Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine • Hacker News Board

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#101

Post by JoshTriplett » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:23 PM UTC

Tade0 wrote: post #66

baron816 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can live somewhere else and drive their ICE cars around. I don't care that much what they do, but I want a live in a city that's livable. I think my vision would make for the most livable city possible.

I live in a city which has a central district unavailable for most of the cars(aside from residents, but parking spaces are very limited). I would never want to live in that district. Reasons: - Buildings are very close to each other which makes the place dark and noisy(sound bounces off the walls). - Rent is high, because apartments are so close to everything that landlords can get away with high prices. - Trash day…

> - Trash day is once a week, because you can't have a garbage truck roaming the streets every morning waking everybody up.

While I agree with the rest of your points, "once a week" trash service is pretty standard in many areas. And if you have properly integrated mechanisms within buildings, even that might be more often than needed.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#102

Post by maxsilver » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:23 PM UTC

bryanlarsen wrote: post #2

Anytime you make something cheaper, easier to use, more useful and/or more efficient you get an increase in usage. Autonomous electric cars are all 4, and will lead to a dramatic increase in the number of miles driven. Some of those miles we can imagine (for instance sending your car on a dead-head journey somewhere for somebody else to use it), but most of the increase will probably be from new usage models that we…

> Anytime you make something cheaper, easier to use, more useful and/or more efficient you get an increase in usage.

This isn't inherently true. You only get an increase in usage if people want/need that usage but previously couldn't have it. (i.e, if there was already a shortage -- if we were severely undeserving the need previously, or a new undeserved need was discovered).

If there is no shortage already and/or no newly-discovered need for something, then making something cheaper or easier does not increase it's usage.

(This is the big common mistake nearly everyone makes when talking about "Induced Demand". If you don't understand that Induced Demand is really about critical shortages further up the chain, then you trap yourself into doing nothing under the false belief that any new capacity added will automatically "induce" a failure of the new system).

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#103

Post by imchillyb » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:24 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #89

stcredzero wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worry that self-driving cars are going to be used as an excuse not to expand public transit, especially in the Bay Area. By reducing people's sunk cost in cars, it may well free up the public mind to alternative forms of transportation. A lot of political inertia comes in the form of personal sunk costs. Also, self driving vehicles could themselves be used to expand public transit. IIRC, In Portland in the 90's, th…

> By reducing people's sunk cost in cars I love this conversation. The US new auto sales run rate is ~17 million vehicles/year, with an average price right around $35k. That's $595,000,000,000 per year in capital being allocated to automotive mobility alone . Think what better things we could do with that capital (or everyone could work far less!) if we only spent a fraction of that on automotive capital costs.

You may love that conversation, but how many Americans are willing to give up their vehicles?

In America, the privately owned vehicle isn't just transportation, it's a status symbol. That's not going to change just because someone crunched some numbers.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#104

Post by toomuchtodo » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:27 PM UTC

imchillyb wrote: post #103

toomuchtodo wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By reducing people's sunk cost in cars I love this conversation. The US new auto sales run rate is ~17 million vehicles/year, with an average price right around $35k. That's $595,000,000,000 per year in capital being allocated to automotive mobility alone . Think what better things we could do with that capital (or everyone could work far less!) if we only spent a fraction of that on automotive capital costs.

You may love that conversation, but how many Americans are willing to give up their vehicles? In America, the privately owned vehicle isn't just transportation, it's a status symbol. That's not going to change just because someone crunched some numbers.

> but how many Americans are willing to give up their vehicles?

That's not the question. Can you afford your own car if the cost efficiencies are no longer there because there are so many fewer cars on the road?

How many people own their own Cessna versus buying tickets on Southwest? Even with a private pilot license, I would never consider owning a plane myself. Too expensive!

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#105

Post by imchillyb » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:32 PM UTC

baron816 wrote: post #12

If I had to choose between a world where 1) everyone owned electric cars 2) no one owned cars but just hitched rides on autonomous ones and 3) no one used cars at all, I would take the third option. I think it's possible if we start building new cities designed for walking, instead of just expanding our current cities, with all the problems that presents. I think the trick would be to strictly limit their footprint t…

> ... we start building new cities ...

I hope that you realize that cities are not just begun and built up (like the ghost-cities of China), but are built up over time because the area was desirable and people migrated to those areas.

The US isn't in the habit of just building a city somewhere. That just doesn't happen.

That -new city building- is something that happens when a country's GDP is slipping so low they have no choice but to spend money (looking at you China) to falsely inflate their growth metric.

