Safe Streets Rebel’s protest comes after automatic vehicles were blamed for incidents including crashing into a bus and running over a dog. City officials in June said…
I live in the area and the streets are just clogged with these fucking autonomous cars. Traffic is slower, people end up having to swerve, it’s just a constant persistent headache. If I had it my way, they’d all be off the streets and into the crusher
Almost like public transit is better than self driving taxis
Public transit is better, but self-driving taxis are absolutely coming to every city in this country, which is great if you live in a city like mine that has little to no public transport infrastructure.
Also, automated taxis can service more rural areas, which is the key driver of lack of public transport in many “commuter cities.”
Luddites gonna Luddite, but this tech is coming, and it’s coming to logistics and taxis first.
Yes, but SanFran ain’t one of those. Taxis have the same problem cars do, which is size.
I am well aware of both the benefits of public transport and this image specifically. This is irrelevant to our discussion
It’s not if I’m arguing that self driving taxis are stupid
Can we instead have self driving buses?
I’m envisioning a system where you tell it your location and where you want to go, then it automatically sets up a route for the bus that coincides with where most people want to go and tells you to get off when it’s near your destination. This can work in conjunction with self driving taxis if no one else is going to your destination.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0ddExZbKD8 but self driving?
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The problem is no one will use them. Busses are full of homeless people and people that NEED to use them than they want to. I was a bus driver for many years. They don’t stop where everyone wants to go and it’s a necessity to most instead of an integrated way of life. The entire American culture would need to change.
Yeah. But US culture needs to change anyways.
For sure. However do you change something that is mostly government subsidized and everyone that manages the systems are happy with the operations?
everyone that manages the systems are happy with the operations?
Is that the case? I suppose most car drivers are not happy with sitting in traffic jams. Better public transport would help.
Make them as unhappy as you.
This is not the case in places outside the US.
I was in SF 4 years ago and it was insane how many self-driving cars were on the streets for tests. Especially on Lombard Street they just drove in circles. I can’t imagine how annoying this is for someone who lives there
And why did you let them drive here if it’s so bad?
What exactly is the fear about self driving cars? I’ve never heard this side of the story.
There’s a concern about more cameras recording all the time, and while I don’t personally buy that argument (because being out in public means you don’t have any expectation of privacy) I don’t agree with these companies storing that data to give to police, effectively making Waymo or Cruise into private arms of law enforcement.
The reason that makes the most sense to me is it still encourages cities to be designed around cars, and not transit or people-oriented methods of travel. Even though they might make travel smoother by better decision-making than people, I’d still rather see more spaces devoted to foot traffic connected by buses or trains than the sprawl necessitated by personal vehicles.
I bet you own a car though.
Cars are freedom. You can go anywhere, anytime, without worrying about a delayed schedule or how many connections you’d need to get exactly where you’re going.
You can listen to your own music and carry as much as you like, without worrying about someone trying to steal it or altercations with the public.
I agree we need electric cars, but anti-car policy is ultimately just trapping people in cities, allowing the rich to still enjoy their cars from commuter towns, etc. whilst the working class are stuck in overcrowded pod apartments. This is literally the reality in a lot of Spain, Sweden, etc. where you’re lucky to get even a 70m2 apartment and parking is extortionate.
cars are freedom
What about my freedom to walk or bike? My freedom to be able to cross the street? My freedom to get milk without taking 2000 pounds of metal with me?
Cars warp entire cities around them. In an ideal world, everyone would be able to own a car, but very few people would need to own a car
I mean, not really. You can go with a car only where infrastructure (roads) has been built, same as transit. There’s more places reachable by that infrastructure, but that is only because things have been built around it. You absolutely do have to worry about delays; there are after all things like traffic jams and road closures. You have to worry about the route you take, not in the form of what connections to take but in the form of navigating the right route. People absolutely have to worry about things like theft and altercation when driving, else people wouldn’t lock their cars, and road rage wouldn’t exist.
Personally, after having moved somewhere I can manage to at least live my life, without owning a car, I find it feels a lot more freeing to just be able to walk places I want to be, or get on a train that someone else is driving, than having to own some expensive machine that needs periodic and also costly maintenance, and then having to operate it constantly to get anywhere, with the risk of accidently killing someone if I make a mistake.
You can go with a car only where infrastructure (roads) has been built
I can drive a car from where I’m at right now to where you’re at right now. And I’m not even going to ask where you’re at. I think that’s pretty neat.
