Uber v Taxis

nzzp

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Nepia" data-cid="608353" data-time="1471926690">
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I think I'm in the MR camp in that I can't see this happening in a 'big' way anytime soon. Of course if it takes off we can revisit this thread and I'll apologise to you driverless car zealots assuming of course I'm not already dead.
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The thing about disruption is that you often don't see it coming. The iPhone and smart phones are an example - 10 years ago, there was no iPhone, but now smartphones are everywhere, and damn near everyone has one.
 
The reality is no-one knows how they will go, when they deploy and what it will mean. And that's the cool thing - this will go the way it goes, without any of us affecting it. It is possible that these things are fatally flawed, but I would be very surprised given that 
(a) every man and his dog is pumping money into these programmes, and
(b) Google have already had extensive successful trials (ie millions of km under their belt).
 
So, let's reconvene here in a decade. I'll bet my goddamn avatar that there will be off the shelf driverless cars available for sale in multiple companies, which are legal to buy and operate. Given the price drops in tech that we see, I'll be very surprised if we don't see affordable cars within a few years of that.

NTA

Tesla also have a swiftly-growing database of autopilot data as well - from earlier this year:
 
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://electrek.co/2016/05/24/tesla-autopilot-miles-data/'>https://electrek.co/2016/05/24/tesla-autopilot-miles-data/</a>
 
"Tesla is now gathering more data from autonomous miles driven in a day than Googleâ€™s program has logged since its inception in 2009. As we discussed last time the subject came up, Googleâ€™s miles are city miles, while the Autopilot is for highway driving which gives a distinct advantage to Tesla in term of racking up data based on miles driven."
 
Also relevant to note that Tesla are gathering data while the car is NOT in autopilot in order to do comparisons and make improvements.
 
<img src="https://electrek.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/autopilot-position-in-lane.jpg?quality=82&strip=all&w=753&h=421" alt="autopilot-position-in-lane.jpg?quality=8">

TeWaio

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="NTA" data-cid="608334" data-time="1471923674">
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Not as efficiently as a bus. But they DO allow a ride-sharing scenario that is more efficient than current single-person commuters in vehicles.
 
Part of the service is accepted that the self-driving vehicle picks up others on the way. So you will have >1 person in each vehicle in the majority of cases. That means less cars. How many vehicle commuters car pool now? Not many, because they don't have people in the same convenient hours and location. Ride sharing doesn't care who you are - it gives you a mechanism.
 
Throw in automated commuter platforms like electric buses and the latest generation of driverless trains, and you're reducing congestion. No doubt.
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This is doubly true because so much congestion on roads is due to human drivers being fucking useless.
 
As in, take heavy traffic that is still moving at the speed limit, then some dipshit on their phone brakes unnecessarily as they weren't paying full attention, which cascades back down a motorway and caused actual stationary gridlock 5 miles back.
 
Take out the disphit on the phone, add in cars that constantly talk to each other so they traffic can move at higher speeds and with less separation, and the capacity of your existing road network increases massively without any traffic jams. 
I think I've posted this before, but its just so amazing when you see it happen. Most traffic jams happen for no reason whatsoever. This is the most frustrating thing ever, and can be largely remedied by driverless cars.

MajorRage

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="TeWaio" data-cid="608402" data-time="1471940756">
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This is doubly true because so much congestion on roads is due to human drivers being fucking useless.
 
As in, take heavy traffic that is still moving at the speed limit, then some dipshit on their phone brakes unnecessarily as they weren't paying full attention, which cascades back down a motorway and caused actual stationary gridlock 5 miles back.
 
Take out the disphit on the phone, add in cars that constantly talk to each other so they traffic can move at higher speeds and with less separation, and the capacity of your existing road network increases massively without any traffic jams. 
I think I've posted this before, but its just so amazing when you see it happen. Most traffic jams happen for no reason whatsoever. This is the most frustrating thing ever, and can be largely remedied by driverless cars.
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Undboutedly this is true. But it's not true when there is a mix of driverless and driven cars on the road. If we could switch to 100% driverless overnight, it would be quite amazing - everything moving uniformly, it would enable logistics guys to work our quickly where true bottlenecks exist and where changes are required.
 
Again, this is a situation I can't see happening for a long long time. Certainly nothing like the 5-10 year timeframe mentioned by many others on here.

TeWaio

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="MajorRage" data-cid="608410" data-time="1471942115">
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Undboutedly this is true. But it's not true when there is a mix of driverless and driven cars on the road. If we could switch to 100% driverless overnight, it would be quite amazing - everything moving uniformly, it would enable logistics guys to work our quickly where true bottlenecks exist and where changes are required.
 
Again, this is a situation I can't see happening for a long long time. Certainly nothing like the 5-10 year timeframe mentioned by many others on here.
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But even a few driverless vehicles in the mix would be enough to break up the "cascade" effect you can see in the clip above, that turns one person's unnecessary braking to a traffic jam back down the road. In the circular queue above, if there were, say, 4 consecutive driverless cars with near-perfect reactions and much closer spacing, it would be enough to stop the shockwave from moving further down the traffic column. 
 
