New transportation technologies

[DaveKCMO]

I doubt the market will ever allow a 100% driverless future. See the manual transmission as an indicator. Unless there is a mandate that all cars are driverless, you'd never get rid of existing traffic management methods.

[shinatoo]

I'm not naysaying, I'm yeasaying. Yea to the idea that cars are fucking stupid. Get on board.

I love cars, and I love tech. We can do anything we put our minds to. Driverless cars will, and already are, happening.

[IraGlacialis]

I can also see bicycles being installed with said computer, allowing a car to detect the presence of a cyclist even before the LIDAR does.

I doubt the market will ever allow a 100% driverless future. See the manual transmission as an indicator. Unless there is a mandate that all cars are driverless, you'd never get rid of existing traffic management methods.

I don't necessarily think that there will be a mandate to have all cars be driver-less, and I would still see most "driver-less" cars have a driver mode, but I can see areas where only cars with at least a driver-less mode can enter. Think, if you have a driver-less interstate with inter-car cooperation, it would be possible to bump up the speed considerably. This would be to the point that it would be considered unsafe for human driving to be involved, but by then, the convenience of getting someplace quickly, efficiently, conveniently (long-haul drive? just watch a movie or read a book), would trump the inconvenience to manual drivers.

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[mean]

I'm not naysaying, I'm yeasaying. Yea to the idea that cars are fucking stupid. Get on board.

I love cars, and I love tech. We can do anything we put our minds to. Driverless cars will, and already are, happening.

I love cars and tech, too, but I can't fathom that the two are a good mix. Driverless cars are sort of like drone C-130s. We may have the tech to make it happen, but that doesn't mean it isn't dumb.

[IraGlacialis]

Driverless cars are sort of like drone C-130s. We may have the tech to make it happen, but that doesn't mean it isn't dumb.

Pilot-less cargo planes? I can actually see that happening in the practical world.

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[shinatoo]

I'm not naysaying, I'm yeasaying. Yea to the idea that cars are fucking stupid. Get on board.

I love cars, and I love tech. We can do anything we put our minds to. Driverless cars will, and already are, happening.

I love cars and tech, too, but I can't fathom that the two are a good mix. Driverless cars are sort of like drone C-130s. We may have the tech to make it happen, but that doesn't mean it isn't dumb.

Because people are more reliable than computers? Might buy this even ten years ago, but today, I'll take a car driven by a Mac Mini over a texting teen, drunk dad, stoned hipster, or methed out OTR trucker that has been driving for 16 hours straight.

And drone cargo planes are a good idea. If a drone gets in trouble it generally doesn't have to make any life saving decisions, because there are no lives aboard. Might have to avoid populated areas but generally drones can just ditch if things get sideways.

[mean]

The point isn't that computers can't make better or smarter decisions than stoned people, it's that using that tech to power rubber + asphalt + giant heavy steel personal vehicles that weigh 1+ tons is stupid. You're basically taking the core ideas behind PRT, which I have advocated on this site for almost 10 years, and applying them to massive, heavy, inefficient vehicles on non-fixed guideways that will be vulnerable to ice, snow, and rain. Unbelievable. So, PRT is great, but only if we get our own personal death machines on asphalt? What the hell, people?

[shinatoo]

The point isn't that computers can't make better or smarter decisions than stoned people, it's that using that tech to power rubber + asphalt + giant heavy steel personal vehicles that weigh 1+ tons is stupid. You're basically taking the core ideas behind PRT, which I have advocated on this site for almost 10 years, and applying them to massive, heavy, inefficient vehicles on non-fixed guideways that will be vulnerable to ice, snow, and rain. Unbelievable. So, PRT is great, but only if we get our own personal death machines on asphalt? What the hell, people?

So you argument is fixed guideway PRT is better than cars? Agreed in theory. Problem is it will never happen on a scale where it will reach all of the people that use cars. So it's just mental masturbation.

PRT>Automated cars>cars. Can we agree on that?

We are not going to get rid of cars in the next 100 years. Lets make them better and safer.

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[mean]

I'm suggesting that go-anywhere PRT is a substitute for go-anywhere cars, yes.

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[mean]

First of all, I'm not suggesting anyone is going to to do anything. Indeed, I'm quite certain that we will continue far, far into the future expending ridiculous amounts of energy to, in most cases,
move a couple hundred pounds of person inside thousands of pounds of vehicle. I just think it's stupid.

"Go-anywhere PRT" does not imply fixed guideways on every road in the country, or necessarily even half the roads in the country. For that matter, roads don't really have anything to do with it. You merely need to have guideways (and portals / stops) near places where 90-95% of people go, generally within 1/4 mile or less. You aren't going to serve everyone. You don't need to serve everyone, just the vast majority of people. This isn't a 100% car replacement, it's a 90-95% car replacement. And if you get 90-95% of people commuting and running around town in 200-500 pound PRT pods instead of 1600 pound cars (and that's a smart fortwo, for crying out loud) you're really starting to have a serious impact on energy usage, not to mention safety and the dramatic reduction in need to spend billions upon billions of dollars on highway upgrades.

