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Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

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Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#461

Post by gboudrias »

oasisbob wrote: post #458
theptip wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that traffic will be "worse" in some sense, in that there will be more of it. But maybe not "worse" in the important sense of how annoying it is, since we won't be consciously piloting a machine through it. Instead we could be sleeping, playing video games, working on laptops, etc. I think that vehicle design will shift a lot once we start optimizing for these new use-cases, and this might make a big differen…

Agree that it's going to be harder to predict, and probably dependent on the individual. When it comes to commuting in the Pacific Northwest, for most of the year an extra half-hour of available daylight at the end (or start) of the day is the difference between getting out climbing during the work week, or not. Personally, I'd trade a comfortable commute for that extra time, no question. Of course, maybe a self-driv…

> for working during the morning commute, and getting off earlier

Surely you mean turning your 8 hour shifts into 10 hour shifts?

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#462

Post by shykes »

a9a wrote: post #148

It will be interesting to see how Lyft's partnership with Waymo evolves given this tech announcement and Waymo's acknowledgment that they plan to offer their own ridesharing service. Lyft's approach to self-driving partnerships in general seems to rest on the assumption that self-driving providers will catch up to each other before any of them can fully handle everything a human driver can do. If this assumption is c…

I think the China/US rivalry will guarantee that there will always be at the very least one major rival to Waymo with global ambitions.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#463

Post by Gustomaximus »

landryraccoon wrote: post #332
aidenn0 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still think that proper self-driving cars are such a paradigm shift that predictions of how it will work are still up in the air. For example, right now I live on the west coast and my parents live on the east coast. 4 kids, Minimum of 40 hour drive or $3500 flight. Here's one tiny example: I can work remotely for a few weeks and my boss doesn't mind. The kids sleep for 8+ hours at night. Friday, Saturday, Sunday,…

> Car usage will go up by an order of magnitude because a major cost of driving isn't the dollars, but the time. This is why I think self driving cars will make traffic worse, not better. The more comfortable it is to be inside a car and the less people mind long car rides, the more people will drive (self driving or otherwise). If road infrastructure is the same, that necessarily means a much higher density of cars…

> self driving cars will make traffic worse, not better.

I definitely see your logic towards higher density with things like 'office cars' so people do more travel. Or sleeping cars but that would be outside typical peak hours. But would self driving increase volume that much? Possibly if people stopped getting trains/busses but this should be remain cheaper and faster via priority lanes most cities have.

Also in general;

Freeways; most traffic jams are caused from someone breaking and then the next person breaks a bit more and so on creating a jam. With self driving car the computers will be able to talk and do a 'everyone accelerate on this mark' and get the flow happening even on very crowded roads. And ideally accident reduction that often creates traffic jams.

Cities: Algorithms will start making little efficiency improvement to driving. All the little things like removing unnecessary lane changing. People double parking to drop something off. And like those futuristic car intersection scenes where cars dont stop at lights but all go through an intersection from every direction reducing traffic back-ups.

We will need to make rules to adapt and keep the flow, e.g. stop people have cars driving around the block rather than parking. Ensure we have 'road neutrality' so the wealthy dont pay a premium for faster trips where other cars in the fleet move aside and slow everyone else type deal.

Anyway, I dont profess to know the answer. Its all a guess! I do suspect the benefits will outweigh additional trips people might take. Besides, who knows, maybe by then we'll have the 'Boring company' or equivalent making private roads so only the plebs use public roads anyway....

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#464

Post by intended »

sangnoir wrote: post #268
jedrek wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree that it's impossible to make predictions, your example is a massive edge case.

I don't think it's an edge case: If an operator redesigns the interior of their fleet with large, comfortable reclining seats, long distance travel by road will become much more competitive with business-/first-class air travel. Boarding at my house and being dropped off at my destination and sleeping all the way (or working if you're a telecommuter, or watching movies) is quite appealing to me - the lack of TSA and/…

The line from travel via auto mated car to TSA style security invasion is actually pretty short.

It just takes one person to decide to go carmageddon and now every car will have weight restrictions, luggage restrictions, then there will be ~~economy cars~~ pods and more.

The moment you start paying for a seat, and the car is owned by someone else, the owners are going to see exactly how LITTLE they can keep in the car, and still get someone to use it.

Unlike flying which benefited from budget airlines, car transport is not likely to benefit more people by going this route.

All this thread is filled with people talking about some sort of benevolent firm wanting to take care of its customers.

The moment the market place hits it's growth plateau, people will be cutting corners to reduce weight, and improve fuel efficiency.

As for rapey scans - they will just expect people to get to a hub, and from that hub pick up their cars.

The hub will have the rapey scans.

The point of the TSA is to make the public feel that something is being "done", post 9/11.

Its a product of fear, not of security requirements.

