Google continues on it’s quest to develop the world’s first autonomous, self driving car. The driverless cars already have over 700,000 miles of testing under their belts, but they’re faced with more and more problems. Google sees a future where driving time turns into riding time, giving more time back to people to be productive, all the while creating safer roads. The problem is, getting there.

Business Insider reported Monday that the MIT Technology Review did a report on the Google self driving car and found that it’s nowhere near ready.  The MIT research revealed that Google’s self driving car has yet to be tested in snowy conditions or with heavy rain. Business Insider also says “…the cars rely so much on maps and detailed data that they can’t drive themselves around 99% of the USA.” a prognosis that could be damning for the project.

But Google’s not fretting over the MIT report they know the technology is still in it’s early stages.

There are several other issues the Google Car team is working through. For one, the technology deciphers humans as column shaped pixels. Right now the car wouldn’t be able to distinguish between a normal person and a police officer that may be directing traffic.

Google Cars also need more detailed routing information than they can provide in Google maps. For instance, a human Google Maps user may know that there’s a detour on a certain road, despite the fact that Google Maps said to take that road. The Google Car would not know that information.

Finally Google is faced with a new regulation from the California Department of Motor Vehicles. Beginning September 16th all vehicles in California must have a steering wheel. As of now Google Cars don’t have steering wheels however the company said for testing on public roads they would retrofit their fleet with steering wheels, brake pedals and accelerators so that a safety tester could take over in a moments notice.

Many analysts have suggested that Google may be on to something with self driving cars but in order for it to catch on the entire way of driving would have to change. A world of entirely self driving cars would be much easier to sustain than separating driven and self driving cars.