I know that the geography of North America and the timing of industrialization basically made this a pipe dream…
Yet, trying to create near-peer artificial human driving intelligence—just so cities can continue to be designed around horseless carriages, minivans, and truck nuts—well, that may not have been the best solution to the problem.
Ideally, autonomous driving would be for “the edge” of a transportation network. Like a house on a dirt road, or a camping site, or the home of a misguided friend who moved to south Gilbert, AZ ;)
You shouldn’t need to be watching for basketballs and red lights on interstate highways. Everyone is going the same direction for long distances between transfers. Cars are often individualism, which I’m certainly not against.
The arrogance of “driving driverless should be easy” probably comes from a lot of people seeing driving as a part of their basic humanity. The car is nearly a cyborg extension of their mobility and physical power.
Me? I just wanna get to the concert. Take the humans out of the equation where it makes sense. I’d rather go with light rail; not my friend who offered to drive, then road rages over a merge, then follows some minivan psychopathically for a few minutes (true stories).
We shot ourselves in the foot because mass transportation in America has failed to impress us as much as a Jaguar XK or Jeep KJ, or whatever your Soul Car is.
> We shot ourselves in the foot because mass transportation in America has failed to impress us as much as a Jaguar XK or Jeep KJ, or whatever your Soul Car is.
As much as I'd like to agree with this, the fundamental problem is that most people in the US do not work at a single point in the city anymore.
That's the real problem. You don't get to connect existing enclaves. You have to build your mass transit, fund it at a loss for decades, make sure it doesn't get overrun with crime, and maybe after 10-20 years there will be enough housing and office space along the line in order to make it viable. Maybe.
Or you can throw down a couple more roads and let people figure out where to live, themselves.
But like. We can certainly innovate more flexible routing systems of transport that don’t require specific neural training and licensing to use foot pedals to stop it crashing.
(Maybe I could have reserved some of those neurons to be better at drumming!)
What stops us from using modular mass transit systems? Lots of things. But when mountains stopped trains, we exploded the mountains. Built huge bridges over ravines.
Because of the period between 1850 and 1970, I don’t buy the excuses. Unless it’s just “we’re still not there yet.”
I'm hoping personally that driverless cars will enable new build out of mass transit by allowing for greater freedom in last mile transport, we'll see :)
Greater density in cities too because fewer car owners means less need for parking. And probably fewer people will want to live in suburbs, today owning a car makes the suburbs a little more appealing because you don't have to deal with city driving and parking.
Yet, trying to create near-peer artificial human driving intelligence—just so cities can continue to be designed around horseless carriages, minivans, and truck nuts—well, that may not have been the best solution to the problem.
Ideally, autonomous driving would be for “the edge” of a transportation network. Like a house on a dirt road, or a camping site, or the home of a misguided friend who moved to south Gilbert, AZ ;)
You shouldn’t need to be watching for basketballs and red lights on interstate highways. Everyone is going the same direction for long distances between transfers. Cars are often individualism, which I’m certainly not against.
The arrogance of “driving driverless should be easy” probably comes from a lot of people seeing driving as a part of their basic humanity. The car is nearly a cyborg extension of their mobility and physical power.
Me? I just wanna get to the concert. Take the humans out of the equation where it makes sense. I’d rather go with light rail; not my friend who offered to drive, then road rages over a merge, then follows some minivan psychopathically for a few minutes (true stories).
We shot ourselves in the foot because mass transportation in America has failed to impress us as much as a Jaguar XK or Jeep KJ, or whatever your Soul Car is.