New vehicles using Ford’s BlueCruise hands-free highway driving assistance system will be able to change lanes on their own starting this fall. The update to the BlueCruise 1.2 system will not yet roll out to existing BlueCruise-equipped vehicles.
About BlueCruise
BlueCruise is one of several hands-free highway driving assist systems on the market today. Like Tesla’s Autopilot or GM’s Ultra Cruise, it combines a smart cruise control system with lane-keep assist, allowing the driver to take their hands off the wheel and trust the car to keep its position in traffic on some highways.
The same system is called ActiveGlide on Lincoln-brand vehicles.
BlueCruise works only on highways Ford has pre-mapped, which currently include about 130,000 miles of highways in the U.S. and Canada.
Related: Self-Driving Cars – What You Need to Know
Also, like Autopilot and Ultra Cruise, it’s not a true self-driving system. Drivers are expected to pay attention to the road and be prepared to take control of the car at all times. A camera tracks the driver’s head position and eye gaze to warn you when your focus has drifted (though Ford says it doesn’t store video).
SAE International, a global association of engineers and related technical experts in the aerospace, automotive, and commercial-vehicle industries, ranks self-driving tech on a 5-level scale. BlueCruise is a Level 2 system — a long way from the fully autonmous driving some companies are pursuing. But no automaker currently sells a more advanced system.
Some safety advocates have raised concerns that automakers market the systems with misleading claims.
The New Capabilities
Beginning this fall, Ford says, BlueCruise 1.2 will be able to change lanes on its own. Drivers will need to signal a lane change with the turn signal stalk, at which point the system will change lanes when it’s safe. It can also suggest lane changes to help get around slow-moving traffic.
BlueCruise 1.2 “automatically and smoothly adjusts the speed as drivers approach a sharp curve and will help signal the driver ahead of time when a speed change is about to occur,” Ford says. This should create what Doug Field, chief EV & digital systems officer, calls a “more human-like” driving feel.
In the ultimate imitation of a human driver, it will also shift in its lane to move slightly further from big trucks.
Not Coming as an Update Yet
Ford says the new BlueCruise 1.2 will appear this fall on the 2023 Ford Mustang Mach-E and roll out to other Ford and Lincoln vehicles in later months. There’s no word on when it might be available as a download to current BlueCruise 1.2 users.
“We will share more about Ford Power-Up and Lincoln Enhance software updates as they are available,” a Ford spokesperson says.