So you don't need 100% driverless cars to get these benefits. You might see noticeable results with only 20-30% penetration - I am only guessing here, but because traffic is a snowball-effect phenomenon, taking just a few humans out of the equation will certainly help!

gollum

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="nzzp" data-cid="608373" data-time="1471933891">
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The thing about disruption is that you often don't see it coming. The iPhone and smart phones are an example - 10 years ago, there was no iPhone, but now smartphones are everywhere, and damn near everyone has one.
 
The reality is no-one knows how they will go, when they deploy and what it will mean. And that's the cool thing - this will go the way it goes, without any of us affecting it. It is possible that these things are fatally flawed, but I would be very surprised given that 
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For me its the fact that it is on the face of it, stupid - driving & accepting people dying while sleepy, drunk, texting etc. And its hard to think of anything that is that dumb that has surviverd the technology coming in.
 
Look at tech disruption last 10 years,
 
The mobile as you note, 15 years ago if you were meeting someone & they weren't there you were fucked. That's even ignoring the smart phone stuff like maps, email, plance boarding passes etc.
Cashless, in some scandi countries its pushing 50% cashless now. I can easily go a week in London without using cash, It's not that long ago I was shoving a Â£20 note into a machine to get a cardboard pass for the tube, now I just wave my phone at the gate, within a couple of years I'll just need the phone in my pocket as I walk past .
Amazon, I can literally buy anything I want & have it delivered tomorrow. I can set it up so once a month I get 24 toilet rolls, 5kg of laundry detergent etc every month, without thinking about it. 
Books v KIndles, I used to get a physical newspaper that I'd miss when travelling, US magazines were either imported & expensive (and late) or not available, now straight to my Kindle worldwide. I can sit in Khartoum & have the Sunday Times & The FT turn up 
Streaming / record TV v having to watch shit live or you miss it.
It's a BIG list
 
Wasted lives & time driving can't go one now tech is basically there. It's the same deal where 10 years ago people said Amazon wouldn't work because who can trust the internet with their credit card details?!!

nzzp

The reason I get a bit excited about this is that it is potentially a game changer for transport. Self drivers start to open up any travel time for other things. It would be like having a full time chauffeur, but free. How cool would that be - have to pick something up from a mate - don't worry, I'll just send the car around and you can load it in. Most of hte benefits start without changing any other aspect of the transport system.

Godder

As said, it will start with trucks and busses. There is a shortage of truck drivers currently which incentivises them being first, so soon there will be a shortage of driving jobs instead. 
Taxis will quickly follow, and that's where the real cut-through will occur - when people stop using cars because it's cheaper to bus or taxi into work than drive and park. 
Likewise, if public transport can switch to electric driverless vehicles of various capacities, and pick up from and drop off to individual addresses for $1, people will actually use it in big numbers.

nzzp

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Godder" data-cid="608472" data-time="1471981906">
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As said, it will start with trucks and busses. There is a shortage of truck drivers currently which incentivises them being first, so soon there will be a shortage of driving jobs instead. 
Taxis will quickly follow, and that's where the real cut-through will occur - when people stop using cars because it's cheaper to bus or taxi into work than drive and park. 
Likewise, if public transport can switch to electric driverless vehicles of various capacities, and pick up from and drop off to individual addresses for $1, people will actually use it in big numbers.
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<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://techcrunch.com/2016/04/25/the-driverless-truck-is-coming-and-its-going-to-automate-millions-of-jobs/?ncid=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Techcrunch+TechCrunch&sr_share=twitter'>https://techcrunch.com/2016/04/25/the-driverless-truck-is-coming-and-its-going-to-automate-millions-of-jobs/?ncid=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Techcrunch+TechCrunch&sr_share=twitter</a>
 
Interesting article on trucks above. And, if you think about potential disruption, check out this article linked to below. These are direct costs - not having to price your own time, but direct costs to employers. 
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/05/382664837/map-the-most-common-job-in-every-state'>http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/02/05/382664837/map-the-most-common-job-in-every-state</a>
 
What's with all the truck drivers? Truck drivers dominate the map for a few reasons.
Driving a truck has been immune to two of the biggest trends affecting U.S. jobs: globalization and automation. A worker in China can't drive a truck in Ohio, and machines can't drive cars (yet). Regional specialization has declined. So jobs that are needed everywhere â€” like truck drivers and schoolteachers â€” have moved up the list of most-common jobs. The prominence of truck drivers is partly due to the way the government categorizes jobs. It lumps together all truck drivers and delivery people, creating a very large category. Other jobs are split more finely; for example, primary school teachers and secondary school teachers are in separate categories.

nzzp

also, interesting and up to date overview here:
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://theringer.com/whos-really-winning-the-driverless-car-race-b1f752ee9abb#.tpxq3umha'>https://theringer.com/whos-really-winning-the-driverless-car-race-b1f752ee9abb#.tpxq3umha</a>

