Peter C:
Automation is fine till you get to a delivery yard with pallets and other objects left lying around.
It will still require someone to be able to think outside the box.
(Cab) and move the [zb] left by others
The gaffer of the yard will move those pallets, if the alternative is paying £200 a day for a driver.
It’s the public road that remains the final frontier. Despite all the hype and the billions already thrown at the problem, vehicles cannot drive themselves on public roads at a standard approaching human drivers.
And roads are not tarmac railways - the space must cater to a wide variety of road users (and misusers), behaviours, and transport modes, which involves almost constant negotiation using the human faculties of those road users.
So like you I’m not holding my breath.