So would Uber or Lyft. No need for special roadways, immensely complicated guidance & control systems, or ridiculously expensive vehicles either.

Going on a long trip? Take a bus, rent a car or use a ride service when you reach your destination, then take a bus back home. The one thing everybody seems to be overlooking is the eye-watering cost of these autonomous vehicles. The average price of a new car is already over $30K. What do you think an extremely complex, fully autonomous car will cost once you factor in the overhead charges for using the infrastructure to support it? Only the very wealthy will be able to afford one of these things for their very own. The whole model of vehicle ownership will change, with fleets of autonomous cars being owned by huge corporate 'transportation providers', which will only be used on an as-needed basis by the public. Owning your own autonomous car would be like owning your own taxi cab. It really won't make much sense for most people to have one of their own when you can just use a phone app to summon one up whenever you need it. Autonomous cars will bring about the end of the privately-owned vehicle. People will still need specialty vehicles like trucks for certain chores, and I suppose there will still be 'collectible' cars around, but that'll be about it.

I've wondered about this too. It's already absurdly expensive for a young person to "get into the game" of driving. Cars are stupidly expensive, driver's education is now mandatory and costs anywhere between $800-$1,500 (when I was a kid I think it was $100-$200 and it was optional / incentivized - you became eligible for licensure 6-12 months sooner with it than without), insurance rates (no joke) TRIPLE OR QUADRUPLE with a 16-25 driver on your policy (and yes, I have quotes to back this up) and until very recently fuel costs were also quite high. There's little incentive for most young people other than those who are well-off and / or don't have an alternative to get their own licenses and vehicles. Add to it the fact that the "driving experience" largely sucks now (particularly in / around metro areas where there are viable alternatives) and I can completely understand why someone would say "screw that - why bother?". Road infrastructure is horrible, there is way too much traffic and congestion and rather than a car being a symbol of freedom it's one of control and even oppression - cops eager to enforce stupid ticky-tack laws for the sole purpose of revenue generation EVERYWHERE now, red light cameras, speed cameras, parking fees (and enforcement) is a burgeoning industry now, "pay-by-the-mile" programs / GPS tracking is coming, etc...

Too many people have turned car ownership into a gravy train and have been milking it for everything they can - oil companies, insurance companies, state and local governments, repair shops, dealerships and manufacturers, etc. It's truly insane what an "average" family can spend now on "expected" vehicle costs without even considering what one or two 16-25 y/os will do. Another subject perhaps but simply making the choices to drive less, not take on any loans for vehicles (i.e. fix up my "old car" fleet - drive them until the wheels fall off, then replace the wheels and keep driving them! instead), minimize or drop insurance coverage and definitely avoid "roadside assistance" BS and things like it can cut costs (and does - speaking for me personally) hundreds to thousands of dollars a year. I use a motorcycle for a lot of my "single occupant" getting around too (dirt cheap). It all helps... I'm a car nut (always have been) but I'm starting to get turned off to driving myself now. We (as a society) took a good thing and ruined it.

Sadly for us enthusiast types I think we've seen they golden age of the motor car come and go. It was fun for a while and I remember the first time I took out a car on my own as a newly-minted driver with the ink still wet on my license and just enjoyed the hell out of it on that glorious summer day a long time ago - the feeling of freedom and just driving around nowhere in particular. There was (for the most part) nobody else on the road and a world of opportunity out there. I doubt many young folks nowadays will ever get that experience, sadly.

Take a bus for a road trip? Seriously? Was that supposed to be in green?

And cars can indeed be expensive if you need latest and greatest. It does not have to break the bank to have a decent reliable car if you don't need the latest gadgets. Cars are very complex machines and it is amazing they work as well as they do. Thousands of parts from manufacturers from all over the world put together by folks getting paid for piece work and it goes 1/4 million miles with some maintenance from the owner. That is remarkable in itself.

No, it wasn't. I wasn't referring to a road trip taken simply for the pleasure of it, but suggesting an alternate method for future long distance point-to-point travel that didn't involve an extremely complex and an insanely expensive transportation system.

If the driver-less car is indeed the future of transportation, then ALL cars will need to be the latest & greatest. Continuing hardware & safety updates, along with new features and capabilities, will compel individuals and ride service providers to upgrade their vehicles on a regular basis. Look at what happens whenever a new smartphone is released...people are sleeping out on the sidewalk for days to be among the first to have one.

I agree. And if we think cars are complex now, just wait until the autonomous variety becomes the norm...

I want to see this happen for two reasons:
1. I commute 45 minutes each way on the freeway to/from work each day... I would love to take the bus/train but I live in a small suburb with no direct access to a bus/train. It would be fantastic if I could invest that hour in a half in reading a good book.
2. My family went through he11 getting the car keys away from my dad (now RIP).

I'd like to see this happen just to keep all the total frick'in idiots out of the left lane.

I don't believe cost will be a problem long term.

HD cameras/vision and proximity sensors are not expensive, not at all. You have servo driven power steering in almost every car already. After that it's software...

A 'city car' could be quite cheap. Look at what Google is planning.

Yup. Lots of R&D and software investment, but the incremental hardware isn't that much.

The problem is that we live with so many lies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWfKj187-4A
Technology is not by far that far that those things are realistic.
Autonomous driving cars? Come on, we "cannot" even automatically prevent an airplane to crash into a mountain, THAT should be easy.

One single EMP and our entire infrastructure goes back to the Stone Age. I'll be hanging onto my simple air-cooled, carbuerated, all-mechanical 911 and motorcycle thanks. At least I'll be able to get around.

[QUOTE=rcooled;8963255]
Going on a long trip? Take a bus, rent a car or use a ride service when you reach your destination, then take a bus back home. QUOTE]

Have you ever taken a bus anywhere ? The people that ride buses are on the scary side....creepy/smelly/homicidal, you stop every 45 minutes at another greyhound station to pick up/drop off more passengers, do you really want to use the bathroom in the back of the bus, and they don't stop for food except for gas stations.

I think a cross country trip on a bus would take nearly a week to accomplish, and would probably cost the price of fuel to do......not to mention, when you get there, you have no transportation.

Why not just go back to horse and buggy?

Actually, when a plane crashes into a mountain it's almost always because the pilot has taken over the controls (unless it's a mechanical failure).

The technology exists for airliners to fly take off to landing without a pilot but the flying public isn't ready for that.

Would you or anyone for that matter be OK with some early 20 something nerd going into the cockpit with a laptop, uploading some files and then getting off the airplane and announcing :"OK folks buckle up, the plane will take off in 10 minutes"?

I want Capt. Sullenburg or someone just like him up front.

And yea, I have been to the bus station to pick up a package shipment. The passengers looked like something from a horror movie. :eek::eek:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Tim_McLean

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Tim_McLean


Thanks for the suggestion, but I would prefer to drive myself.

No - I wouldn't! I still want a warm body up front.

Yeah, and why is that not "corrected"/prohibited by the hardware/software? It is running anyway, so why does it not avoid such obvious threats?