In the west, we are capitalist driven. That means a city will spring up around a feature. Doesn't matter what that feature is, but it's growth is organic and not necessarily well-planned as you're suggesting.

We could theoretically do this, but we don't.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#106

Post by Zelizz » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:34 PM UTC

cbhl wrote: post #59

twblalock wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worry that self-driving cars are going to be used as an excuse not to expand public transit, especially in the Bay Area. The problem is scale -- once the population reaches a certain size, the roads are going to be gridlocked even if every car is self driving. I'm not sure if the Bay Area is at that point yet, but NYC certainly is, as are most of the major cities of the world.

Not expanding public transit already happens. Google/Cisco/Apple/Facebook was running its own shadow public transit system for free to the cities, but the anti-techie lobbies demanded that SF regulate it to a shadow of its former self and tax the tech companies every time a bus stops to pick up passengers. In Seattle, Google just gives its employees a bus pass, because their public transit system isn't full and dysfu…

In Seattle Microsoft also runs its own substantial bus service, "the Connector". There are so many Microsoft employees commuting in and out of Redmond every day that it makes a lot of sense.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#107

Post by Tiktaalik » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:35 PM UTC

mywittyname wrote: post #54

twblalock wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worry that self-driving cars are going to be used as an excuse not to expand public transit, especially in the Bay Area. The problem is scale -- once the population reaches a certain size, the roads are going to be gridlocked even if every car is self driving. I'm not sure if the Bay Area is at that point yet, but NYC certainly is, as are most of the major cities of the world.

Hopefully Uber/Lyft start a van/bulk transit service. This would help reduce traffic by combining trips while being more efficient than buses because the server can dynamically route the driver to optimize pickups and departures. Perhaps even adding discounts for riders willing to trek the last mile on foot.

> while being more efficient than buses because the server can dynamically route the driver to optimize pickups and departures.

There's a big assumption here that this dynamic routes would actually be more efficient than the simple fixed routes we have now. I'm skeptical.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#108

Post by Zelizz » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:36 PM UTC

bwanab wrote: post #41

bryanlarsen wrote: post #2

Anytime you make something cheaper, easier to use, more useful and/or more efficient you get an increase in usage. Autonomous electric cars are all 4, and will lead to a dramatic increase in the number of miles driven. Some of those miles we can imagine (for instance sending your car on a dead-head journey somewhere for somebody else to use it), but most of the increase will probably be from new usage models that we…

Congestion? I don't think you're taking into account the huge advantage that autonomous cars have with respect to coordination among themselves. Much, if not most, congestion is caused by human drivers attempting to accrue advantage to themselves through maneuvers that disadvantage everybody else on the road.

I think I've read that congestion (at least highway congestion) is mostly caused by overbraking.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#109

Post by Tiktaalik » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:37 PM UTC

bwanab wrote: post #41

bryanlarsen wrote: post #2

Anytime you make something cheaper, easier to use, more useful and/or more efficient you get an increase in usage. Autonomous electric cars are all 4, and will lead to a dramatic increase in the number of miles driven. Some of those miles we can imagine (for instance sending your car on a dead-head journey somewhere for somebody else to use it), but most of the increase will probably be from new usage models that we…

Congestion? I don't think you're taking into account the huge advantage that autonomous cars have with respect to coordination among themselves. Much, if not most, congestion is caused by human drivers attempting to accrue advantage to themselves through maneuvers that disadvantage everybody else on the road.

No most of congestion is caused by the spacial inefficiency of car based infrastructure. Cars are big and roads have fixed capacity. Autonomous cars will not significantly change this.

Re: Electric cars: The death of the internal combustion engine

#110

Post by Tiktaalik » Thu, Aug 10, 2017, 6:43 PM UTC

bryanlarsen wrote: post #2

Anytime you make something cheaper, easier to use, more useful and/or more efficient you get an increase in usage. Autonomous electric cars are all 4, and will lead to a dramatic increase in the number of miles driven. Some of those miles we can imagine (for instance sending your car on a dead-head journey somewhere for somebody else to use it), but most of the increase will probably be from new usage models that we…

Autonomous cars may dramatically expand the set of people that can drive cars, which will accordingly increase the amount of cars on the road.

Right now the set of potential drivers are limited to 16 to around 80 (though many seniors may be forced to stop earlier). When skill and attention and licensing are no longer requirements for driving, then children and seniors that would have been forced to bicycle, walk or take transit will be able to call an autonomous car.