I have noticed that fast drivers are starting to realize that if there is a nice new car you can just cut it off. They're very likely to have adaptive on and it will just back off instead of riding your bumper. I see people taking advantage of this. Ive also at least seen someone fuck with another driver by getting over in front of them, then going back and then getting back in front a few times. Real close too. So just a new form of trolling.

I also see lots of cars on the way into seattle every day who are leaving what would have been absurd distances in manual driving constantly. These all seem to be auto-driven. This latter definitely makes my life easier getting through traffic as there are so many 200ft+ gaps now at 20 mph on the freeway.

They're probably erring on the side of safety so staying far enough so that the car can come to a complete stop if the car in front slams their brakes. The way most people drive, if the car in front slams their brakes, they don't have enough distance to stop, but driving closer to the person in front of you reduces traffic so it's a decision we make to increase risk a little to save time.

The companies making the software of course want to avoid lawsuits so they're going to ignore time savings.

yeah I get why they're doing it, it just feels mis-calibrated. Everyone talks about self driving cars packing in as tight as train cars but what I'm seeing currently is them using 4x the space at least. And yes I know it's not L5 driving, but at this rate, 90% of cars in 10-15 years will be this spaced out by default. Rip commute times.

Also get off my lawn.

The packing can only occur if all cars are self driving. It is unlikely to occur in the USA for awhile but we will probably see it happen in China where traffic is really bad.

I wish they would shorten the gap as traffic slows. It makes adaptative useless for any kind of driving under 60.

Subaru does that, though not as aggressively as I would prefer. Fortunately there is a button on the steering wheel that cycles through 3 distance settings, making it very easy to switch to a closer following mode in slow traffic and switch back at faster speeds.

Is the following distance adjustable? On my 2016 Camry Hybrid, it has 3 pre-set distances you can cycle through, as a button on the steering wheel. Normally, I use the Short distance, which is about 2 seconds behind the car ahead of me. It's about twice the distance I used before buying the car, yet barely too close for most cars to squeeze into.

Often, when I'm following a 1st car, and this 1st car changes to another lane - and there's a 2nd car ahead that the 1st car was following - I'll swap from the Short distance to the Long distance. This keeps me the same distance behind the 2nd car as I was when the 1st car was between us. Sometimes a 3rd car will swing in between me and the 2nd car - taking the place of the 1st car - and so I cycle through the distances back to Short. Like holding open a space, because a driver more aggressive than me will force their way into the gap anyway.

Other times, I'll use the Medium distance in bad weather, or on empty highways so I'm not pressuring the driver that I'm following.

I think it is configurable but I haven’t bothered yet. Really, I want it to vary with traffic speed.

Mine varies with traffic speed. At 60 mph, it's about 2x-3x the distance as at 30mph. It defaults to Long, but Short is best for Seattle-area driving.

From the manual: Select a distance from the table below. Note that the distances shown correspond to a vehicle speed of 50 mph (80 km/h). Vehicle-to-vehicle distance increases/decreases in accordance with vehicle speed.

  Long   ~160 feet
  Medium ~130 feet
  Short  ~100 feet

(160 feet ought to be enough for anybody - almost every modern car and truck has a 60mph to 0mph braking distance under 160 feet on dry pavement. This car's braking distance is 125 feet, so Medium follow distance keeps you far enough behind a car that you could stop entirely in the gap.)