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Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

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Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#91

Post by ssl-3 »

tkgally wrote: post #90
k99x55 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't fall on the trap of self-driving cars will make our lives better. They won't. Building cities for people first is what will improve our lives. Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0

The city where I live—Yokohama—is very different in layout and density from the U.S. cities shown in that video. My neighborhood consists of many small plots of land, each with a different owner, separated by narrow streets. Unless it all gets wiped out by a tsunami, it’s never going to be rebuilt or have its layout changed—the landowners, many of whom live on their plots of land, would not stand for it. My house is…

You raise a very valid point, and it is a point that I do not see expressed very often.

While it is "easy" (and, I think, proper) to build new areas of cities to be walkable at some point in the future, the fact remains that today cities already exist as they stand and many of them may not be very walkable.

Even in already-walkable cities, it is important to consider the fact that all of us will eventually (hopefully!) live long enough to be considered old.

Looking forward to when I myself may become old, I think I'll still like to be able to get from A to B (and back) with a minimum of fuss and at a time of my choosing.

So it is my hope that by the time I reach that point, the world will have options for me and other old people that are better than old people have today.

And that's just me, some day.

But many people are old right now. They can benefit from things like self-driving cars right now, even in walkable cities.

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#92

Post by RGamma »

k99x55 wrote: post #87
tkgally wrote: post #8

This will be interesting. As an aging nondriver living in Yokohama, I’ve been both hoping that self-driving cars become available here before I develop mobility issues and wondering how feasible they will be. Since I don’t drive, I don’t have a sense of what the roads here are like from the vehicle’s perspective. But many of the streets, including in the neighborhood where I live [1], are narrow, have no sidewalks, a…

Don't fall on the trap of self-driving cars will make our lives better. They won't. Building cities for people first is what will improve our lives. Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0

That video was rather thoughtful. Almost makes me want to short SDC companies, buuut lobbying.

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#93

Post by ssl-3 »

nephanth wrote: post #76
jjallen wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do humans get a pass but computers don’t? Why do computers have to be perfect but it’s perfectly legal for humans to kill someone if the sun was in their eyes? Make a list of those stuff for humans every day and it would be gigabytes of records. Almost all goes unpunished.

My very personal opinion is maybe it shouldn't be ok for humans either. Maybe the benefits of cars absolutely don't outweigh the contant risk of deaths and injuries they pose (especially in metropolitan aeras where they are easily replaced by other modes of transportation) Reality is "because humans can take responsibility for their actions". And it seems the way our society is built, we'd rather have individuals tak…

It's not OK for human drivers, either.

But we see bad driving whenever we are out ambulating in the streets, anyway, even in a world with vehicles that are almost always operated by humans.

In this world we have today, illegal things happen on the road all of the time.

(And we've always seen it, at least in quasi-modern times. It isn't something recent. I'm absolutely certain that we saw it in the horse-driven era, too; we just didn't have much in the way of pocket supercomputers back then to record it with.)

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#94

Post by RGamma »

jjallen wrote: post #68
TechDebtDevin wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally just watched a video of a Waymo vehicle driving through and over the debris of a fresh car accident. Sorry, one day this technology will be ready for primetime but it currently is not. I think its complete BS that Waymo and others get to operate and test on public roads. The decision to prototype and test novel technology in public spaces where it can and will kill innocent people should be determined by…

So don’t try to improve the existing system that already kills tens of thousands a year? Saying it can and will kill innocent people when this hasn’t happened in fifteen years doesn’t pass the smell test.

The US is, like in several other public welfare stats, a bad outlier in traffic deaths among industrial nations. Thank your corpo overlords. Create the problem, sell the solution.

