GM expands Super Cruise hands-free system in U.S., Canada

General Motors is making its Super Cruise hands-free driving system usable on 70,000 more miles of roadway in the U.S. and Canada as it prepares to expand availability of the technology.

Most of the additional miles will be in the U.S., but Canada's availability will significantly increase from the roughly 8,000 miles offered today, according to a map GM released Wednesday.

GM offers the driver-assistance system exclusively on the Cadillac CT6 large sedan. Super Cruise is compatible with about 130,000 miles of divided highways that have been mapped using lidar. The system uses the mapping with high-precision GPS and onboard sensors and cameras to allow hands-free driving.

“Super Cruise is extremely popular with our customers and has earned all kinds of accolades form the press and the tech world. It’s going to get better each year and each generation, just like Cadillac itself and just like General Motors," said GM President Mark Reuss when announcing the increased availability Wednesday at the UBS Global Industrials & Transportation Conference.

Reuss declined to discuss the cost associated with updating the mapping and increasing Super Cruise’s availability. 

The added miles will be available by the fourth quarter to 2018 and 2019 Cadillac CT6 owners through their Cadillac dealer. They are part of a software update to the system that will be enabled by the dealer and then remotely downloaded to the vehicle.

In addition to the mileage expansion, the software update will include performance improvements to Super Cruise and its driver-monitoring system, which uses facial recognition to determine if a driver is attentive.

GM has regularly updated the system since its launch nearly two years ago on the 2018 CT6. It plans to expand the system to every Cadillac model beginning next year as well as to other GM brands. Reuss previously said every GM vehicle could eventually offer Super Cruise.

Customers have used Super Cruise to travel 2.5 million miles in the U.S. and Canada, according to GM. The system also is available in China, but a company spokeswoman said GM cannot share the miles driven there because of privacy laws.

Some — most notably Tesla CEO Elon Musk — have criticized the use of lidar and high-definition mapping in general for driver-assist systems and, eventually, autonomous vehicles.

In April, Musk called lidar a "fools' errand" and said HD mapping is a "really bad idea."

Nonetheless, GM's Super Cruise system has faced significantly less backlash and public criticism over safety concerns than Tesla's Autopilot driver-assist system.