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How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

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Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Self driving cars are not magic and judging their braking distance is not much easier than with a human driver. I think kids trying that will quickly find out that it's not too hard to make an autocar hit a human. In other words, I think the problem would quickly solve itself.

In bad neighborhoods, the carjackers(might not want a autonomous car though) or robbers might just roll a beach ball into the street to stop the car or maybe just a cheap open umbrella. I can imagine those people who practice "rolling coal" doing the same thing to rich autonomous car riders or just throwing a beach ball out the window on an interstate. Lots of possibilities that security researchers will need to cons…

Autonomous cars have a lot of data gathering sensors - even if the car doesn't know something is going on, logs of what happened will greatly aid the police in their efforts to track down the criminal.

If carjacking becomes a problem the cars will figure it out and start locking all the doors. Or if the car is unoccupied, let the carjaker in, then notify the nearest police station it is coming in with a criminal.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. I see this here on hacker news with people excited about the notion of doing away with stop lights so that AI traffic can flow easily. People are completely ignoring the existence of pedestrians and cyclists. It would not be surprising to see a new crime of "hindering an autonomous automobile" be lobbied for.

It's only a matter of time before some stupid kids start jumping in the way of self-driving cars to make them brake hard. That's when we'll see the anti-pedestrian regulations appear, by my estimation.

Kids already do that against human driven car. It's not a new problem.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#233
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if they do cross, they have the right of way. Outside of maybe the autobahn, you should never be driving a car fast enough to where you cannot see a pedestrian in time to stop for them. It's pretty unlikely that the pedestrian is ever found at fault for an accident in Germany.

You have the right of way when crossing against a signal? Why bother with signals then?

As a way for cars to coordinate with each other, and to ensure there's a phase when cars stop.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#234
post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If automated vehicles become popular, I predict new crimes will be added in addition to jaywalking. Cyclists may be restricted and anything else that confuses AI drivers. If certain intersections or sections of road consistently confuse AI drivers, automakers will lobby for ways to change these roadways. I suspect calls for AI regulation by people like Elon Musk are really attempts at regulatory capture to make autom…

When I think of crimes and AI drivers I always think of people using drugs or making sex in driverless taxis.

And then you remember that as part of the passenger safety case for driverless taxis, there will necessarily be cameras and microphones and the ability to lock the doors and redirect the taxi to the nearest hospital or police station, right?

When we were building the Heathrow Pod[1] -- which is effectively an autonomous taxi system -- this was an objection that people raised all the time. In practice, it took approximately zero instances of bad passenger behaviour for people to catch onto the fact that the interior of an autonomous vehicle that can deliver you non-stop to airport security is really the last place on Earth that you'd want to engage in anti-social behaviour.

1: https://www.heathrow.com/transport-and-directions/heathrow-p...

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#235
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>New technologies require new ways of organizing things... I think it's pretty clear by now that organizing whole cities around the automobile was a huge step in the wrong direction and the sooner we begin to correct it the better. Just look at Copenhagen as a shining example of a city that began re-focusing its traffic on actual people (and not f *ing metal boxes taking up way too much space) decades ago.

Copenhagen isn’t McMansions on quarter acre lots, while most Americans panic at the suggestion of any density level higher than that. Permission to play in the street won’t fix low suburban density or the low effective density of high rise neighborhoods that are mostly vacant investment properties.

> Permission to play in the street won’t fix low suburban density

It can help, if it means parents feel less need for private gardens.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#236
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If automated vehicles become popular, I predict new crimes will be added in addition to jaywalking. Cyclists may be restricted and anything else that confuses AI drivers. If certain intersections or sections of road consistently confuse AI drivers, automakers will lobby for ways to change these roadways. I suspect calls for AI regulation by people like Elon Musk are really attempts at regulatory capture to make autom…

Why cant we get automated bicycles and get rid of the humans on bikes?

When are we going to learn and just get rid of the humans?

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bikes aren’t faster than cars for the elderly, the vision impaired, handicapped people or small children. I’m all for more bikes and more bike routes, but cars offer more independence for a lot of movement restricted people.

I hope the vision impaired and small children aren't driving cars. And all of these groups would be helped much much more by not designing cities around cars, in the 95% of hours in the day where they are not in cars and need to navigate every day life. A $60k retrofitted transporter van isn't exactly the definition of "independence".

Actually, there are many visually impaired people who can, and do, drive. As an example, I know a woman in her sixties who is classed as visually impaired. She can see well enough to get herself about but she can't make out peoples faces until she is fairly close and has to have a magnifying glass to read even fairly large text. She has been assessed as safe to drive, but is excluded from driving at night.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#238

Now is an opportunity, perhaps first in ~100 years, perhaps last, to recover the streets for unaugmented humans: slow down cars in urban areas, increase qualifications for humans to drive, eventually ban human drivers entirely, leaving only automated vehicles with enough sensors and going slowly enough to reduce auto-related deaths for pedestrians and passengers alike to zero.

> Now is an opportunity, perhaps first in ~100 years, perhaps last, to recover the streets for unaugmented humans: slow down cars in urban areas, increase qualifications for humans to drive, eventually ban human drivers entirely, leaving only automated vehicles with enough sensors and going slowly enough to reduce auto-related deaths for pedestrians and passengers alike to zero.

What about people who genuinely love to drive cars & ride motorcycles? Are we a danger this utopian self automated future? I just don't see it happening. There's so many people that are enamored with cars and motorcycles, who love the sensation, independence and freedom derived from the experience. Older manual Ferraris or air-cooled Porsches appreciate in value for a reason.

I almost lament at the future where an entire generation will grow up without experiencing such "archaic, manual and dangerous vehicles" because it will be too expensive, much as classic supercars will remain out of reach for majority of the population.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only a matter of time before some stupid kids start jumping in the way of self-driving cars to make them brake hard. That's when we'll see the anti-pedestrian regulations appear, by my estimation.

Not just kids - it's a perfect way to carjack someone.

carjacking vehicles with constant internet connections and GPS's doesn't strike me as an extremely profitable maneuver.

the whole "car detects obstacle in an untrafficed area, stops, door is opened, passenger gets out, passenger gets back in, changes destination to a place not proximate to anywhere they've ever been before" process also sounds like the sort of thing that would justifiably raise a bit of a red flag. maybe not an automated call to 911, but it should probably dump all records to the cloud and trigger a call from an onstar operator or similar.

Re: How Automakers Invented the Crime of “Jaywalking”

#240

Now is an opportunity, perhaps first in ~100 years, perhaps last, to recover the streets for unaugmented humans: slow down cars in urban areas, increase qualifications for humans to drive, eventually ban human drivers entirely, leaving only automated vehicles with enough sensors and going slowly enough to reduce auto-related deaths for pedestrians and passengers alike to zero.

I'd be on board with that if you similarly phased out bicycles. People who ride bicycles down the sidewalk are a danger, and need to be stopped.
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