211–217 of 217 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you think self driving cars are cool, wait until two years from now when you're stuck behind them in your morning commute every day, while they drive 15 miles under the speed limit.
I can't wait to ride my fixie 5mph in front of them :)
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The same way stores keep unattended restrooms clean: periodic inspections throughout the day and a timely response to customer complaints: If cars report to a central facility for a 5-minute inspection after 45 minutes of service, they've already cut labor costs by 90%, but with some increased capital costs due to decreased fleet availability.
I was thinking it would be kind of up to the next passenger. If they are ready to get in the car/Uber, and notice it's extremely dirty, or god-forbid someone puked in their recently, maybe they have something on the app or in the car that says "Report car for service inspection/cleaning" and "request another ride".
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Yes, just the >80% of the population in urban centres (developed countries), >50% worldwide and increasing rapidly. Tiny market!
I live in what's considered an urban area due to population density. But I wouldn't personally describe it as urban. I have multiple farms near my house, and on the way to work, I pass by numerous farms for a good part of the way. Be careful confusing urban with city. It's merely population density. Regardless, Uber et. al. doesn't reach where I live. It's not an option. It's not a choice at the moment. Living in an…
From Wiki:
> The U.S. Census Bureau defines an urban area as: "Core census block groups or blocks that have a population density of at least 1,000 people per square mile (386 per square kilometer) and surrounding census blocks that have an overall density of at least 500 people per square mile (193 per square kilometer)."
By that definition, which would seem to completely rule out farming, I doubt you're actually in an urban area.
Just saw this: https://electrek.co/2016/12/14/uber-autonomous-rides-califor... I am confused do they require a permit or is uber changing the claim/capabilities of the car to evade getting a permit?
No permit as far as I can tell. They have drivers actively monitoring their vehicles at all times and are playing semantic games right now as that article says. The biggest disappointment to me is the way they're deliberately ignoring NHTSA's guidelines around collision and near-miss data sharing.
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There are non-rational things like animals, kids, and adults with their face in their phones to watch for, so it will never be fully rational... However, the fact that the computer in the following car can detect instantly that the front car is slowing, it can react instantaneously and (theoretically, with similar braking distances) the following car would stop exactly the same distance (give or take a few inches) fr…
OK, so we agree that the lead auto-car may still apply maximum braking unexpectedly. Therefore the follower needs to leave enough space to compensate for reaction latency, difference in braking power, etc. So how does data communication (or lack thereof) affect this? The follower can instantly detect that the leader is slowing via sonar/lidar/radar, right?
Then the distance between the cars that they should hold should be calculable by enforcing braking performance on the automated cars...
Assuming its enough, a simple 2 carlength rule would 1) give enough distance to stop and 2) allow for merging easily (second car would slot into place, following cars would slow slightly to make the gap again) ...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I try to leave 10-20 car lengths between myself and the next vehicle in this kind of stop-and-go heavy traffic. No waves for me! The anti-traffic essays indicate that doing what I'm doing will actually speed up the breakup of a traffic jam.
That's true, but depending on the local driving culture, this may just lead to many vehicles cutting in front of you and making the gap vanish. In metro NY/NJ, at stop-and-go speeds on freeways, 1 to 2 car lengths seems to be about as much as you can safely leave without it quickly being snatched away. Too bad.