So you can take it as a bet, that if any of the scenarios come true here - you will eventually return back to TSA levels of security theater.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#465

Post by adrianN »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #459
kjksf wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The self-driving platform will financially nudge you in the right direction. Currently Uber charges more during rush hour. It's rather obvious that self-driving operator will implement similar price discrimination e.g. $10 if you drive alone, $5 if you share with one or more people. And the more they want you to share, the bigger the surcharge e.g. if $10 vs. $5 doesn't have desired effect then maybe $20 vs $5 will.…

Still, traffic will be worse when you compare one bus with 50 people vs. 12 self-driving cars with 4 people each. A bus is 14-15m long, whereas even a small car like the Chevy Bolt is over 4m. So parked bumper-to-bumper the cars produce >3x as much traffic, and then you add some gaps for actually driving you're up to 4x. Personally I'm very skeptical of both the claim that a) self-driving cars will see huge adoptatio…

They could build small self driving busses.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#466

Post by Johnny555 »

aidenn0 wrote: post #232
LrnByTeach wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is the most probable scenarios I foresee. If you are a pessimist about autonomous being bigger part of transpiration then add 2 years to DATES shown below. 2021 : Electric Self-driving on-demand FLEET Car 1000 miles/month SUBSCRIPTION from Google, DiDi, Uber, Renault/Nissan,Tesla, VW,Toyota,GM for $400/month 2024 :same 1000 miles/month SUBSCRIPTION $200/month At $200/month Subscription price for 1000 miles/month…

I still think that proper self-driving cars are such a paradigm shift that predictions of how it will work are still up in the air. For example, right now I live on the west coast and my parents live on the east coast. 4 kids, Minimum of 40 hour drive or $3500 flight. Here's one tiny example: I can work remotely for a few weeks and my boss doesn't mind. The kids sleep for 8+ hours at night. Friday, Saturday, Sunday,…

A $30,000 car that lasts for 200,000 miles costs you $0.15/mile or $450 one way for 3000 miles (I ignored age-based depreciation, but also didn't account for other costs like maintenance and insurance). At 30 mpg (because a car that a family of 6 can feel comfortable riding/sleeping in for 40 hours is not going to be a compact car), that's around $250 for gas.

So you're at $700, or $1400 both ways.

With advanced purchase, you can get flights from SFO to NYC for $250, so that's $1500 for your family of 6.

I find it hard to get good sleep in a car, I can't imagine having a good experience trying to sleep 4 nights in a row. Nor can I imagine spending 40+ hours in the car over 4 days with the kids, even if they are sleeping a lot of that time.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#467

Post by LrnByTeach »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #459
kjksf wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The self-driving platform will financially nudge you in the right direction. Currently Uber charges more during rush hour. It's rather obvious that self-driving operator will implement similar price discrimination e.g. $10 if you drive alone, $5 if you share with one or more people. And the more they want you to share, the bigger the surcharge e.g. if $10 vs. $5 doesn't have desired effect then maybe $20 vs $5 will.…

Still, traffic will be worse when you compare one bus with 50 people vs. 12 self-driving cars with 4 people each. A bus is 14-15m long, whereas even a small car like the Chevy Bolt is over 4m. So parked bumper-to-bumper the cars produce >3x as much traffic, and then you add some gaps for actually driving you're up to 4x. Personally I'm very skeptical of both the claim that a) self-driving cars will see huge adoptatio…

> say the average American today spends $600/month total on owning a car. Why would anyone price a self-driving service at $200/month? No, they'd go for an initial price of $400/month for a couple of years to get customers, then sneak back up to $600/month once they've caught most of the market.

In year 2000, in order to run a medium web site as a company you need 2 Servers one for each Database, WebServer. People bought each server box for $5000 and server capacity used is only at 15%

Come to 2012, Amazon AWS charged for the same Servers only $40/month . Amazon know It costs lots for website owners, why they offer all the server capacity for $40 ???

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#469

Post by Johnny555 »

LrnByTeach wrote: post #380
landryraccoon wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Car usage will go up by an order of magnitude because a major cost of driving isn't the dollars, but the time. This is why I think self driving cars will make traffic worse, not better. The more comfortable it is to be inside a car and the less people mind long car rides, the more people will drive (self driving or otherwise). If road infrastructure is the same, that necessarily means a much higher density of cars…

Road Traffic won't worsen as you mentioned, let me explain why ? Increased capacity utilization. I assume, you are a technical person. If you look back at year 2000, In a typical IT company there is a server Box for each category. A Database server box , a WebServer Box ( physical machines ) etc.. very few people used viruvalization etc.. Physical Machines capacity utilization is around 15% . Come to 2017, with Amazo…

You're ignoring the time cost (or assuming that other people don't care) -- if the ride takes 20 minutes by myself or 30 minutes by the time the car finds another passenger going my way, and then takes an earlier exit ramp to drop off that passenger, next time I'm not going to select the shared ride option.

That's the only thing that keeps me from using something like Uber Pool today -- I don't want to spend extra time picking up/dropping off another passenger.

Re: Waymo now testing its self-driving cars on public roads with no one at the wheel

#470

Post by doikor »

Gustomaximus wrote: post #463
landryraccoon wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Car usage will go up by an order of magnitude because a major cost of driving isn't the dollars, but the time. This is why I think self driving cars will make traffic worse, not better. The more comfortable it is to be inside a car and the less people mind long car rides, the more people will drive (self driving or otherwise). If road infrastructure is the same, that necessarily means a much higher density of cars…

> self driving cars will make traffic worse, not better. I definitely see your logic towards higher density with things like 'office cars' so people do more travel. Or sleeping cars but that would be outside typical peak hours. But would self driving increase volume that much? Possibly if people stopped getting trains/busses but this should be remain cheaper and faster via priority lanes most cities have. Also in gen…

> With self driving car the computers will be able to talk and do a 'everyone accelerate on this mark'

This won't even be necessary as the self driving cars will have vastly superior reaction time when compared to humans. Especially if the cars are electric and thus have almost instant power to the wheels.

Especially if you use tricks like radar underneath the car in front of you so you can react to what the car one car ahead of you does etc.

Also a lot of the highway traffic jams are caused by too small distance between the cars. A self driving car should be much more efficient in keeping enough distance between the cars to keep up the flow.

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