google planned to take its own technology.

Today the answer arrived in the form of the illustration above: Google will build it's own self-driving cars  — ones that test the technology to such a degree that they lack steering wheels.

After several years of testing Toyota Priuses and Lexus RX 300s outfitted with sensors and Google software, Google's director of autonomous vehicles Chris Urmson revealed the plan Tuesday night in a blog post, saying the company was aiming to build about 100 prototype vehicles, equipped with two seats, a little room for passengers and a few buttons for inputting directions — and that's about it.

"They won’t have a steering wheel, accelerator pedal, or brake pedal… because they don’t need them," Urmson said in a blog post. "Our software and sensors do all the work. The vehicles will be very basic—we want to learn from them and adapt them as quickly as possible—but they will take you where you want to go at the push of a button."

Google's electric-powered cars will have a 100-mile range and be limited to 25 mph — putting them under federal rules for "neighborhood" vehicles that require seat belts, headlamps and wipers, but not a full suite of air bags and other safety systems that would require far more complex automotive engineering. (Those same rules require rear-view mirrors, even though the Google passengers can't do much about what they show.) The front of the car and the windshield were also designed to minimize harm in any impacts with pedestrians or cyclists.