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Waymo in Portland

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Re: Waymo in Portland

#241

Post by JuniperMesos »

charcircuit wrote: post #224
svnt wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a chicken and egg problem. As long as the majority of people who would maintain the social environment are avoiding the social environment, the healthy consensus/operating regime can never emerge.

It's not. Pass a law that continuing to be noisy or disruptive on a bus or train after a warning results in 10 years of prison time with no parole and consistently enforce it. The problem will solve itself without a chicken and egg problem. Problematic people can simply be removed from society to make for a good social environment. Adding more good people is not the only option and in fact only hides the problem inst…

This would involve incarcerating a lot of homeless people, which is expensive, and pro-homeless activists would see it as a human rights abuse and fight it.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#242

Post by pishpash »

habnds wrote: post #193
jdprgm wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's comically (and extremely variably) priced. A trip from DC to NYC and back would be ~$25 in electric costs with a typical electric car versus Amtrak could easily be $300+ though possibly as cheap as $50 if you are flexible to awful hours like depart at 4:30am or something.

the actual cost of a trip between times square and the national mall is about $200 all things considered based on the ~0.80 federal mileage reimbursement rate for 250 miles. that train corridor is overwhelmingly successful as well so the idea that amtrak isn't a good deal is at odds with reality.

That's assuming you don't already have a time-depreciating asset in your possession. Per mile cost is about halved if you drive significantly more than average.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#243

Post by ortuna »

jeffbee wrote: post #38
ortuna wrote: post #25

So, these streets are so tiny and pedestrians are used to just walking out on crosswalks because most people stop at crosswalks

Every town says the exact same thing when Waymo shows up, and it's never true. There's nothing unique about Portland drivers, streets, sidewalks, or pedestrians.

I feel like I've lived in enough places and they're pretty small relatively speaking but whatever, seems like we'll see how it actually plays out.

I'm not saying it's going to randomly speed up to 80mph and crash into a building and explode. Just that I'll finally have a chance to witness those hilarious videos in person

Re: Waymo in Portland

#244

Post by NoGravitas »

briffle wrote: post #152
Silamoth wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least 80% of what you’re describing would be satisfied by trains and buses. It’s wild that Americans are so obsessed with self-driving cars while ignoring public transit that solves most of the problems. It’s reliable, more efficient, better for the environment, and less stressful for you. I’m not saying cars shouldn’t ever exist. The ‘last mile problem’ is a thing, and proper self-driving cars could be good for p…

I looked at taking the train from my town to Glacier National Park along with my bike. The route goes from Portland and Seattle to Chicago, and has a stop at south glacier. Step 1, get to the local train station in my town. There are 6 trains daily between me and Portland. Also, amtrak on the cross country trains requires the bikes to be in a box, in storage cars. So I gotta get a large bike box, and get myself, my b…

Most of this is just that the US rail system is amazingly shitty by global standards.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#245

Post by fsckboy »

xvedejas wrote: post #221
fsckboy wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> TriMet relies heavily on payroll taxes that are deeply unpopular among the self-employed and small business owners just a point of clarification, the term "payroll taxes" refers to Social Security and Medicare taxes that are applied to your paycheck; you don't pay them, self-employed and employers pay those. Wage-earners do not pay them directly, but do collect the social security and Medicare benefits that they pa…

> you don't pay them, self-employed and employers pay those If a tax is a function of the worker's income, it doesn't really matter (except for nominal terms) whether the worker or employer pays the taxes, the economic effect is the same. Who actually bears the burden of the tax ends up determined by the price elasticity of supply/demand in that labor market, and is not determined by who is on the hook for the litera…

>If a tax is a function of the worker's income, it doesn't really matter (except for nominal terms) whether the worker or employer pays the taxes,

yes, I took a lot of micro (and macro too for that matter) but if what you say were true, neither political party nor activists would go on and on about taxing "corporations". You should direct your comments toward the parties that do that. But of course, you would get downvoted because the parties that do that don't want to hear otherwise. That's what I was doing, trying to explain ecomonics in ways they'd be receptive to, because telling people how things work is always a good thing even if they are not ready to go all the way.

also, in terms of pure micro, indirectly taxing things is never as efficient as directly taxing them, which you are not accounting for. The inefficiency tax in the form of "lower overall employment" is not easily measured even though we know it's quite significant and as impactful as "well this tax averages out the same" when it's not the same.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#246

Post by persona_reuse »

QuercusMax wrote: post #177
jeffbee wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because MAX is on rails it can and does come to a complete halt for indefinite periods of time whenever some jackass in an Escalade parks it on the track. I know this firsthand and I only lived in Portland for one month.

Are you sure you're not thinking of the Portland streetcar? Max does not have nearly the same issues.

MAX has dedicated right-of-way outside the city centers, but in the cities it shares city streets. Tourists drive / stop-at-lights in the dedicated lanes a lot.

Streetcar is more susceptible to being stopped because someone parked over the white line, but with 20 minute headways it takes longer to cause a problem.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#247

Post by Schiendelman »

blks wrote: post #228
starkparker wrote: post #127

For context, this is coming in as TriMet is laying off staff, reducing service frequency, eliminating bus lines, and cutting parts of light rail routes due to a $300M budget shortfall. The cuts were exacerbated by state Republicans getting a proposed payroll tax repeal onto the ballot next month; TriMet relies heavily on payroll taxes that are deeply unpopular among the self-employed and small business owners, so the…

Waymo is an expensive taxi service, not a solution to public transport.

The cost of providing a bus exceeds the cost of operating a car in many cases, like lower population density neighborhoods. It may save the public money to centralize transit on major corridors and then subsidize trips on Waymo in some areas and at some times.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#248

Post by Jblx2 »

hyperadvanced wrote: post #223
hitekker wrote: post #203

Seems like a hostile market for Waymo. Many Portlanders despise tech giants and are strongly anti-car & anti-AI, far more than SF. Not to mention Portland's political / governance / people problems already inclines the population to anger.

If Waymo is still operating there by the end 2027 I’ll eat my hat.

How long does Waymo generally take to map and otherwise get ready for a new city rollout (permits, etc.)? I guess I wouldn't be surprised if they haven't even started offering rides in 2027.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#249

Post by Schiendelman »

sheept wrote: post #186
xnx wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Portland is really forward-thinking, they would be smart to use this opportunity to jump to the next stage of public transport by focusing on flexible bus routes and Waymo/rideshare subsidies for the poor and disabled.

Self driving cars aren't the next stage of public transport; they're a bandaid solution to American urban design. They're still cars, so they still contribute to traffic and increased pavement wear, and I cannot imagine they'd be cheaper at scale than buses for storage/maintenance/cleaning.

I spent ten years in the trenches of American urban design policy. The best we could do was lose very slightly less quickly. It's not changing. Trains are great, we should build more, and we probably should replace a lot of bus routes by subsidizing rides on Waymo and its ilk. It'll be cheaper and provide better service.

Re: Waymo in Portland

#250

Post by creato »

josefresco wrote: post #67

I wonder how long Google will continue to subsidize this at a substantial loss? Estimated $30–40 billion spent in the last decade that only really pays off if they dominate the market.

I don't think Waymo needs to dominate the market to succeed. They just need to scale up (time)x(number of vehicles) enough to amortize the R&D costs of the self driving capability. Paying a driver is a big chunk of a taxi/Uber's costs, so eliminating that leaves a lot of room to maneuver.
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