TheTigerMaster
Superstar
Driverless vehicles still can't compete with the capacity of mass transit.
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- Thread starter Mercator
- Start date
Driverless vehicles still can't compete with the capacity of mass transit.
rbt
Senior Member
Indeed. Wouldn't be surprised if congestion sky-rocketed before we figure out a few new laws/taxes to prevent it.
Car owners aren't going to care much if their car sits in traffic without an occupant. They'll send it home to be parked (doubles traffic at intersections) or have it go around the block a dozen times while eating dinner when they can't find a space easily. It would only take about 0.1% of downtown workers to send cars around the block all day to cause a massive permanent traffic jam.
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TheTigerMaster
Superstar
Automated cars will reduce the incentive for private car ownership, for reasons that have been discussed prior in this thread and elsewhere. My hope is that government will eventually place limits on private car ownership, and encourage the use of uber like car sharing services. This would dramatically reduce congestion and the space needed to store cars. It would also stop nonsense like car owners having their car circle the block indefinitely.
rbt
Senior Member
Agreed entirely for the next generation; it probably won't take with the 40+ crowd that's had 20+ years of car ownership under their belt already. They'll mostly keep buying vehicles for many many years; there's a ton of momentum for those people.
This will happen pretty naturally with future generations. I don't think government would get the votes to ban private vehicle ownership until Millennials (30 and unders) start voting as a block. Allowing auto-taxi service and banning private vehicles are 2 very different options with (most likley) decades between those 2 steps.
Certainly reduces day-time storage space required; dead-heading vehicles and those travelling to pickup riders do consume roadway space that is currently free (just as taxi's roving NY during AM peak for passengers cause some congestion). It would be interesting to model.
Also, if automated-taxi fares approach a TTC fare we may suddenly find a few hundred thousand additional people trying to use full sized vehicles instead of squeezing onto the bus/lrv/subway. A congestion surcharge will become essential, but again this will occur years and years after the problem is severe.
Johnny Au
Senior Member
How long did it take for those who use horses on public roads to realize that their way would become obsolescent? Please don't include the Amish, as they still use horses on public roads even in 2016!
There is no doubt that when Ford first mass produced motor vehicles, there were a large number of people who steadfastly refused to abandon their horses.
There is no doubt that when Ford first mass produced motor vehicles, there were a large number of people who steadfastly refused to abandon their horses.
crs1026
Superstar
Why do we relish eliminating car ownership altogether? Are we advocates for a society where government passes laws to forbid anything that we don't agree with? Would we be upset if say 40% of people found good reason to continue owning their own vehicle?
I can understand congestion taxes, or limits to bringing vehicles into the central city for the day (to reduce the impact on parking needs, more than to alleviate congestion - a commuting trip is a vehicle on the highway, regardless of who owns it). There will be many people whose travel needs include destinations where communal cars can't or won't go.
Simple economics and lifestyle choices ought to manage this, once shared cars become available.
- Paul
I can understand congestion taxes, or limits to bringing vehicles into the central city for the day (to reduce the impact on parking needs, more than to alleviate congestion - a commuting trip is a vehicle on the highway, regardless of who owns it). There will be many people whose travel needs include destinations where communal cars can't or won't go.
Simple economics and lifestyle choices ought to manage this, once shared cars become available.
- Paul
mdrejhon
Senior Member
I do not think laws eliminating ownership are needed, as simple economics will simply make it more unaffordable to own a car in a few generations. Worldwide carbon laws, to things like making hailing daily becoming cheaper totalled than the monthly payments.
That is where relative pricing differences will solve this. It will be more expensive to take solo than as a group.
As hailing becomes popular and consists of say, a New York sized percentage of vehicles on the road (eg 25 percent of vehicles on road are hailable rides of all kinds, including those run by TTC and GO), the more optimized delay-free carpools becomes available (ie hailing an existing carpool already headed past you) ... The more attractive the carpool option becomes. Minibus mostly-fixed routes that dopoff you two blocks from destination, four-passenger all-the-way-to-front-door carpools, solo occupant taxis.
All the above would have more similar arrival times than today once the fleet is large enough that so many carpool options exist, that a route-matched low fare carpool minibus is easy to hail.
Imagine an app, like a supercharged Transit App, that presents you a list of arrival times and prices, and you just choose the cheapest ride (including public dial-a-bus clones) that keeps you on time.
Invariably, it will increasingly almost always be a pooled vehicle of some kind (including, of course, full size buses that are dynamically assigned to a brand new fixed route of incredible carpool demand).
Brand new bus routes created daily on demand! Ethereally appearing and disappearing. Basically a bus run as a superset of 100 identical-route carpools, and any available nearby unused bus is instantly dispatched when a computer recognizes hail surges on specific routes! People standing distributed over a whole block or two would be directed to walk to the dynamic "bus stop" a few meters away to reduce the number of stopping.
The route would literally be fixed anyway by default simply because of sheer number of people on an optimal bus-route-style itinerary created realtime on demand. So it would not be slower than a real pre-determined official bus route...
Obviously this would be in the situation of sheer number of near-identical carpools...it is simply dynamically merging and using the largest available vehicle that meets the time-arrival needs of everyone (including all pickups).
You doth day much ado about nothing, when you can brainstorm things like the above....
Obviously, congestion charges may still apply, to help coax more people into fewer hailed vehicles, translating into bigger price differential between small and large "carpools" (including "bus routes" as a bus running as a giant carpool)
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ehlow
Senior Member
Some will still require owning cars but for the average person living in a big city it's kind of a waste to own a car that sits in a parking lot (either at home or at work) most of the day.
I find that in Toronto there are tons of people who own cars and use them a few times per week only.
I find that in Toronto there are tons of people who own cars and use them a few times per week only.
nfitz
Superstar
I'd think many use it far less than that. Most only go to work a few times a week!
crs1026
Superstar
Definitely true. I hate looking out at the driveway and thinking how much money is sitting out there rusting.
But try strapping your bicycle or canoe to the top of a self-driving hailing vehicle on a sunny Saturday morning. Even north Pickering is out of reach, let alone Campbellville. Or the Grand River.
- Paul
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
Many of these people would be better off selling their cars and using Uber, as it might save them money:
http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/01/when-does-uber-become-cheaper-than-owning-a-car/
junior43
Active Member
Yup. I have zero interest in self driving cars. Even cars that can parallel park now I couldn't care less about. My only interest in automated driving is if it can be used as a dd.
Until then I'll avoid any cars with this automated crap.
But I'm a forty plus dinosaur that actually enjoys driving.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
You'll be interested in it once insurance companies realize how much fewer collisions they get into, and consequently jack up the rates for non-autonomous vehicles.
junior43
Active Member
Couldn't. Care. Less. Last accident was 10+ years ago. Last accident that was my fault was Almost 30 years ago. How can they hike my rates if I haven't had an accident. They'd be persecuting all drivers who don't ( or can't) afford new cars with this technology. It will be a very slow transition to automated for this among many reasons.
Who votes most? Old people. Who will resist this? Old people. It'll be 20+ years before insurance companies can go after analog drivers.
Who votes most? Old people. Who will resist this? Old people. It'll be 20+ years before insurance companies can go after analog drivers.