Connected/Automated vehicles and infrastructure in Boston

AV evangelists also tend to neglect the very real possibility that suburban-based SOVs could become AVs, particularly given the suburban mindset of America and the very real power base of voters and money. And suburban-based AV-SOVs used for commuting could lure a lot of people away from commuter rail and long mass transit commutes, by offering essentially a similar, but more convenient "no need to drive" commute. Even if you are stuck in horrible traffic, you're not driving, so can be pretty productive as you crawl into and out of the city.

AV-SOV carmaggedon.
 
JeffDowntown said:
AV evangelists also tend to neglect the very real possibility that suburban-based SOVs could become AVs, particularly given the suburban mindset of America and the very real power base of voters and money. And suburban-based AV-SOVs used for commuting could lure a lot of people away from commuter rail and long mass transit commutes, by offering essentially a similar, but more convenient "no need to drive" commute. Even if you are stuck in horrible traffic, you're not driving, so can be pretty productive as you crawl into and out of the city.

AV-SOV carmaggedon.
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Suburbs? Technologically easier, yes. But Suburbs do not have the screaming necessity for it.

It already is approaching an existential need in cities. It will be even more of an existential need in the coming decades. The impetus for this isn’t based on the discretionary but on the do or die economic survival needs of cities being choked off.

The Surburban consumer doesn’t face that same “Can’t get there from here” scenario.

No one wanted to wear a mask until it became an existential need. Some still don’t but the vast majority do. Necessity is a mother.

Personally, I never intend to give up the freedom of driving my own car. But in a dense and dynamic city, I certainly would because of the increasingly existential necessity.

Money talks. The center city real estate possibilities of this globally would be in the trillions. This isn’t some sandals and granola idealism. This is cold, hard economics and good old fashioned-capitalism.
 
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shmessy said:
Interesting that you used the word “era”.

You DO understand that the definition of “era” connotes IMPERMANENCE?

All along, I have said it very well may NOT happen in Boston by 2035. But it will have been implemented in several global cities by then and the decision would be up to Boston whether or not it wanted to be in that group. Simple as that.
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None of what you said is fundamentally incompatible with what I said. You're just leaving out a whole ton of context in your more optimistic predictions.

"A pragmatist and an idealist walk into a bar to discuss utopia..."
 
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George_Apley said:
None of what you said is fundamentally incompatible with what I said. You're just leaving out a whole ton of context in your more optimistic predictions.

"A pragmatist and an idealist walk into a bar to discuss utopia..."
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The key is to be neither dogmatically stuck in pragmatism nor idealism. Accept the POSSIBILITIES that do exist, without GUARANTEES of results until they happen.

Simple as that.
 
shmessy said:
The key is to be neither dogmatically stuck in pragmatism nor idealism. Accept the POSSIBILITIES that do exist, without GUARANTEES of results until they happen.

Simple as that.
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I've never rejected the possibilities, though.
 
ra84970 said:
What we know from street design is the livelier a street is, the more pedestrians it draws, and in the end, the shorter pedestrian crossings and shorter intersection cycle times that we want at urban center intersections. I mean in some places they just outright ban personal/private vehicles in certain shopping/business districts either 24/7 or for a majority of the day. I just don't see anything about connected vehicles (and automated vehicles) resolving the geometric problems on city streets because the operations aren't the problem. So much is not about a techno problem but a political problem or a design problem.
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Completely agree with all of this. But thats completely changing the discussion. My post and the posts I was responding to were about whether humans or computers would operate vehicles more efficiently.
If the vehicles became more efficient travel lanes could be removed. Even without that, travel lanes could also be narrowed when you remove the human comfort level aspect of travel lane width. Both would be improvements for the public realm, which should absolutely be the priority.
 
