Ice cold take. There will never be self driving cars deployed on mass scale, and expecting or depending on them to "fix" transportation is a masturbatory VC pipedream. The time and monetary costs to implement the infrastructure dwarfs the costs of any new public transit, the legislative hurdles are going to be glacial and inconsistently applied, and assuming the AI gets trained not to brake at every street lamp and these things reach retail, rides are not going to be available for anything less than a price inaccessible for 90% of people. If you think governments are slow to build new bus routes, what makes you think they're going to jump over backwards to make sure people can afford a glorified taxi?
Also - imagine the horrorshow if there was a "small" fire in an underground tunnel only designed for self driving electric cars. For "safety" - the cars might be forced powered down and doors would be force locked. And if people started breaking their windows to get out - they'd find that there's no walkaway to safety because - of course - they were supposed to stay in their cars.
And - oopsie - there's no way to get firetrucks and fire equipment to the fire. And even firemen on foot might not be able to get to it either. The small fire rages and it gets bigger and bigger and bigger.
Ice cold take. There will never be self driving cars deployed on mass scale, and expecting or depending on them to "fix" transportation is a masturbatory VC pipedream. The time and monetary costs to implement the infrastructure dwarfs the costs of any new public transit, the legislative hurdles are going to be glacial and inconsistently applied, and assuming the AI gets trained not to brake at every street lamp and these things reach retail, rides are not going to be available for anything less than a price inaccessible for 90% of people. If you think governments are slow to build new bus routes, what makes you think they're going to jump over backwards to make sure people can afford a glorified taxi?
Also - imagine the horrorshow if there was a "small" fire in an underground tunnel only designed for self driving electric cars. For "safety" - the cars might be forced powered down and doors would be force locked. And if people started breaking their windows to get out - they'd find that there's no walkaway to safety because - of course - they were supposed to stay in their cars.
And - oopsie - there's no way to get firetrucks and fire equipment to the fire. And even firemen on foot might not be able to get to it either. The small fire rages and it gets bigger and bigger and bigger.
People could get BBQed underground.
:this: