[ExI] self driving cars again

[spike]

-----Original Message-----
From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org
[mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Charlie Stross
Sent: Sunday, August 12, 2012 2:48 AM
To: ExI chat list
Subject: Re: [ExI] self driving cars again


On 11 Aug 2012, at 23:29, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

>  
> Woohoo!  Way to go, Thrun! 
>  
>>... Work quickly lads, please.  I have six parents who need this
technology riiiight nooooow.  Between all six, they own 11 cars, and will
gladly give you all of them for three self-drivers, one for each couple.
>  

>...Assuming they live in reasonable proximity, they don't even need one
car/couple. I ran across a news report a year or two ago from a trade body
-- something like the British Association of Car-Park Operators -- who'd
established that, during peak rush-hour periods, 96% of the UK's private
vehicle fleet was parked up at any given time...

Ja.  A variation on that theme is that there is are a number of them parked
all over, spaced appropriately, so that when one calls for a ride, it is
with a few hundred meters always.  So there would still be parked cars
everywhere in the suburbs but the rush hour idle car count could be perhaps
40 percent instead of 96.  One's immediate intuition is to think that would
reduce the number of cars by a factor of about 2, but this is wrong.  It
reduces the car count by a factor of more than 10.  If 96% are parked, then
one in 25 is being operated.  If we reduced the overall car population by a
factor of 10, one in 2.5 is being operated instead of one in 25, which is
40% utilization.

This will work if we have on-call cars everywhere, ready to go on short
notice.  They could be close enough to be on-scene within a couple minutes.
Taxi service in the burbs takes usually at least 20 minutes' notice, and it
is expensive.

>...If you discount the psychological issues associated with ownership and
territorial exclusivity -- ...

There is all that, but everyone can win here.  Those who can afford it can
keep their individual cars.  I know of huge population segments who only
need a car occasionally.  Of those 11 cars I mentioned in the original post,
most (well, all of them actually) are just sitting still and quiet, as they
rot away.

>...Think of it as doing for automobiles what time-sharing operating systems
did for computers. One side-effect: if we only need a tenth as many cars, we
can make the individual cars much nicer than the average tin box on wheels.
-- Charlie

Good thinking Charlie!