On topic: On the road

There a sequence in Orson Welles's marvelous movie 'The Magnificent Ambersons,” set in the early years of the 20th century, in which Joseph Cotton's inventor character gives a ride to some friends in his latest attempt at a horseless carriage.

His aim, his daughter explains, is to prove his vehicle can maneuver through the new-fallen Midwestern snow. Soon, she adds, he wants to develop wheels 'made of rubber and all blown up with air.”

The vehicle is loud and noxious and perpetually needs to be restarted. At one point, as Cotton fusses with getting his contraption's engine running once more, they are passed by a couple in horse and buggy.

'Get a car,” they laugh as they whiz by.

But at the next turn, the carriage tips over, tossing its passengers into the snow, and the horse - with its buggy - dashes off home.

The man and woman then join up with the daring automobile party, and once the engine is restarted, they all ride off, singing.

As the movie was made in 1942, Welles of course knew what the future would bring for the automobile, despite the skepticism those early cars evoked. But the auto industry took hold as people became more familiar with the vehicles.

It took people awhile to get used to self-operating elevators, too, once there no longer was need of a trained person to close the doors and push a button for its riders. Like children the first time they see an escalator at the mall.

Same was true of the internet, right? Maybe not so much fear as wondering why one would ever find such a thing useful.

Now we come to a reluctance about drones and so-called driverless cars. The U.S. Postal Service released a survey last month saying 57 percent of respondents don't like - or at best are neutral - to the idea of packages delivered by drones.

But halting their development may be like trying to get the genie back in the bottle.

Cedar Rapids-based Rockwell Collins has been working with NASA on communications technology that would hand off control of unmanned aircraft from one tower to another for a few years now. And researchers at the University of Iowa's Human Factors and Vehicle Safety Research Division are hoping to certify a road for 'automated” cars.

Yes, we need a multitude of guidelines for both. The Washington Post noted earlier this month for example that the federal government still needs to come up with regulations that would allow Amazon to test drones beyond how far the pilots actually can see them.

But as with the horseless carriage, as potential buyers see the benefit to something new, more businesses will grow.

'The usual history is people are pretty content with what they know, what they have, and adopting an innovation does take substantial effort,” Ben Shneiderman - described as a human-computer interaction expert at the University of Maryland - told the Washington Post for that same Oct. 12 story. 'The question becomes, ‘Which are innovations that may be more acceptable to people, and how might a manufacturer accelerate adoption?'”

But as Rebecca Lindland, Kelley Blue Book's senior director of commercial insights, added, 'Familiarity breeds desire.”

In a later scene in 'The Magnificent Ambersons,” we're told a rival automaker has started a business. Maybe that will drive those with horses off the streets, a guest worries.

Cotton's character replies by relating his vision of streets being made longer - 'clear out to the county line.”

'Dream on,” the guest scoffs.

But we know who ended being right.

Michael Chevy Castranova is Business editor of The Gazette.