Some people imagine that driverless cars are a thing of the very distant future however are we really that far away? Car manufactures think not, in fact the first prototypes have already been tested on UK roads and the government are looking at the changes that would be needed to the Highway Code to allow for these new vehicles.
Cars that you can currently buy have the technology to park a car without driver participation, they can warn you if the car drifts out of a lane on the motorway, they can follow the car in front at a set distance and brake automatically to avoid collision so the only other step needed would be for the car to automatically follow a route on GPS.
All of the technology is already there, its just a matter of thrashing out the legal details about liability and safety that currently stand in the way, my predication is that within the next 10 years driverless cars will be readily available and within then next 50 years the standard self-drive car will be obsolete, as will driving licences.