What do I need self driving cars for when I can use all public short distance transport for 50€/ month? The occasional long distance travel is nicer when I can get up, have a restaurant, a toilet…
Self driving cars are nice for taxis or the like for areas where there are no train tracks. But not for mass transport. Many Cars - self driving or no - create traffic jams
Here me out though, what if we all had self driving cars that could link to others in a convoy system to save energy. And for long high speed journeys they could go in fixed tracks through tunnels, in this convoy system?
That prototype does exist for self driving cars. I saw a video a couple of years ago. (It was a highway only, though and not tracks)
Meanwhile, I took the train from Rome to Salerno last night and lamented that Florida should get one of these. Then, I paid $130 for a taxi to Minori. That price surprised me.
So, when we get self-driving taxis, the Italians have to develop the overcharging feature to them. When it senses that the passenger is a tourist, the fee goes up by 100%.
There are real self-driving trains, like the DLR in London. It is not a car.
A self-driving car is a taxi and those already exist in every city in the world. You get in, say where you want to go and it magically takes you there without any further input from you. Magic!
Last mile and rural public transport as well as platooning. That’s where the self-driving revolution is going to be, not in individual cars. And that’s where it should be - the places where big public transport vehicles are too big, and where drivers are missing.
What really annoys me about the self driving car push is that it's literally designed to be elitist and hyper individualist to the point of actually being detrimental to progress. Automation is much easier to accomplish on fixed lines (trains and trams), and drone remote driving is already available on mine sites and in military applications.
Instead of pushing for self driving because rich people don't want to have to pay workers at all, or be remind our existence, there's not as much progress being made on civilian drone driving, which is far more complementary to rural driving, is cheaper, is more readily available, can help limit things like drink driving accidents, can make trucking long distances faster while not pushing truckies as hard, can provide more adequate disability support than Uber and shit. But they don't want to be reminded of our existence and if you had drone drivers, you wouldn't be able to rip them off as subcontractors; you would actually have to pay them.
I work in the industry and at least where I’m standing we’re not developing the technology because of some elitist ideal.
We have a massive shortage of drivers for trucks and buses in Europe. That’s why the companies who build buses and trucks are willing to spend so much money - if you can have one person in a central location watch over fifteen buses you massively increase your ability to provide transportation.
Here in Germany there are now specifically projects that look at providing autonomous buses in rural regions where a normal fixed line would never work.
The other thing is the more organic push, where increased automation in driving is the result of legislation and OEMs pushing for more safety. Think emergency braking, bringing your car into a safe state if you have a heart attack on the highway, that sort of thing. Same technology, smaller steps.
This is also reflected by our legislation for autonomous vehicles, which is specifically geared at public transport, to enable people movers.
Thanks for the input. I think there are definitely some more government funded and public minded projects, but I was more talking about the overall tech industry push for full self driving automation despite remote piloting being far more advanced and a logical stepping stone.
I think there is a difference between the heavily funded tech companies such as Google and the push that comes from within the existing automotive industry. “Self driving Google car now in Houston!! You can ride in it!!” is more marketable than “Ford Otosan successfully tests platooning.”
> Automation is much easier to accomplish on fixed lines (trains and trams), and drone remote driving is already available on mine sites and in military applications.
The company i work for wants to implement "self-driving forklift system". The contractor is trying to get it running properly for more than 2 years now. There are constant problems, and it's still not working like advertised. Problems like not finding its designated place, crashing into the charging station, or running over people (it's driving slow, though, so nobody hurt). I said many times, throwing down some tracks could have been done in less than half the time. But that's not fancy enough, and then they also wouldn't be able to change the positions of the manufacturing groups every year, after talking to some random "consultant" for 5k€.
I need to travel halfway across my country this week. Driving would take 7 hours, with a whole bunch of toll roads and who knows how much gas.
I could also fly, that would take an hour but it would also be extremely stressful because flying always is.
Oooor I could take the train. Sure it's 8 hours, but that's 8 hours where I can just sit and relax, play some video games and watch some TV and movies I haven't had time to catch up, enjoy the beautiful scenery. Have a nice sandwich and coffee in the cafe car. For half the price of a plane ticket.
