AIBU to think we don’t want driverless taxis?

I mean in terms of moving towards a society where people own fewer things - the idea is generally that if you have self driving cars, rather than everyone owning a car that is sitting parked 80%+ of the time, everyone pays to use cars as a service. Which in itself is a good idea.

But considering the current way things are moving with more and more key elements of our lives controlled by fewer and fewer businesses, this car scenario is yet another potential monopoly which is unhealthy for society and the economy on a number of levels.

The only drivers I ever have had in an uber are immigrants. I’m not assuming either as I always chat to my drivers and they say where they are from. There will be a lot of unemployed immigrants if this takes over. Same with deliveroo/uber eats if that gets automated.

Also what would happen if some drunk person pukes up everywhere? I wouldn't fancy being the next customer

Again, why the obsession with "owning" ?

It makes no sense to have a car sitting on your drive (or at work) doing fuck all for 12 hours every day. Personal transport is - by its very nature - horrendously inefficient over time.

If we weren't enjoying the start of a climate catastrophe caused by such things, it wouldn't matter.

The environmental impact of autonomous vehicles has been the elephant in the room so far. Not simply because they are electric. But because they can be effectively > 90% time efficient.

If you don't believe me, ask ChatGPT. And if you don't, others who make decisions already have.

What are you on about? Why concerned?

I think self driving cars could be amazing for older and disabled people. But I share people's concerns about ownership and further concentrating of money and ultimate ownership in fewer and fewer hands.

I'd love to own one myself so i can chill on my hour long commute.

I am interested that the taxi driver in LA thought that he would be able to just buy a few to work for him!

I can easily see consortiums springing up where a bunch of folks all chip in to buy a driverless car they will run as a taxi for 20/7.

If you can buy a driverless car for (example) £100,000, and it can get to work making a net £10/hour for the owner, that's £1,400 a week.

When I say net, that;s after fuel and maintenance.

I take it you haven't been in a driverless taxi yet. We used them extensively in San Francisco. The first time was just for the novelty value, to say we had. But, I'm a convert.

As for the jobs side of things, I understand this, but these taxis do still provide jobs. They still need a lot of tach support, they clearly have a great cleaning crew and seem to spend more on maintenance than regular taxi fleets.

They are creating other jobs too (sort of). If a passenger gets out and leaves a door open, the car won't move. The system now contacts Door Dash. A Door Dasher is sent to close the door and they get paid $6 a door. Extra cash for the food delivery industry.

Of course. We allow “people” who have been taught & licensed, who can make a judgement on the surroundings they find themselves in, as these articles demonstrate, robots can only respond to what they have been programmed to do. Big difference!

Indeed @XmasCrackPies

Apparently if you don’t close the door properly then the Waymo won’t move, so people are employed to go around closing Waymo doors!

There is a tiktok video of an Amazon van completely surrounded by Waymo cars that managed to get themselves gridlocked around him. They work well until they don't. What happens when there is an accident in a narrow street and they have to reverse back? Or navigate a Cornish country lane with a tractor bearing down on them?

We have a female taxi driver here and she is always booked. She has several cars and a van to cater for groups as well!

I am scared of drone deliveries. There was a drone flown by an overly enthusiastic PC near us which maimed a child because they had not done any safety prep checks before launching while trying to catch someone who had run off on foot. I trust driverless cars over driven by over-excited men drones.

I’m less worried about jobs etc than I am about the fact that these will mostly have been tested in the USA, and pedestrian/cyclist behaviour and culture is not the same there as in the UK, and driving culture certainly is very different. The people inside the metal box might feel safe, I’m not so sure about the people outside it who might get be involved in an accident if something goes wrong.

I am interested that the taxi driver in LA thought that he would be able to just buy a few to work for him! The issues are that there are only 1 or 2 providers who are allowed to run them after much testing. I very much doubt they'd split the costs by subbing their expensive vehicles out to old taxi drivers to keep them in a wage!

We were in LA over the summer holidays and used them a lot. They felt very safe and we didn’t have a single issue, if anything it felt like they were being very cautious

Or they simply followed the rules of the road ? Suggesting that what you feel is normal is just recklessness that has been accepted as the standard ?

There are cameras in them so I assume something like that would get flagged.

We were in LA over the summer holidays and used them a lot. They felt very safe and we didn’t have a single issue, if anything it felt like they were being very cautious. The London ones will get better over time. They were generally slightly cheaper than a driven uber and you also didn’t have to factor in a tip on top of the fare price. They don’t go on the highways so sometimes a journey may take longer, we used a normal driven Uber for the one longer journey we had and interestingly when we chatted to our driver about them he was all for them. He said he’ll just eventually buy multiple driverless cars and then send them out on the road to do the work for him.

Deadly serious

One interpretation of that data could be that we are comfortable with that number of fatalities.

I wonder (again) what people might think if autonomous cars could get that figure down by 50% ? Or more ? Would grieving relatives be happy that their dearest died just so a few people were happier driverless cars weren't around ?

I might use Uber if it was guaranteed to be a driverless car.

They have too many dodgy drivers who couldn't get from one end of a street to the other without using a Sat Nav.

You can’t be serious

@Greyover @helpfulperson Road accidents have been going down, even when traffic peaked in the 90s. Safety glass, seatbelts, Euro regulations, improved car design, speed limits & bumps. The roads are safer now than they've ever been.

I’m all for it, had some uncomfortable experiences with taxi drivers as a young woman.

My dad is in his 70s and really hopes driverless cars will be available to buy soon. I expect they will be pricey but older people become very isolated when they can’t drive anymore. He’s keen to be able to still get around!