NTA

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="nzzp" data-cid="608499" data-time="1471986926">
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also, interesting and up to date overview here:
<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='https://theringer.com/whos-really-winning-the-driverless-car-race-b1f752ee9abb#.tpxq3umha'>https://theringer.com/whos-really-winning-the-driverless-car-race-b1f752ee9abb#.tpxq3umha</a>
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That fatality for Tesla will always hang around their necks like a millstone. Will be interesting to see how the other companies go once they're on the highway as well, rather than suburban streets and arterials.

nzzp

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="NTA" data-cid="608514" data-time="1471990713">
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That fatality for Tesla will always hang around their necks like a millstone. Will be interesting to see how the other companies go once they're on the highway as well, rather than suburban streets and arterials.
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Yeah
 
I think you either need full autonomy, or full self driving. in-between is suck ... you expect someone to sit there for weeks to months and then suddenly grab the wheel and make a smart decision?

NTA

I think you need a certain percentage of full autonomous to reach the desirable safety figures.
 
For self-drive cars, better safety measures are required, but looking at some of the cars you see on Aussie roads... we're a while off.

jegga

<a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.gq.com/story/the-uber-killer'>http://www.gq.com/story/the-uber-killer</a> 
Uber killer backstory

NTA

Well, that's fucked up.
 
The connectivity provided by the app is its strength and weakness. You'd think after the first incident, something about his driver account would have been shut off?

NTA

Also: things like this make the jumpiness of US police understandable.

TeWaio

Man that its utterly crazy. What a chilling read.

gollum

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="nzzp" data-cid="608515" data-time="1471991034">
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Yeah
 
I think you either need full autonomy, or full self driving. in-between is suck ... you expect someone to sit there for weeks to months and then suddenly grab the wheel and make a smart decision?
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In between lets people get all the benifits & get user to it while not needing the laws to catch up. If that had been full autonomous it'd have been a disaster for Tesla in a country as litigious as the US, as it wasn't they had a fall back & couldn't be touched. Sure the PR was bad, but not crippling.
 
The next step is semi Auto taxis, so people who don't buy a Tesla can experience auto without the laws needing to be in place (because a driver is there). Rather than wait for the laws to be in place they are getting a groundswell of people demanding & experiencing full Auto, while a driver sits there for legal reasons. Its really smart. 
 
 
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Godder" data-cid="608472" data-time="1471981906">
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As said, it will start with trucks and busses. There is a shortage of truck drivers currently which incentivises them being first, so soon there will be a shortage of driving jobs instead. 
Taxis will quickly follow, and that's where the real cut-through will occur - when people stop using cars because it's cheaper to bus or taxi into work than drive and park. 
Likewise, if public transport can switch to electric driverless vehicles of various capacities, and pick up from and drop off to individual addresses for $1, people will actually use it in big numbers.
</div>
</blockquote>
 
Yeah, I fully expect within a few years most major city centres (eg the congestion zone in London) will be auto only. That's the easy way to roll it out. The less people actually living in the centre of a city the easier. Milton Keynes is already test running taxis.
 
The biggest upside I can see (personally) is it'll make cycling to work viable & safe. At the moment the core thing stopping me is the abysmall standard of driving in London. In 5 years I'll be able to bike in without a black cab cutting me off or a bus turning across me. It'll be fricking great

Rembrandt

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="jegga" data-cid="608574" data-time="1472003620"><a class="bbc_url" href="http://www.gq.com/story/the-uber-killer">http://www.gq.com/story/the-uber-killer</a> 
Uber killer backstory</blockquote>
 
Crazy. I bet the tin-foiled hat brigade had a field-day with that too

TeWaio

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="gollum" data-cid="608684" data-time="1472029600">
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In between lets people get all the benifits & get user to it while not needing the laws to catch up. If that had been full autonomous it'd have been a disaster for Tesla in a country as litigious as the US, as it wasn't they had a fall back & couldn't be touched. Sure the PR was bad, but not crippling.
 
The next step is semi Auto taxis, so people who don't buy a Tesla can experience auto without the laws needing to be in place (because a driver is there). Rather than wait for the laws to be in place they are getting a groundswell of people demanding & experiencing full Auto, while a driver sits there for legal reasons. Its really smart. 
 
 
 
Yeah, I fully expect within a few years most major city centres (eg the congestion zone in London) will be auto only. That's the easy way to roll it out. The less people actually living in the centre of a city the easier. Milton Keynes is already test running taxis.
 
The biggest upside I can see (personally) is it'll make cycling to work viable & safe. At the moment the core thing stopping me is the abysmall standard of driving in London. In 5 years I'll be able to bike in without a black cab cutting me off or a bus turning across me. It'll be fricking great 
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I have been cycling in to work in London for about 5 years, and been knocked off my bike twice. Both times: black taxi, pulling out without looking when I was going straight.

The Silver Fern

Uber v Taxis