I ran across a story in the news today about cars that can drive themselves. As loyal reader of my blog will attest, I am obsessed with this idea:Driverless Cars
A couple of interesting points: First, GM is trying to design a car that will be compatible with existing roads -- and existing, human-controlled traffic. Second, the time-frame is within the next eight years. Both of these assumptions are way, way beyond anything I would dare predict. I still think it will take 10 years before most people accept the fact that this will happen someday. It will be ten years after that before we see driverless cars on the roads.
Given that this is being researched by a leading innovator like GM, we can expect millions to be wasted on concept cars that never reach the roads. On the plus side, they might thrash around and get Honda or Toyota interested.
A couple of interesting points: First, GM is trying to design a car that will be compatible with existing roads -- and existing, human-controlled traffic. Second, the time-frame is within the next eight years. Both of these assumptions are way, way beyond anything I would dare predict. I still think it will take 10 years before most people accept the fact that this will happen someday. It will be ten years after that before we see driverless cars on the roads.
Given that this is being researched by a leading innovator like GM, we can expect millions to be wasted on concept cars that never reach the roads. On the plus side, they might thrash around and get Honda or Toyota interested.
The picture above is of my Grandmother Cage, my Dad, and his younger brother and sister. The car in the background is, in my opinion, one of the best looking automobiles in human history.
6 comments:
I think it does make sense to recycle the existing roadways for whatever future transportation system we create. My own feeling is that it makes no sense to try and run automated vehicles over potholes alongside human drivers. I see future vehicles running on rails, like this...
www.prtproject.com
This gives you the advantage of a fully automated system, plus one that is fully electric without bulky batteries.
gary
Well, first of all, welcome to my blog! Interesting link.
Regarding mass transit on rails -- I think the entire idea is a walking corpse. The cost of putting in the rails is just too high. You nailed the problem with electric vehicles (at least for now), but hybrid electrics using renewable fuels have roughly the same environmental impact as all-electrics.
My fundamental problem with mass transit is the station problem. Today, I can go from DIRECTLY from my doorstep to any doorstep within hundreds of miles. I can leave anytime I want, and schedule as many stops as I choose. Bringing rails to the front door of every building in the country is a fundamentally insolvable problem. Adding stations involves maintaining two systems (the one that gets you to the station (roads & busses?) and the one that gets you from station to station (rail). The loss of convenience and efficiency is poison.
And it isn’t necessary (or it won’t be). See the DARPA challenges, and add computing power that is 1,000 to 1,000,000 times more powerful than what we have today. Personally, I wouldn’t want to mix computer and human traffic for one reason – I don’t trust humans. But eventually some areas (congested cities, probably) will close their traffic to human-controlled vehicles. After that, the closed regions will spread until human drivers are limited to amusement parks, where they belong.
James
Hi James,
I understand your issues...let me try and address them...
> The cost of putting in the rails is just too high.
But you need to compare that to the cost of maintaining the roads themselves. Our roads are in bad shape. Rails would be a large initial investment, but with lower subsequent maintenance requirements.
> but hybrid electrics using renewable fuels have roughly the same environmental impact as all-electrics.
But they don't solve the other issues...increasing congestion, tens of thousands of deaths annually in the US, and inherent inefficiencies of the current control system when humans are involved. And even if you attempted to automate all the vehicles, it's a much harder logistic to overcome when you're running over potholes and such. Finally, steel wheels running steel rails is inherently much more energy efficient as opposed to rubber tires on asphault.
> My fundamental problem with mass transit is the station problem. Today, I can go from DIRECTLY from my doorstep to any doorstep within hundreds of miles.
You say hundreds of miles, but the vast majority of vehicle trips are within the same city, from one well traveled destination (your house) to another (your job). The PRT concept does NOT use stations. It gets your door to door.
> I can leave anytime I want, and schedule as many stops as I choose.
Same with the PRT concept.
> Bringing rails to the front door of every building in the country is a fundamentally insolvable problem.
If we can bring roads door to door, we can bring rails door to door. Admittedly not in addition, but instead. With the PRT system you free up all that land currently used for parking lots. You eliminate all the traffic signals. And since the motion is fixed, not all of the road surface is needed for the PRT tracks, even accounting for multiple tracks per road. So you get a service path / bicycle-pedestrian path with what's left over.