Of course I don't think it will happen, but I wish that it was at least on the radar. Considering that I've had an impossible time persuading the urban nerds on this site of such a system's merits, I can't imagine it being politically feasible on any level except perhaps in the most progressive possible cities. Which is probably why a modest system is being backed by the mayor of Mountain View, and by nobody else anywhere as far as I know.

[bobbyhawks]

So by "go-anywhere PRT" you're suggesting that someone is going to build fixed guideways on every road in the country? Surely I do not need to point out why that is never going to happen. ...

To mean's point, fixed guideways in the more congested areas will increase the overall efficiency of any potential future technology, decrease lane width requirements, and decrease the amount of concrete/asphalt around us (and therefore road maintenance delays). Increased predictability leads to increased efficiency. Fixed guideway travel would allow for higher speeds and fewer stops. When you leave the track, you essentially turn into a self-driving, go anywhere vehicle.

Fixed guideway also allows for the infrastructure to protect itself and others while the vehicle can think solely about its passenger. The infrastructure can send a halt message when a vehicle is moving beyond what is expected, and the vehicle can employ protective measures when other vehicles behave unusually. While I think it would be extremely useful in urban settings, I think another great benefit would be over long highway stretches, like I-70 across Kansas. Any automated vehicle without a fixed guideway will require the passenger to be awake and paying attention at high speeds. The untethered car could encounter catastrophic situations such as a wreck, deer, miscalibrated GPS, etc. A tethered vehicle will still have some of those issues, but the infrastructure will let it know that a car is stopped ahead, and swerving off the road is never going to happen by accident. Road conditions become less relevant, as a fixed vehicle will not spin out of control. Long trips on a tethered line become less burdensome as the line tether can deliver power to the vehicle, requiring few if any stops. One can latch on at a highway on-ramp, and they are essentially on a train until they exit at their destination or stop to stretch their legs.

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[KCMax]

I can't see completely driverless cars for the same reason I don't see mass transit embraced by the masses. People like being in control, even it creates a far more dangerous situation.

[bobbyhawks]

The main advantage of fixed guideways is that you use them to deliver power to vehicles so they don't have to have drag around heavy engines and fuel/fuel cells/batteries. If your vehicles are built to go anywhere, they're going to have those things and be big and heavy anyway, so fixed guideways gain you basically nothing.

You are picking one element of the benefits of fixed guideways and claiming that it is the only benefit. Trains are big and heavy. Streetcars are hardly light vehicles. Delivering power to the vehicle is merely one of the benefits of a fixed guideway, along with safety, holistic traffic management, increased speed allowances, and diminished driver stress. A fixed guideway also allows a fuel cell/battery to be fully charged and ready to take over for the last mile, requiring safer and cheaper batteries and less advanced technology for each vehicle. This is certainly an advantage, but it is not the "main" advantage.

In the near term, automated vehicles sans the guideway are the obvious way to go, but the problem is that every version of this technology for some time will require the driver to fully pay attention to the road. Until everyone is in a like vehicle (to eliminate unpredictable behavior), and until the technology is so smart and fool-proof that crashes, or reaction events, or road condition issues are highly unlikely, drivers will have to carefully monitor the vehicle. Personally, I think this increases the stress of driving rather than diminishes it.

It is my belief, though, than not unlike a carpool lane, PRT or automated-only lanes can be created in heavy commuter corridors for much less than it would cost to create a traditional rail line. Existing cars can be retrofitted with guideway connectors that will enable them to "grab on," and inattentive drivers will not wander off the roads. A 30 mile commute in LA could utilize 28 miles of automated-only lane, and a fixed version of this could deliver a charge to an electric vehicle along the entire route. In the future, this could mean lighter batteries and cheaper vehicles, but it could also mean that, once you pull away from the charge lane, you still have 50 miles of a 50 mile charge to drive around the city. When it is time to go home, you hook on and charge so that you can drive around your home area. Your car and all other cars on the line react to the same data, and road conditions rarely if ever factor into the safety of the commute. Fixed guideways can also be connected to monitor things like crosswalks and make things safer for pedestrians. I could see a city like London, which has considered banning cars altogether, creating such a network inside the city.

[mean]

In the near term, automated vehicles sans the guideway are the obvious way to go, but the problem is that every version of this technology for some time will require the driver to fully pay attention to the road.

This is obviously true, and frankly, the idea of riding around in a computer-driven car in an ice storm scares the holy living shit out of me. The idea of sailing 30 feet above the street on a fixed guideway during an ice storm does not.

It is my belief, though, than not unlike a carpool lane, PRT or automated-only lanes can be created in heavy commuter corridors for much less than it would cost to create a traditional rail line.

The system under consideration in Mountain View supposedly costs ~$10 million per mile and achieves fuel efficiency equivalent to 200 miles per gallon at 100+ mph.

Anyway, I realize it is completely impossible for KC, and indeed probably almost anywhere in the US, to ever do anything remotely like this. I don't bring it up because it is plausible. I bring it up only to demonstrate that there are better ideas out there, which will, like all the newest and best ideas seem to, probably happen in China or elsewhere first.

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