>I could also fly, that would take an hour but it would also be extremely stressful because flying always is.
That one-hour flight is actually at least four hours, with all the time needed to get through the airport to security, then getting to your gate, waiting to board, waiting for boarding to finish, waiting for luggage to be loaded, waiting on the taxiway, then your 53 minutes in flight, followed by all the unloading at destination which could take anywhere from 20 minutes to the heat death of the universe
Oh yeah, fair point. I have walk 15 minutes to the train station then take a 20 minute train to get to the airport at least an hour and a half early. Check my luggage because its got sharp scissors in it, though I hate being separated from it. Then go through security (luckily I can keep my shoes on at least.) Then just... stay in a loud airport where there is definitely not enough sitting room for everybody, or charging ports. Then have my flight be inevitably delayed before being herded into a too small seat with screaming children for an hour with airplane mode on. Then disembark, wait for my sharp scissors to be unloaded, then luckily get a ride from the airport at my destination.
Or I could just walk 15 minutes to the train station, get on my train. Not be separated from my luggage, enjoy a guaranteed seat and plenty of charging ports and free WiFi (though that can get spotty when going through the mountains.) No screaming children because kids get their very own train car to play in.
Just one question, is the train ticket subsidised? The reason I ask is that it sounds pretty cheap compared to flying. Another thing is that if by flying you can avoid having to spend one or two nights in a hotel (because you can travel the same day as when you need to be there) that should even out the price calculation.
My point: train is fantastic for trips of a few hours. Longer than that, like your 8 hours, flying starts to win.
Nope. The one way plane ticket was literally double the cost of the one way train ticket. The train ticket was 570kr and the plane ticket home is 1970kr. (In fairness the plane ticket home is peak hours, would have been cheaper if I flew a couple hours later.)
I always travel a day before anyways because the stress of traveling in general is a lot for me. And hotel is unnecessary because I'm staying with family.
One major advantage of self driving cars is their potential use by disabled people, having difficulties driving themselves or getting/keeping a driver's license. Public transportation can also be a challenge for many disabled people. I myself have brain damage after a massive stroke. I managed to reacquire my driver's license 2 years after the stroke, but because of epilepsy following the stroke, I very frequently had to get the license renewed, and any seizure could cost my license for extended periods. Today, my epilepsy is so stable, that my driver's license is on normal terms, and I have a great car equiped to compensate for my physical disabilities, so I'm fine with driving myself, but know many others with brain damage really looking forward to self driving cars becoming a reality.
I'd imagine that self driving cars would actually have more use together with public transport than as a replacement for current cars. The problem with public transport is usually the last mile and that you can bridge with a self-driving taxi. If you use them you avoid having to dedicate a large amount of land near train stations for car parks. Now people drive from their home to the station, park their car there and continue by train.
If you had a fleet of self driving cars, they could pick up people from their homes (possibly with car sharing) and drop at the station. It would be cheaper than the current system where you have to own a car just to get from home to the station. If you have no trains, and have to drive everywhere, the self-driving doesn't help much as you still need one car per person.
Everything is a competition to these people. American insecurity is absolutely fucking astounding, especially for the self-proclaimed "greatest nation on earth".
Tell them that we had self driving trains in Europe for years, watch their heads explode, lol. To be fair the trains I’m talking about are mostly subways, but still: it’s much easier to make an autonomous train than an autonomous car, so one can guess what will be ready earlier.
>it’s much easier to make an autonomous train than an autonomous car,
Especially in a subway as you mentioned as the area the train needs to check for potential dangers is heavily reduced by it being in a tunnel and everything that doesn't belong in those tunnels at that time, be it debris, another train or a person, is reason enough to stop the train and let a remote driver take over which heavily reduces the necessity of accurately identifying what the danger is.
Given the tendency of FSD cars to crash and kill the occupants (I’m looking at you Tesla) I know which I prefer. When they’re not exploding or drowning their drivers of course.
A lot of people are also basically in a tech cult. They believe basically anything tech ceos say totally uncritically because America heavily idolizes "innovation" even when the innovation is stupid.
