21–30 of 236 posts
There are a lot of big claims in this article. As someone who hasn't been paying much attention, is it credible that they have a near-ready-to-go self-driving car right now?
>Electric self-driving cars will save millions of lives and significantly accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy, but only when they’re deployed in large numbers. Just like cars that we drive, self driving cars enable sprawl. Sprawl will never be environmentally sustainable. We need cities that you move through by foot, bike, and public transit.
I will say that self-driving cars help a bit in getting people to bike, though. The biggest barrier to biking in San Francisco is people's fear of getting killed by cars (the SF Bike Coalition has done surveys on this). Self-driving cars should pose less of a risk to cyclists - they don't run red lights or speed, etc.
Another potential benefit would be reducing the need for parking. The biggest obstacle to physically separated bike lanes is the space they take up - typically that requires removing parking. If self-driving taxis are super cheap, that should lead to less car ownership, and possibly less demand for parking.
That's all very speculative though.
Seriously though. Please call me when that happens. I really, really want to not have to drive anymore. I don't care what the price tag is.
tl;dr we have built a car that does not self-drive, but like, some day, it will, we're pretty sure Funniest thing is they still use wiring harnesses. If you're manufacturing the car from scratch just build a digital bus into the frame.
Wow. FYI - This is how you mess up content marketing. If the author genuinely wanted me to read the article and get to know the brand, he shouldn't have used such a scummy title. Yes, the article is /technically/ true. But they are only talking about the hardware, and acknowledge in the second paragraph that they don't have the software. So while the title implies self-driving cars are a solved problem, they are real…
Waymo and Uber are more likely to have beat them to it (lidar) than Tesla, but point very much taken.
Redesigning the software of a production car and actually integrating the tech at the factory-level gets you much closer to a mass-volume car than making some fancy software with a sensor package that you bolt to the top of a minivan.
>Electric self-driving cars will save millions of lives and significantly accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy, but only when they’re deployed in large numbers. Just like cars that we drive, self driving cars enable sprawl. Sprawl will never be environmentally sustainable. We need cities that you move through by foot, bike, and public transit.
Assuming clean, renewable energy powers all electric mobility, why not? I do not want to live in a city/urban area, and I will pay more not to.
EDIT: @InitialLastName
Sorry, HN throttling kicked in, can't reply to your reply so I'm putting this here.
If I have a well for water, septic for sewage, solar on my roof, and a gravel road to town, what's the problem? I understand its super expensive for cities to deliver utilities and services across sprawl, but if I'm not asking for those services and utilities to be provided, it should be a non-issue.
If anything, sprawl will make service and utility delivery more efficient, as we'll have no other choice for those who choose that lifestyle.
>Electric self-driving cars will save millions of lives and significantly accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy, but only when they’re deployed in large numbers. Just like cars that we drive, self driving cars enable sprawl. Sprawl will never be environmentally sustainable. We need cities that you move through by foot, bike, and public transit.
In cities and dense inner suburbs, parking is a limiting factor to higher density; typically every parking spot is taken, and then some.
Also, automatic driving could greatly improve the cost and convenience of public (or private fleet) transit.