I agree we should invest in more walkable infrastructure (your second point), but that doesn't happen for many reasons, and AVs can also assist that process by eg removing parking spaces and making buses cheaper.
The remaining noise and pollution concerns call for building robotaxis that are quieter and lighter-weight, which seems to be what's actually occurring.
I admit his shallow dismissal of mass traffic fatalities as "marketing" and "corporate profits" immediately destroyed all credibility in my eyes. Millions of grieving parents aren't helped if some video 'dunks on' tech companies with irrelevant non-argument quips, what actually helps is (controversial opinion) to stop the killing. AVs are the only realistic path to that world.
And as he points out (@29:56), more traffic would mean a push for more roads, which is inefficient and wasteful: it takes over a dozen lanes of highway to move less people per hour than a signal lane-width of subway. E.g., (@32:11) more car traffic caused the elimination of the trolley/tram/streetcar on the Brooklyn Bridge so that another car lane could be added which decreased the services provided:
> If the job of the Brooklyn Bridge is to move people between the two boroughs, the reallocation of space from transit to cars has been disastrous. In 1902, one year before the photograph was taken, the Brooklyn Bridge moved roughly 341,000 people a day across all its modes, according to the Federal Highway Administration. It hit its peak capacity a few years later, with 426,000 people using it each day in 1907.
> Today, 125,000 motor vehicles cross the Brooklyn Bridge each day [PDF], as do roughly 4,000 pedestrians and 2,600 cyclists. For the bridge to carry as many people as it did at its peak, each of those cars would need to carry more than three people, but they do not. In 1989, when the city counted around 132,000 motor vehicles crossing, the FHWA estimated that 178,000 people crossed the bridge daily.
* https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2011/04/11/the-efficient-past-an...
Every mode of transportation needs space to operate, and by focusing on cars for private transportation it has decreased route capacity compared to every other mode, even walking:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Passenger_Capacity_of_dif...
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Route_capacity
> The noise and pollution concerns call for building robotaxis that are quieter and lighter-weight, which seems like what's actually occurring.
Noise is a function of speed, so any vehicle travelling >50 kph will cause noise: is there a desire to restrict speeds? If we're going with EVs for our future, the mass of the batteries for a given range can hardly be reduced.
> I admit his shallow dismissal of mass traffic fatalities as "marketing" and "corporate profits" immediately destroyed all credibility in my eyes.
And his other point (@13:02) that if American road designs were similar to (e.g.) Swedish road designs there would be a 80% drop in fatalities with current technologies? No (possibly) pie-in-the-sky tech needed. Perhaps there could be benefits to autonomous vehicles (AVs), but mass traffic fatalities can be reduced now if the actual desire is there, e.g., Hoboken, New Jersey, has had zero traffic deaths over the last seven years:
* https://apnews.com/article/hoboken-zero-traffic-deaths-dayli...
It went unmentioned that noise also correlates with drag, and upcoming mass market AVs are far more aerodynamic than existing cars. Quantity of noise matters here, not just "makes [non-zero] noise."
If we want to restrict speed, AVs can reliably achieve that (vs speed enforcement of human drivers). Computers never get impatient! Again AV buses are left out in your analysis.
Restructuring all American cities to be like Swedish cities is far more "pie-in-the-sky," sorry to break it to you.
"Will destroy cities" remains vastly overblown given the actual concerns being voiced here. And again, zero credit for ultimately preventing millions of fatalities annually (which is literally "cities" worth of people being "destroyed"). Where is your concern for those people?
AV public transit mentioned @30:58. More general point is continuing (over-)emphasis on cars is inefficient and wasteful compared to other options, regardless of whether the cars are human- or computer-driven.
> You neglect to mention that noise is correlated with drag, and upcoming mass AVs are far more aerodynamically efficient than existing cars. Quantity matters here, not just "makes noise.
Even now, with perhaps less aerodynamically efficient cars, tire noise is the largest source, so if aerodynamic efficiency goes up then tire noise will become a larger proportion:
> continuing (over-)emphasis on cars is inefficient and wasteful compared to other options
Quite ironic to call AVs "pie-in-the-sky," then propose a gargantuan fixed infrastructure overhaul (which has been consistently mired in inaction for decades) instead.
> tire noise will become a larger proportion.
Anyway I think this has played out. Good discussion, cheers
It was done decades ago… like in the Netherlands. As he explains in the video (@43:28), Utrecht and "Fake London" (London, ON, CA, where he grew up) have similar populations (300K vs 400K), and at one point were about equally car-focused. But one city deemphasized car use and the other continue to emphasize it.
Similarly Amsterdam switched focus and now is a poster child for active transportation:
* https://www.fastcompany.com/3052699/these-historical-photos-...
* https://exploring-and-observing-cities.org/2016/01/11/amster...
Paris seems to have begun the process:
* https://momentummag.com/paris-cycling-numbers-double/
* https://www.cntraveler.com/story/biking-cycling-in-paris-fra...
In contrast, many US cities are enacting policies and street designs that make things car centric (discussed @34:16) and hostile towards humans.
> Who cares about "proportion?" Absolute quantity is what matters here.
If there is X dB of noise, and (say) 80% of it is produced tire-road interaction, there is a floor that it cannot go below. And if "More traffic = more transportation services provided" is desired as you stated above, the proportion reduced by aerodynamic improvements will be eaten by by more vehicles on the road, for no net gain.
And you'll still have non-noise pollution like tire and brake dust.
Action happens, but it's hard to spot:
https://youtu.be/XOpjDSUmPtU?si=VC50ougKXQJp4nSz
https://youtu.be/PUnRr69GHJg?si=nopp1t0Sagj_YnXi
Many places are adding roundabouts, bike lanes, etc.
It's just slow and in some places they still don't get it (the South, Texas and Florida in particular).
The Netherlands did do this decades ago (Utrecht from the video).
What's North America's excuse?
The video even discussed how private tram companies in the US were bought up and dismantled in order to create more demand for cars.
Do you prefer the world dominated by EVs that is portrayed towards the end of the video or Utrecht? As can be seen in the video, Utrecht used to be car-dominated up until the 80s, but later chose to reject the influences from car companies and rather focus on enabling more mixed forms of transportation.
You will have to explain why, because there's absolutely no evidence for that claim, and plenty of evidence for better solutions. As shown in Utrecht, right there in that video.
Cars are inefficient and dangerous, and it's not clear that AVs are going to be significantly better, whereas it's pretty clear that bikes and trams are.
Only in utterly narrow-minded USA-centric view of the world... I'm fine with US being terrible place to function without a car but please don't spread that cancer abroad.
Which can lead to more traffic (@21:07). Which can encourage more resources to be moved from people to vehicles (@32:37). More traffic can increase pollution (@38:05), both particle and noise, even with EVs because tire wear, road wear, and brake wear (even with re-gen) generally increase with higher vehicle weights/masses.
He then contrasts London (Ontario) and Utrecht (@43:28), and how even given their similar beginnings and similar populations, the decisions each made on how to design things made one more human-habitable and the other one less.