Re:The 'Self Drive' Act puts America on the road to reducing...
by bryanlarsen on Wednesday September 06, 2017 @04:07PM
(#15186704)
5x seems extreme, but I'll certainly grant you 2x on the freeways.
But if you put twice, or worse 5x, as many cars on the freeways, that'll just jam up the urban core even worse than it already is. And self-driving cars are probably less efficient than human-driven cars in the urban core simply because they're much less aggressive in their interactions with pedestrians and cyclists. This is a good thing, but it will increase congestion.
Efficiency improvements can only add increase capacity by a fixed percentage. The massive improvements in cost ($0 in labour!) and convenience will cause usage to increase by orders of magnitude, IMO.
But if you put twice, or worse 5x, as many cars on the freeways, that'll just jam up the urban core even worse than it already is. And self-driving cars are probably less efficient than human-driven cars in the urban core simply because they're much less aggressive in their interactions with pedestrians and cyclists. This is a good thing, but it will increase congestion.
Efficiency improvements can only add increase capacity by a fixed percentage. The massive improvements in cost ($0 in labour!) and convenience will cause usage to increase by orders of magnitude, IMO.