> Adding stations involves maintaining two systems
The PRT concept involves no stations. Clearly it can't cover every country road in Kansas, but that's an issue with any mass transit proposal. But my contention is that the transfer to traditional vehicles at the outskirts is more than worth it given all the other benefits. Plus, I expect travel between major cities would utilize some sort of piggyback mechanism such that people never leave the vehicle, so once again no need for traditional transportation.
> DARPA challenges
I agree that in the future it will be ever easier to run an automated system on rubber tires, but the advantages of using rail will still be there. And a rail vehicle will ALWAYS be easier to control than a vehicle with rubber tires, even in the future. And more efficient as mentioned above.
> Personally, I wouldn’t want to mix computer and human traffic
Absolutely agree...it's a no brainer. And it's not just the safety aspects...it means we would still need all the traffic signals that are so horribly inefficient.
> But eventually some areas (congested cities, probably) will close their traffic to human-controlled vehicles.
Of that we agree...future generations will not even learn how to drive.
gary
Regardless of how it happens, it's very pleasant to think of the day when people will be free to read, think, work, create, or just be entertained instead of the mind-numbing drudgery of driving a car. I wonder how that will change society – will there be an outpouring of creativity as people use this time?
Agree that rail vehicles are easier to control, and you have a good point about energy return on an almost perfectly hard surface. Also, I would like to have rail-like speeds, but as you point out, most trips are fairly short. I still think that computer-controlled cars have a big lead on infrastructure. There are 16-20 existing lanes going into and out of Atlanta on I-85 alone, and computer-controlled cars (like rail cars) can be very effectively scheduled. The cost per mile of rail just seems overwhelming to me. I also wonder how we would transition from road to rail. Existing congestion is so overwhelming that I can’t see removing lanes even temporarily to add rails. It seems, to me, to be the work of decades … and what do people do during the transition?
But, honestly, it doesn’t matter much to me. Road or rail, eliminating the stupefying inefficiency of existing traffic will be a revolutionary change. And, just possibly, it could have some negative results. Driving a car is the one common activity that can immediately punish stupidity. What happens when we have an entire generation reach adulthood that has never experienced ANY real life-and-death responsibility? Does driving a car, and facing the risks involved, force people to grow up in some way?
I still look forward to the day that makes the steering wheel obsolete, but it can be sobering to think about!
Good to talk with you, Gary.
James
Hi James,
> will there be an outpouring of creativity as people use this time?
Or will they just watch more TV? As I see it overpopulation is one of the largest problems our society faces, a problem that's rarely even talked about. And the PRT concept could actually work against that issue by allowing cities to continue to grow larger. So it is indeed a complicated web we weave.
> Also, I would like to have rail-like speeds, but as you point out, most trips are fairly short.
Many mass transit concepts put a large emphasis on speed. My own thinking is that a vehicle like the PRT wouldn't really need to go that fast. For one, there are no traffic signals, which greatly speeds up the trip. And for another, what's the hurry if it's a relaxing ride? People need to slow their lives down.
> I still think that computer-controlled cars have a big lead on infrastructure.
Without a doubt. Much less work. But for much less of a gain IMO.
> The cost per mile of rail just seems overwhelming to me.
It will be great, but the key to the design is keeping this ost low. These tracks need to be literally like the tracks you pieced together as a kid for your Lionel trains, only larger. So not only would they be cheap due to mass production, but also cheap because they 1) can be laid down fast and 2) don't require construction of new throughways since they just use the existing road surfaces. That's key to the whole concept as I see the transition as the largest challenge, not the actual technology of the system.
> Existing congestion is so overwhelming that I can’t see removing lanes even temporarily to add rails.
The key is doing it FAST. Make sure to check out the transition page.
> Driving a car is the one common activity that can immediately punish stupidity.
I'm a fan of Darwin as well, but this kills a lot of innocent people as well. Maybe with all the free time gained by not sitting in traffic some will take up rock climbing. There you go...
gary
Great photo!
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