JumboBuc said:
I just don't think it's at all practical or realistic.
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George_Apley said:
I just don't see
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Balerion said:
doesn't seem that realistic to me.
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George_Apley said:
I don't see it advancing much
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Charlie_mta said:
I don't see happening for a very long time.
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there is a 25 year old in Florida who is worth more than 2 Billion dollars as of last week and a lot of car companies of the world that would disagree with you. Im not choosing a side (just pointing out potential benefits that havent been mentioned) and Im certainly not putting a timeline on it. But typically Id lean towards the billions of dollars over random internet posters, but we'll see. should be an interesting 'ride' (pun intended).
 
real_EthanHunt said:
there is a 25 year old in Florida who is worth more than 2 Billion dollars as of last week and a lot of car companies of the world that would disagree with you. Im not choosing a side (just pointing out potential benefits that havent been mentioned) and Im certainly not putting a timeline on it. But typically Id lean towards the billions of dollars over random internet posters, but we'll see. should be an interesting 'ride' (pun intended).
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I can point to dozens of "Billion Dollar" investments in new tech that went nowhere. Big money funding is not necessarily smart money funding.
 
real_EthanHunt said:
there is a 25 year old in Florida who is worth more than 2 Billion dollars as of last week and a lot of car companies of the world that would disagree with you. Im not choosing a side (just pointing out potential benefits that havent been mentioned) and Im certainly not putting a timeline on it. But typically Id lean towards the billions of dollars over random internet posters, but we'll see. should be an interesting 'ride' (pun intended).
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I agree with Jeff's point. But I'll also say that *no where* have I said that I don't think we'll have the technological capability to have AVs doing our driving for us on a relatively short time frame. I don't think it's likely that society is going to restructure itself to allow AV-only zones on that same time frame. It's that simple.
 
real_EthanHunt said:
there is a 25 year old in Florida who is worth more than 2 Billion dollars as of last week and a lot of car companies of the world that would disagree with you. Im not choosing a side (just pointing out potential benefits that havent been mentioned) and Im certainly not putting a timeline on it. But typically Id lean towards the billions of dollars over random internet posters, but we'll see. should be an interesting 'ride' (pun intended).
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Are you talking about Austin Russell? The guy who said this?:
“I do believe the trucking and logistics industry is going to be one of the largest and also one of the most overlooked opportunities in this larger industry,” Russell said. “It’s nearly a trillion dollars a year in the U.S. alone...and a huge portion of it is up for grabs for whoever solves this problem.”
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Luminar--the comany that made that guy rich--develops lidar sensors. None of the posts you snippet-quoted are saying AVs won't happen or that lidar won't work. Not a single one. They're saying that AVs likely won't completely remake cities, from an organizational / regulatory point-of-view, in the next 15 years. These are entirely different questions. Advancements in lidar tech have absolutely nothing to do with re-organizing city streets!

And Russell's own statements that I've quoted above suggest that he may even agree with the posts from which you selectively snippet-quoted! AV is coming, cars are better at driving themselves (improving lidar is part of this), and the biggest opportunities are perhaps in the trucking and logistics industries! But that has nothing to with AVs eliminating urban street parking and establishing urban street grids fully segregated from those outside of cities.

--------------------------------

It drives me absolutely bonkers when someone clips a quote from a detailed post out-of-context and tries to prove it wrong by citing evidence that actually supports the overall point of the post from which the quote was clipped!
 
theSil said:
A timely bit of news relevant to this discussion; Uber is exiting the game: https://techcrunch.com/2020/12/07/u...deal-that-will-push-auroras-valuation-to-10b/

I would read this as much more of a statement on Dara and not the entire industry though.
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Disagree. Its a statement on the industry as Uber has been pushing that it would reach profitability with its autonomous fleet. If they don’t believe in its doable not only is Uber in a bind but possibly the whole concept is garbage.
 
meddlepal said:
Disagree. Its a statement on the industry as Uber has been pushing that it would reach profitability with its autonomous fleet. If they don’t believe in its doable not only is Uber in a bind but possibly the whole concept is garbage.
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I was reading about this earlier and I think that they finally came to their senses that there is still trillions of dollars on R&D required to get to the point that there will be urban AVs that can get to L5 automation.
 
