Riyush Thakur

IR 2/ English 10 GT
10-26-18
IR Site Visit
IR Site Visit Reflection

On October twenty first, I attended my site visit to the Howard County Library Central

Branch. After my first site visit to UMBC, I acknowledged that I loosely prepared to gather as

much information as possible. I chose this location because I reserved a specific book and a

legal journal about my topic. Planning ahead guaranteed that I would leave with something. I

also wanted to casually explore the library for my topic. Prior to the site visit, I knew that self

driving cars were advancing rapidly while legal standards were behind pace. I also read that the

driver of a car is declared legally liable of ninety three percent of car accidents rather than the

owner. Specifically, I wanted to investigate the phenomenon behind this surprising number.

At the library, a friendly librarian retrieved my reserved material. The book was called

“Autonomous Driving-Technical, Legal, and Social Aspects.” I’ve only read introduction

chapters, but the book has already shows insight and promise. The part I read discussed the

US Department of Transportation’s plan “to support the integration of automation” into the

existing transportation system. However, the individual states seem ahead of the department in

experimentation of self driving cars on the road. The state of California has already made plans

to allow unmanned vehicles on the road as soon as April 2018, but someone needs to be able

to manually control the car from the outside in case an emergency occurs. I was even motivated

to read further into legal aspects after getting captivated by the first few pages. Waymo, a

corporate entity leading research in self driving cars, has legally deployed thousands of self

driving cars. Since 2009, Waymo has been blamed for only one car accident among numerous

car accidents. I got a strong head start in the book, and I’ve yet to open the legal journal.

Overall, I was very comfortable on my site visit because I had a planned objective to

follow, and I the public library wasn’t as intimidating as the UMD library. My site visit was

productive and enlightening towards my topic. Next I plan to go to an actual court case disputing
 Riyush Thakur
IR 2/ English 10 GT
10-26-18
IR Site Visit
the liability of a self driving car. Through my past research, I believe I have acquired the

necessary legal background knowledge in order to understand and learn from a court case.

Finally I also plan to contact the author of this book and conduct an interview with her in order to

advance my research. Ultimately, my site visit was extremely successful as it provided a

plethora of paths in order to continue my research.