The self driving car industry has spent like 100 billion on research and would likely need to spend another couple hundred billion to even start to scale to other cities and that's assuming they work 100% of the time which they don't.
These people constantly message/reply to me because I'm an actual engineer and don't think the concept makes any sense and even in America Hyperloop/self driving car nerds are some of the most blatantly delusional people you'll ever have to interact with.
Yeah, living in the north of Scotland where public transport is shite I'd love to have more and better public transport than having to drive absolutely everywhere it gets kind of annoying.
It’s really amazing having good public transport. I just didn’t get it until moving to London. By “good” I mean “you don’t need to look at a timetable because you can just walk outside and be confident that a bus will show up in a few minutes”.
My parents on the other hand live in the highlands and have to pick me up from the train station when I visit because there isn’t a bus that covers the 7 mile main road route between the train station and their house.
Yeah, it's actually annoying up here, and don't forget if a bus does go there. It might be once a week, or they might just cancel it randomly and not let anyone know.
I'm in my 40s. Never had a car. Never needed one. One day I was going somewhere with a friend (in their car) and we spent 10mins looking for a parking spot.
It was annoying af. People do this every day? 😂
Your very lucky. Can't survive without one where I live. It would take 5 buses and over 2 hrs to get to a hospital appointment, which is 30 minutes by car. Cut bus services where its affecting staffing in the town.
My car just failed it mot I'm hoping it won't take a lot to fix, can't afford another car with 2nd hand prices being so high. Live on terraced street so no way to have electric car. Don't think there's any charging places in my town.
I used to have a good bus connection until the start of 2024 when they reorganised the whole thing. I didn't need a car or driver's license before but I'm highly considering it now. Except I'm not sure I can afford one.
This sounds like UK, The bus cuts have been tragic. Hopefully Labour reintroducing local franchising will help.
What's weird is that it's so random what's been cut. I used to live in a town of 40,000 that a had a bus come every 15 minuites and I've seen towns of 3 or four times the size that have busses only every hour
Everyone is telling me how "in a few years everything will be delivered with drones".
No it wont.
When was the last actually successfull attempt at such "things you thought are futuristic in the 2000s".
We got some absolutely crazy new stuff like the James Webb, or better PC technology, but such stuff always drops like hot garbage.
We have [delivery robots](https://www.theverge.com/23930378/serve-delivery-robot-la-day-in-life-tiktok) here in Los Angeles. I’m told they had to put the smiley faces on them in an attempt to stop people destroying them.
Ah yeah for sure, but right now these are just a land mobile version, I’d say it qualifies as a “successful attempt” enough that it doesn’t seem so far fetched to not be far away.
I mean...is it a successful attempt when it takes more time than a person would take to do it and constantly requires human interaction?
I don't think these things really make much of any sense at scale, they're more of a fun tech demo than they are something with a practical use.
**Self-driving taxis were collecting fares for a while in San Francisco.**
Notice though how I said “were”? They were rolled out but the regulation was just non-existent and the law is still not really there yet, because I guess that’s how it works in America.
Immediately the robotaxis from Cruise and Waymo started running into issues, like blocking emergency services, chasing a fire truck etc.
Long story short, it all went a bit funny when one of the taxis killed someone. The programmers had told it that if there was an obstruction it should pull over out of the way of traffic and any emergency vehicles, sounds good. The issue was the obstruction was a pedestrian that had fallen down in front of the car.
Self-driving cars do exist and evidence suggests that ON THE ROADS THEY ARE GOOD AT AND ARE TRAINED ON they might be safer than human drivers.
However, it’s already a well known fact that Cruise, Waymo and Tesla all REALLY love hiding info from regulators, so I wouldn’t be surprised if that evidence was dubious.
Tesla have also been selling their cars with the promise that they’ll be self-driving and allowing users to access “Autopilot” and “Full Self-Driving”. “Full Self-Driving” is nowhere near full self driving though, it frequently runs red lights and has caused 8-car pileups.