JumboBuc said:
It drives me absolutely bonkers when someone clips a quote from a detailed post out-of-context and tries to prove it wrong by citing evidence that actually supports the overall point of the post from which the quote was clipped!
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seems the intent of my post wasnt perceived as I meant.
Im not trying to prove anybody wrong. I understand/agree there are difficulties involved and Im not attempting to minimize or disregard them. Im not even taking a position 1 way or another if it can happen, my only position is that it would provide benefits that hadnt been discussed here previously.

my attempted point was that a lot of the posts are loaded with personal view points from people that are not involved in the process (either technically or policy) and there a lot of people/companies that are involved in it working/spending $$ on overcoming these difficulties (both technical and policy).
 
real_EthanHunt said:
seems the intent of my post wasnt perceived as I meant.
Im not trying to prove anybody wrong. I understand/agree there are difficulties involved and Im not attempting to minimize or disregard them. Im not even taking a position 1 way or another if it can happen, my only position is that it would provide benefits that hadnt been discussed here previously.

my attempted point was that a lot of the posts are loaded with personal view points from people that are not involved in the process (either technically or policy) and there a lot of people/companies that are involved in it working/spending $$ on overcoming these difficulties (both technical and policy).
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Great point - - regarding your last sentence, I find this site fascinating, incredibly comprehensive (and constanting evolving): https://mobility.mit.edu/
 
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shmessy said:
This thread is going to be fun to look back upon............

www.reuters.com

Exclusive: Apple targets car production by 2024 and eyes 'next level' battery technology - sources

Apple Inc is moving forward with self-driving car technology and is targeting 2024 to produce a passenger vehicle that could include its own breakthrough battery technology, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
www.reuters.com www.reuters.com
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.....and I find it quaint that the market analyst also doesn't get it:

"...Hal Eddins, chief economist at Apple shareholder Capital Investment Counsel, said Apple has a history of higher margins than most automakers.
“My initial reaction as a shareholder is, huh?” Eddins said. “Still don’t really see the appeal of the car business, but Apple may be eyeing another angle than what I’m seeing.”

Apple is not getting into the "car business". They will be partnering with a car maker to create a fleet to feed their transportation/ride APP. Forget about built-in obsolescence in future. It will be in the best interests of Apple (and their competitors) to make these things last 20-30years with easy-to-upgrade tech. The aim will be to maximize TRIPS which will be priced by subscription.

Just like today car dealerships don't sell cars for revenue - - they, at thier core, sell loans. Mr. Eddins' mind is in the 20th century.
 
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shmessy said:
.....and I find it quaint that the market analyst also doesn't get it:

"...Hal Eddins, chief economist at Apple shareholder Capital Investment Counsel, said Apple has a history of higher margins than most automakers.
“My initial reaction as a shareholder is, huh?” Eddins said. “Still don’t really see the appeal of the car business, but Apple may be eyeing another angle than what I’m seeing.”

Apple is not getting into the "car business". They will be partnering with a car maker to create a fleet to feed their transportation/ride APP. Forget about built-in obsolescence in future. It will be in the best interests of Apple (and their competitors) to make these things last 20-30years with easy-to-upgrade tech. The aim will be to maximize TRIPS which will be priced by subscription.

Just like today car dealerships don't sell cars for revenue - - they, at thier core, sell loans. Mr. Eddins' mind is in the 20th century.
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It is also another platform to hoover all your data from.
 
shmessy said:
This thread is going to be fun to look back upon in 2035............

www.reuters.com

Exclusive: Apple targets car production by 2024 and eyes 'next level' battery technology - sources

Apple Inc is moving forward with self-driving car technology and is targeting 2024 to produce a passenger vehicle that could include its own breakthrough battery technology, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.
www.reuters.com www.reuters.com
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I still think we're all arguing past one another here, but go off.
 
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