Autonomous vehicles, planes and high speed rail

[FlyerInHi]

If the maglev happens between D.C. and Baltimore, Baltimore would be a great place to invest in real estate.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/officials-have-settled-on-2-possible-routes-for-the-high-speed-maglev-but-project-is-still-years-away/2018/02/11/d50238d2-0cf9-11e8-8b0d-891602206fb7_story.html?utm_term=.78905c4e38e8

[FlyerInHi]

I love the idea of free public transport that Germany is exploring. There is a lot of innovation around the world. And in USA we may be left with second rate transport.

When Americans are old and struck in their suburbs with nothing around, they will have nobody to blame but themselves.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/02/14/germany-to-fight-pollution-with-free-public-transportation/?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories-2_germany-transport-1130am%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.70b03813173c

[The-Shoveler]

Autonomous vehicles will likely kill most Public transport as we currently know it.

Will autonomous vehicles kill commuter trains, high speed rail and planes for regional travel?

Yes IMO.

[FlyerInHi]

[quote=The-Shoveler]Autonomous vehicles will likely kill most Public transport as we currently know it.

Will autonomous vehicles kill commuter trains, high speed rail and planes for regional travel?

Yes IMO.[/quote]

I don’t think so. Autonomous vehicles will be addition to transport options that will free up real estate.

I’m putting my money in city centers and suburban areas like UTC, Mission Valley, even Temecula mall. In the future more people will want to live near the restaurants and retail showrooms. Only the regional malls with critical mass will survive.

If you go to Vegas check out the new lotus apartments right in Chinatown. rents are $1100 for a studio $1700 for a two bedroom and $2400 for three bedroom. More expensive than houses in summerlin, a good suburb with good schools.
That is what the techbro demographics want because they can uber everywhere in 10 min.

Shoveler, what do you think of the Internet encouraging densification even though telecommuting is a viable option?

[Ribbles]

I think Shoveler might be right, and here’s why – a very common scenario in the future will be privately-owned autonomous electric vehicles that stay busy giving rides while the owners aren’t using them. The income that it would take to cover the car payment and electricity would be ridiculously low – at a wild guess, a handful of rides/day at 25-50 cents/mile. That’s bus pass territory for the lowest income brackets. There would need to be some regulation, because there may be far more cars available than customers. I can see a market for small vans with routes decided by computer, though – a few people from my Temecula neighborhood going to the same area in San Diego, for example.

I would personally prefer a ride to the bay area in an autonomous car (mine or someone else’s) over flying or high-speed rail (and I mean actual high-speed rail, not the joke currently under construction).

More predictions: California will raise gas taxes so high that most people start buying electric, but the roads will continue going to shit, so they’ll need to enact a mileage tax on everyone, which of course they will promptly spend on something other than roads. Even some gearheads will realize that many all-electric cars are so fast they don’t need that flat-plane crank V8 anymore, and go to the dark side of silent running. They will be mocked by the rest of us even as we lose to them in drag races. Uber and Lyft drivers will be out of a job. Internal combustion engines will be outlawed in LA and SF first, maybe shortly before (20 years?) human drivers are outlawed in the entire state – which will also reduce that bay area trip time to 3-4 hours at the speeds allowed when there are no distracted monkeys at the controls. First responders will have the only vehicles with steering wheels. Many traffic lights and stop signs will be removed, as they aren’t needed with a linked network of autonomous vehicles. It will be interesting to see how they handle pedestrians in those situations – the cars would stop for them, but that would mess with the efficiency of traffic. Maybe foot bridges/elevators in the metros. Gas stations will be converted to charging stations, with the only functional gas pumps found near race tracks, which will eventually be the only places a real, breathing motor is allowed to run. Towed there by a self-driving electric truck, of course.

[FlyerInHi]

very interesting Ribbles.

Big picture wise, the 1980s were the heyday of the suburbs.
So why are we seeing a return to the city and the widening gap between urban properties values and less urban real estate? All of that despite cheap communications that theoretically allow people to live further apart. Remember when long distance phone calls were super expensive even between Downtown SD and Del Mar.

