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Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

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Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#381

Post by LtWorf »

atoav wrote: post #354
LtWorf wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's not nearly as profitable…

Profitable. For whom? For the municipiality a 6 lane street vs a two lane street with public transport and bicycle lanes can make the difference between neverending debt and prosperity. Places with good public transport and bicycle infrastructure and denser mixed use pay more tax revenue. Spread out urban sprawls and suburbs give the municipiality a lot of street surface to maintain, for very little tax revenue in re…

Municipalities are generally managed to dry the funds in favour of the friends of whomever is in power. Usually such considerations come last.

For example in Italy many municipalities removed public transport so that FIAT could sell cars. And USA is at least just as corrupt.

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#382

Post by ricardobayes »

xyzzy123 wrote: post #369
ricardobayes wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a well-known thing in AV circles that some companies were actually faking their route by hardcoding them for demos etc. Also one shortcut is to use HD map data, and relying on 100k+ LIDAR sensor data that will never will be cost-effective. I know of only a handful of companies that rely on 'cheap' sensor data (cameras/radar) and use real-time calculations.

If a full time driver earns 25k-50k that's sort of equivalent to every regular taxi and uber having a $500k / $1M driving package onboard already (at 4%), right? I don't know the industry but very naively it doesn't seem to me like $100k really breaks the unit economics? Particularly if volume / learning curve can reduce the price?

You are right in the way that the industry seems to be shifting from general-purpose self-driving to transportation/hauling.

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#383

Post by papito »

ricardobayes wrote: post #361
IAmWorried wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. I had no idea that these things had such fundamental limitations. I'd feel a lot less safer using one now, to be honest. If you had to estimate, how long would it be before AVs would be able to do all their calculations locally? Is that something that's even under consideration at the time?

It's a well-known thing in AV circles that some companies were actually faking their route by hardcoding them for demos etc. Also one shortcut is to use HD map data, and relying on 100k+ LIDAR sensor data that will never will be cost-effective. I know of only a handful of companies that rely on 'cheap' sensor data (cameras/radar) and use real-time calculations.

Well, THAT has a Dropout-like HULU miniseries written all over it.

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#384

Post by Bromeo »

moffkalast wrote: post #375
bjoli wrote: post #316

The promises of self driving cars have always seemed weird to me. Sure, I would love to have a world where all cars are self driving. The security benefits seem large. But decreasing congestion? We already know how to do that, and in many ways it seems like a safer bet than some kind of technogy with large problems and even larger unknowns; public transport. Cheap, well developed, reliable public transport will beat…

> cheap > well developed > reliable Speaking as a guy in Europe where we generally have "good" public transport, I think you can only ever have ONE of those at the same time, with some exceptions. Cheap fares? You get decrepit busses from the 80s and the timetable's just a suggestion (what my city used to have) Well developed? Development isn't cheap so fares get expensive, busses are Mercs that run on CNG and the ti…

> so 2/3 for them I suppose

In Zürich, a monthly city ticket is around $50, and a monthly country wide public transport ticket is $340 (and really gets you almost everywhere). Annual tickets are slightly cheaper.

I would argue while not "very cheap", the prices are still reasonably cheap, especially when compared to reoccurring car costs.

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#385

Post by Dan_Sylveste »

lelanthran wrote: post #305
astrange wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cause the post implied that it's right to be mad at Tesla, but that wouldn't help. Feel free to give the car back to the dealer. Although I'd think this would be obvious on the test drive. Also, being livid is probably bad for your health. Might get high blood pressure.

> Cause the post implied that it's right to be mad at Tesla, Of course it's right to be mad at Tesla - they resolved a property dispute by force. > Also, being livid is probably bad for your health. Might get high blood pressure. I wouldn't be livid in that situation, but I would consider criminal charges against Tesla in my jurisdiction. After all, the dealer is only on the hook for civil claims, Tesla is on the hoo…

>I would consider criminal charges against Tesla in my jurisdiction.

You live in a jurisdiction in which a private person can levy criminal charges?