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#95

Post by Aeolun »

k99x55 wrote: post #87
tkgally wrote: post #8

This will be interesting. As an aging nondriver living in Yokohama, I’ve been both hoping that self-driving cars become available here before I develop mobility issues and wondering how feasible they will be. Since I don’t drive, I don’t have a sense of what the roads here are like from the vehicle’s perspective. But many of the streets, including in the neighborhood where I live [1], are narrow, have no sidewalks, a…

Don't fall on the trap of self-driving cars will make our lives better. They won't. Building cities for people first is what will improve our lives. Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0

Tokyo doesn’t need to be built for people. It already is.

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#96

Post by k99x55 »

tkgally wrote: post #90
k99x55 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't fall on the trap of self-driving cars will make our lives better. They won't. Building cities for people first is what will improve our lives. Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0

The city where I live—Yokohama—is very different in layout and density from the U.S. cities shown in that video. My neighborhood consists of many small plots of land, each with a different owner, separated by narrow streets. Unless it all gets wiped out by a tsunami, it’s never going to be rebuilt or have its layout changed—the landowners, many of whom live on their plots of land, would not stand for it. My house is…

Cars are the most age discriminatory mode of transport of all: only 18+ and not too old can use it, and most disabled cannot use it. A

Bicycles work to all ages, all abilities.

In your case an ebike, trike (etrike?) or even mobility scooter might be a much lighter, cheaper, scalable option.

Hey why not a self-driving e-scooter? Why does it have to weight 2 tons in the first place?

Bike infrastructure is not only for bicycles: its for trikes, wheelchairs, mobility scooters, ebikes.

Watch:

* Who else benefits from the Dutch cycling infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSGx3HSjKDo

* 8 to 80, people of all ages cycling in the Netherlands: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swqaAIkGtpA

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#97

Post by Aeolun »

nixpulvis wrote: post #32
GoatOfAplomb wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo is doing alright in San Francisco as well. That's not directly comparable to Tokyo, either, but I expect it's a much less distant of a comparison than Phoenix.

I saw a video of a bunch of Waymos backed up on each other being too hesitant to make a turn. Kinda reinforced a fear I have of these things. Not to mention I would hate to try and wave one of these things to turn before me... or wink my headlights. IDK, like I get the appeal for driverless cars, I just still don't like them.

That… doesn’t sound like such a bad thing to me. I’d rather have my driverless car hesitate (in a safe location) than be too agressive.

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#98

Post by Aeolun »

zombiwoof wrote: post #52
opdahl wrote: post #11

Going to be very interesting to see how the Japanese people react to this. The service the taxi drivers provide when you take the taxi in Japan is on another level, such as waiting for you with the open door and closing the door for you as you enter. A driverless car will never be able to copy that. Japan also has very good public transportation reducing the need for a car for day to day travel so cost might be less…

I agree on the taxi experience being next level. I just wonder how the aging population will replace them. Have you ever seen a 20 something cab driver in Japan? I been many times and never have so wonder if there is a job shortage coming

Means it’ll eventually get more expensive no?

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#99

Post by Aeolun »

RavlaAlvar wrote: post #77
opdahl wrote: post #11

Going to be very interesting to see how the Japanese people react to this. The service the taxi drivers provide when you take the taxi in Japan is on another level, such as waiting for you with the open door and closing the door for you as you enter. A driverless car will never be able to copy that. Japan also has very good public transportation reducing the need for a car for day to day travel so cost might be less…

It is unbelievably expensive though, a 40 minute ride from Osaka city to KIX airport could cost you 30k yen.

I did a hours ride from my home to the airport for 10k. How do you get to 30k?

Re: Waymo will bring autonomous vehicles to Tokyo

#100

Post by Aeolun »

klausa wrote: post #84
pezezin wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True. It doesn't help that most streets don't have sidewalks and you are forced to walk on the road. And even when there are sidewalks, people ignore them...

Oh, I mean — that's a thing even in the densest parts of Tokyo, people (and not just tourists!) just have no concept of moving aside to not block the flow, frequently walk like 3/4-abreast and block the entire width of the stairs/sidewalk ;P

Kinda surprising considering how everyone can do it perfectly on the escalator. To the point of ignoring the signs that tell them to stand two abreast.
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