My theory is that the Internet and social media give people more knowledge and therefore the desire to live in the “best areas” of the world. Kinda like how branding and aspirational marketing work. That’s why lot of cities in the world build vanity projects to create buzz and put themselves on the map.

[spdrun]

Electric cars are great.
Autonomous cars phoning home, spying on people, recording, logging, data-mining, slicing, and dicing their trips are a fucking awful idea.

As far as pedestrians — there need to be better means than “footbridges and elevators” to address the issue before lights and stops go away. Imagine how many crossing points, lights, stop signs there are in the US as a whole, then imagine the cost of bridging each one.

Frankly, let’s hope that North Korea orbitally smacks the HQs of a few firms working on this self-driving shit before it gets lobbied into existence. Or just hacks them into the stone age.

[FlyerInHi]

5G controlled monorail that’s cheaper than subway systems.

Pretty cool

Huawei goes into unmanned driving with BYD’s monorail

spd, did you read about how the NYC subway is now plagued with delays?

[Ribbles]

[quote=spdrun]Electric cars are great.
Autonomous cars phoning home, spying on people, recording, logging, data-mining, slicing, and dicing their trips are a fucking awful idea.[/quote]I think it’s inevitable. There are too many drivers in the U.S. who aren’t smart enough or skilled enough to be in control of a two-ton vehicle. The number of lives saved will be staggering – and that statistic will be far more visible than the sinister side, which will be downplayed by both politicians and manufacturers. California will be on the forefront, and I’ll have long since left for Idaho.

[spdrun]

Fortunately, the US generally lacks respect for life when guns and cars are involved — they’re emotional, not rational issues. If gun control is any guide, it will fortunately be a slow painful process. The lives lost in obstruction of progress are worth the slowing of the degradation of privacy — life in an absolutely safe, controlled society isn’t worth living.

[FlyerInHi]

sdp, I suppose you’d rather live in poverty rather than enjoy all the modern tech.

theoretically, tech allows us to do more with fewer people so humans can enjoy more leisure and intellectual enlightenment

example, 5G tech can alert if your bus is late. You don’t have to wait for hours for a broken down bus to arrive. Then your boss fires you or sends you home for being late. That’s the life of poor people in USA where public transport sucks.

[spdrun]

Tracking buses where fares can be paid for with (anonymous) cash or cards re-filled with cash: not evil.

Tracking ALL vehicles which are tied to an identity: evil.

[FlyerInHi]

Data warehousing and mining is separate from the tech.

For example using IoT, location and intelligence, smart networks can alert people on the platform of late train. But people not intending to ride would not be alerted.

People who don’t reside on a certain floor will not be allowed access if riding alone in elevator. Or receive an “area restricted” alert if they get off on the wrong floor. If they don’t depart with 5 min, the security office is alerted and the appropriate camera feed displays. All without the need for humans to do anything.

New tech can also enhance privacy and security. My brother dated a bank teller in college. She looked up his number and called him. *Gasp* invasion of privacy! That was the old days with old computers. But today, CSRs cannot just browse customer info. They need to make contact with verifying info before accessing the data. There is an electronic trail that wasn’t there with old technology.

Now, you can’t ask the cop or the county clerk to tear up your buddy’s citation. There is an electronic trail.

[spdrun]

Nah, we ticket, fine, and jail too many people. Being able to slip a cop something to “fix” a problem is a good thing. My morals are fundamentally third-world.

[Hobie]

[quote=Ribbles]I think it’s inevitable. There are too many drivers in the U.S. who aren’t smart enough or skilled enough to be in control of a two-ton vehicle. The number of lives saved will be staggering – and that statistic will be far more visible than the sinister side, which will be downplayed by both politicians and manufacturers. California will be on the forefront, and I’ll have long since left for Idaho.[/quote]

Not thrilled with autonomous cars, but would agree it is will happen. No one has discussed this yet but self driving cars is actually a very plausible way to reduce congestion. If each car identifies its destination, then it can pick and sort out what freeway lanes to use all the while of keeping speed more constant and efficient.

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