Thread: Autonomous Vehicles

Originally Posted by Zeros

"I don't really understand the argument that not having to drive the car means people will no longer want to own it." It's not an argument, it's a preference.

This thread's not about electric vehicles. It's about autonomous vehicles.

...just wait and see what will happen with road tolls, route planning, monitoring, other charges, gold class roads $$, road not on auto map issues! etc.

Not sure I understand your reply, sorry. I didn't mention electric vehicles at all. I was addressing the common prediction that autonomous cars will lead to a reduction in car ownership as a whole.

Originally Posted by Classic88

Not sure I understand your reply, sorry. I didn't mention electric vehicles at all. I was addressing the common prediction that autonomous cars will lead to a reduction in car ownership as a whole.

Hey no probs, you're probably right re reducing car ownership - I wouldn't want to own an autonomous car. ...it's not an argument, just differing points of view.

My next comment about elec vehicles was separate, re others posting about electric vehicles. Autonomous doesn't necessarily mean electric or vice versa.

Cheers

Autonomous cars will appeal to those people who don't want to share their ride with an overworked and underpaid barely literate immigrant doing the piloting. Limousines with a liveried chauffeur will cater for the customers who want the human touch.

Autonomous vechile's are all ready better at driving then a large % of the population, and i wouldent mind one i could also drive as driving 6+ hours to see the rents would be much nicer if after work i could load the car up head off and have a sleep on the way their.

Car ownership is all ready on a downward trend in Europe because they have decent public transport and cost's of owning a car are so high and fuel so expensive, this is for britian

In 1994, 48 per cent of 17-to-20-year-olds and 75 per cent of 21-to-29-year-olds held driving licences. By last year, as the recently published National Travel Survey showed, these figures had fallen to 31 and 66 per cent

so place's of large open area's will still have individual's owning cars but high population center's that have decent public transport, or autonomous cars that are cost effective to use rather then owning your own one will see declining numbers of vehicle's sold.
also more people are holidaying O/S or interstate with air travel being so cheap now then driving their so that takes out anther reason to own a car.

but where this will hit hardest is autonomous transport, if you own a transport companies your wet dream is a truck that doesn't stop unless its loading or unloading, no sleeping no rest break's, no weekends off, no sick days and also 30% of the worlds workforce out of job, and they all reayd can do, its just a matter of who is responsible for an accident the owner or the manufacture of the autonomous truck that programmed it to save its self rather then avoid Timmy who walked out in front of it.

Originally Posted by lyonsy

Autonomous vechile's are all ready better at driving then a large % of the population, and i wouldent mind one i could also drive as driving 6+ hours to see the rents would be much nicer if after work i could load the car up head off and have a sleep on the way their.

If only that were the case.

What is coming out is autonomous vehicles won't stop deaths from motor accidents. They will merely reduce deaths from motor accidents.
The other thing is the person in charge of the vehicle (formerly driver now occupant) will be responsible for any accident the vehicle is involved in.
The person in charge of the vehicle (formerly driver now occupant) will still require a drivers licence and would be required to be in charge of (be awake) the vehicle at all times.

I'll see if I can find where I read this.

I look forward to the day that semis will drive in convoy in the left lane of expressways at 100Kmh and the second will not immediately try to pass the first on every slight incline where the first drops 0.1kmh because he has a slightly heavier load.

On second thought while I was writing this, what happens when the trucks have different gearing , different loads, different power. I can foresee this convoy being completely split on hills when the first slows , the second reacts but cannot keep up due to gear changes etc.

Or maybe they all have to be Tesla trucks with equal loads. LOL

Or maybe the second will try to pass the first and so on. "plus Change plus le meme chose"
Regards Philip A

The load of the vehicle will always be a factor regardless of the propulsion system.

The difficult thing with the 100kmh speed limited trucks is you can get up beside the other truck but run out of room to pass as you cannot increase your speed. Of course you can get booked for as little as 1kmh over the speed limit especially in Melbourne now so it is a moot point. I think there is more of a problem with cars that have to be 'the one in front' and then slow down to 80 once they've overtaken you whilst you were driving at 100.

Driverless cars will no doubt make it very difficult to speed except on overrun depending on how presise the control system is.

Hmmm. Actually, I might be seeing something 'good' (although that's a questionable word) developing here.

At present, if I'm driving and I crash, I'm at fault for killing whoever.
In the future, if I'm sleeping in my autonomous car and it crashes and kills someone, I can argue the manufacturer is to blame! They cop the fine and I walk away.

Hmmm. Is that a reason to buy an autonomous car....?