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#386

Post by gambiting »

jakzurr wrote: post #358
gambiting wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, maybe a different, well known example - the radiation Theraphy Therac-25 machines which would sometimes(extremely rarely) deliver a lethal dose of radiation instead of the one entered. Undoubtedly those machines saved more lives than they took, and also it's without question that they did so more accurately than any human operated machine could ever do. Yet they are considered one of the biggest failures of medic…

Would I be incorrect to suppose that you don't use seatbelts?

I don't see why I wouldn't use them(or why would anyone), can you explain?

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#387

Post by michaelscott »

Bromeo wrote: post #384
moffkalast wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> cheap > well developed > reliable Speaking as a guy in Europe where we generally have "good" public transport, I think you can only ever have ONE of those at the same time, with some exceptions. Cheap fares? You get decrepit busses from the 80s and the timetable's just a suggestion (what my city used to have) Well developed? Development isn't cheap so fares get expensive, busses are Mercs that run on CNG and the ti…

> so 2/3 for them I suppose In Zürich, a monthly city ticket is around $50, and a monthly country wide public transport ticket is $340 (and really gets you almost everywhere). Annual tickets are slightly cheaper. I would argue while not "very cheap", the prices are still reasonably cheap, especially when compared to reoccurring car costs.

Switzerland also solved the last mile problem with Mobility, if you really need it

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#388

Post by ClumsyPilot »

I am just wondering how many people have to die before it finally dawns on on us that the current approach is idiotic.

The supposed smart cars can't even talk to each-other directly 'without internet' to warn of a car pileup! They can't report to city traffic control about their condition.

We should be innovating in infrastructure instead - create standardised computer readable infrared road markings, equip each traffic light and each lamp post with a radio beacon, each crash barrier could have a radio marker, create PUBLIC maps of each city, have a central traffic control sypercomputer in each city provide directions to cars. Have each car painted with infrared markers so they recognise each-other. Provide cyclists with something these cars can recognise.

We could even make radar-reflective pants so that autonomous cars see them better.

the whoe traffic system needs to be looked at and brought to a new set of standards, whatever they may be. I am not sure what they are, but it should be clear to anyome with half a brain thay having a car use a camera to tell if the traffic light is red or green is idiotic.

untill a new system is ready, no car without AGI level ai will ever be safe

The only problem is that such collective approach conflicts with the way VCs work.

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#389

Post by ClumsyPilot »

pembrook wrote: post #379
bjoli wrote: post #316

The promises of self driving cars have always seemed weird to me. Sure, I would love to have a world where all cars are self driving. The security benefits seem large. But decreasing congestion? We already know how to do that, and in many ways it seems like a safer bet than some kind of technogy with large problems and even larger unknowns; public transport. Cheap, well developed, reliable public transport will beat…

I’ve lived in and frequently traveled to cities with what is considered the best public transportation in the world (Paris, NYC, London, HK, Singapore, Zurich, etc etc). In almost all the above places, there have been frequent instances where I’ve had to use taxis and/or rent a car. And that was while living/staying in the core of these cities. 99.99% of places on earth aren’t nearly as densely populated as the ones…

"You ever wonder where the food you eat gets grown and how it gets delivered"

the argument is strange, they don't exactly deliver 40 tons of wheat to the bakery with a taxi. Noone is arguing against cargo and utility vehicles unless they can be substituted by railway (which could be better designed, etc)

https://www.tescoplc.com/updates/2021/how-tesco-is-turning-t...

Re: Driverless robotaxi fleet paralyzed for hours in San Francisco

#390

Post by ClumsyPilot »

atoav wrote: post #354
LtWorf wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's not nearly as profitable…

Profitable. For whom? For the municipiality a 6 lane street vs a two lane street with public transport and bicycle lanes can make the difference between neverending debt and prosperity. Places with good public transport and bicycle infrastructure and denser mixed use pay more tax revenue. Spread out urban sprawls and suburbs give the municipiality a lot of street surface to maintain, for very little tax revenue in re…

well you see when the municipality is doing well, we don't call it profit, so you can't win the game by definition.
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