A ride in a self-driving Ford Fusion

(WJBK) - Autopilot is being hailed as the future of automotive engineering, and automakers are getting close to having the high-tech vehicles road ready.

FOX 2's Charlie Langton went for a driverless ride in a Ford.

"This is one of the most exciting projects in the automotive industry," said Randy Visintainer, Ford's director of autonomous vehicle development.

Exciting in that it's a car that, well, drives itself.

Langton took a ride in an autonomous Ford Fusion hybrid, in which you basically just sit back and let the car drive itself.

"All we've done is told it go over there behind that building and then come back," said Yacob, the driverless car operator. "So it is online planning, 'Oh, I need to turn left here, I need to turn right there, I need to go through this intersection,' and stuff like that."

In the immediate future like in 2018, Ford plans to use these cars to transport its employees from building to building at the Ford headquarters in Dearborn.
    
By 2021, Ford intends to use these cars commercially in a ridesharing service. There will be no driver, no steering wheel, no gas pedal and no brakes.  And they're testing this in the snow.