But I do agree, walkability and reliable public transit are super nice. The time I’ve spent in smaller, remote ski towns where I could walk/bike or take a bus anywhere in a short amount of time are some of my favorite memories.
You’re ignoring the thing car drivers complain about the most, traffic delays. To me real freedom is being able to get to the places I need to using my own two feet, without needing to spend thousands every year on a car, insurance, etc. Headphones also exist and let you enjoy your own music while outside of a car without disturbing anyone!
What we need everywhere is a people first policy that makes it so you don’t need a car to get around, especially in cities.
I’m not sure what you are talking about with Spain. People there are not “trapped” in cities, they have good public transit in most cities and one of the best high speed rail systems in the world to get between cities, on top of that an extensive bus system that is even cheaper and extensive than the trains.
But in Spain there are not connections to most places outside cities, like most smaller towns don’t even have rail connections, nevermind going to the countryside and touristic places.
Yeah, it’s okay between cities (although AVE is expensive), but that’s my point - it’s only cities.
In Spain you can totally get the bus to most places, especially touristy places! AVE is expensive but there are budget high speed operators operating now and the bus is cheap. All these options are far cheaper than owning a car (and cheaper than owning a car in a car centric country as well!).
Also those towns that don’t have good connections it’s mostly poor people living there, so rather than being stuck in cities because they don’t own cars, they’re stuck in poor rural towns because there is no transit to other places!
I think the view behind the anti-car movement is that there shouldn’t be cars. Period. Doesn’t matter what income bracket. Gas powered cars create huge amounts of pollution, all cars generate lots of waste and are in general very inefficient modes of transportation.
I believe in the end it advocates for busses and trains (above and below ground)as public transit. I think there’s also a belief that infrastructure is supposed to be updated to support this. Busses get their lane, while most of a street is for people moving under their own power, be it walking, cycling or using a wheelchair.
I think the view behind the anti-car movement is that there shouldn’t be cars. Period.
I don’t think so. Fuck-car people are rather against the omnipresence of private cars and how cities prioritize them instead of greener means of transportation, which creates mortal danger, pollution, wasted energy, wasted materials and wasted space. But I don’t think they would mind the occasional car for reasonable usage like disabled people, craftsmen, public services etc.
Thousands of accidents a year from human drivers. I sleep
90 accidents a year from autonomous vehicles. Lazer eyes
DARPA figures out how to safely drive cars using LIDAR. Musk asked for a self driving car. Engineers come back the LIDAR solution. Musk fires them, says if humans can drive with two eyes, then so can computers. Cameras are cheaper than LIDAR. Second group tries it with cameras, can’t get it to work, asked why they can’t use LIDAR. Second group of engineers is fired. Third group comes up with something that ‘kind of works’. People die. Big companies avoid self driving altogether, even though we have a perfect solution with LIDAR, all because Musk wanted to save a buck and can’t get out of the way of his engineers.
The interviewed protesters sound a little whacky. Maybe the cars are doing surveillance with the police, but that idea seems far fetched and unrealistic. Maybe I’m wrong.
I agree with more public transportation, bikes, and so forth, but I also agree with self driving cars. I dream of a future in which all cars are driven automatically without human drivers. Humans are very fallible and we all know, in almost every city, how many shitty drivers there are. Autonomous vehicles could fix this.
Companies like this will sell their data to anyone willing to pay.
Maybe the cars are doing surveillance with the police, but that idea seems far fetched and unrealistic
I’m sure that’s what people said about Ring, or Facebook messages being used to arrest women for abortions. Why would a company turn down an extra revenue stream (or subpoena)?
Facebook messages being used to arrest women for abortions.
That’s a misrepresentation of what happened. The police already suspected her, and so they requested the information from Facebook. Facebook didn’t voluntarily supply a bunch of data to the police for no reason, and then the police didn’t comb through all the data to find this one crime that they otherwise didn’t know about.
What is being suggested with the automatic cars is that the police are actively monitoring the surveillance footage looking for criminal activity. They definitely won’t be doing that. It’s way to much like work.
Cars are incredibly inefficient at transporting people though, like you need a massive highway to transport the amount of people a train can transport, not to mention how much higher maintenance roads are compared to train tracks.
Cars are incredibly inefficient at transporting groups of people long distances
FTFY
I’d love a legit train system to take me to locations across the state or country. But for running errands or local, day-to-day tasks, trains aren’t the answer.
Of course! For running errands and local, day-to-day tasks the bicycle is of course the best vehicle :)
I mean, a car wouldn’t help in that situation either, so…
Good luck getting through that with any vehicle lol