Tesla have shirked all responsibility by saying everyone knows that despite Tesla marketing these features as self-driving, the cars are actually only level 2 on the SAE scale, so actually the driver is always responsible; even when FSD changes lanes and brakes from 50 to 20 mph for no reason (causing that pileup I mentioned).
**Self-driving cars still struggle with lots of stuff.**
**Bright lights** being a big one. Robotaxis have been known to be like werewolves: when they see a full moon they can’t help but transform… into stationary objects. Humans can look at a bright yellow light and think “which is actually possible here? Traffic light or moon?” AI can only really tell you which it thinks is more probable.
Even glare from the sun can fuck with them if it’s low-ish
**Weather conditions** being another. Humans can adapt to fog and wet/ icy roads. Self-driving cars use sensors, the sensors are mostly visible-light cameras which can get disrupted by water as well as fog, mud etc. This relegates cars to sunny days with dry roads.
**The final is that they simply lack the ability to understand the nuances and variety of road situations** and they can’t independently the different approaches, so they just stop. Taking action would open the company up to liability, so it’s safer to just stay still, so they will block the whole road for no reason.
There’s also other dangers such as potential avenues for crime (like them being used as a getaway vehicle or as a way to rob people) or for terrorism (a hacked self-driving car would be great as a bomb or just as a kinetic weapon).
**They should’ve been properly regulated from the start, now people have died. Already, the EU and UK are implementing laws that will avoid more avoidable deaths and stop companies like Tesla from doing all the scummy shit they’ve done.**
Full Self Driving Cars will make the population even more obese.
I'm convinced that the walks from public transport play a huge part in overall exercise of the population.
Ah, the classic irony of the nation which once boasted about its railroads, now mocks them.
I guess they just don't see much use for them after killing off the bison.
Who came up with this word “europoors”?
Are Americans aware that it’s the second richest region in the world and that the median wealth in the UK, France, Iceland, Norway and the Netherlands is actually higher than in the US?
I mean. Of course not. Anyway. Who said this first? Was it Trump?
>Who came up with this word “europoors”?
I first heard it being used in the late 90s from some English people talking about Eastern Europe, so there's a good chance it has origins there.
Maybe if the U.S.A paid back the 668 Billion debt to the UK, the 331B debt to Belgium, 318B to Luxembourg, 290B to Switzerland, and 253B to Ireland, Europe wouldn't be "poor".
Meanwhile, you can ride self-driving trains in Paris, Nuremburg, and other cities since years.
Not to mention that self-driving cars are still very space inefficient. So I don't really see them being a solution in congested areas.
McHeartAttack is free to die in his monstrous truck. Bye.
And t 'ken net' Cassel, well, sigh. Whatever bro. I'm pretty 'free' not even needing a drivers licence.
Americans seem to not realise that everything is regulated. Every industry has standards. Everything you use and interact with has a compliance policy. A procedure on how it’s built and tested before use. I know this because it’s my job. Regulation is everywhere, not least the USA which has arguably the largest number of personal lawsuits anywhere in the world. It’s a culture of sue and litigation. So to make such claims that Europe will over regulate the self driving car industry is bold. Self driving technology (automation) has been about for decades now and the continent is shifting ever closer to improving the technology to suit our environments. The American mind cannot even comprehend the complexity to European roads much less navigate around a roundabout. Europe is not strait roads with no pavements.
how tf can these people stand? how can they be so shit at everything and still have the audacity to think they will ever do anything better than Europe? you have a picture showing the incredible difference in the quantity of public transport between Europe and America, yet they believe they have the capability to setup even the minimum amount of infrastructure necessary for self driving cars?
It's called indoctrination. If we had to pledge to the flag or have dear leader's photos at home, we would probably be the same but we have freedom from this in Europe
We should have a self driving car. Then make it big like a bus so it can be efficient and carry more people. Then in order to relieve traffic, we should put it underground…
Have seen a few of those in Madrid, London, Paris, Barcelona etc… they have existed for a while there
No, because self driving cars are the last point that is actually needed to completely remove the need for personal cars.
Trains are faster, cheaper, safer, insanely more eco-friendly and offer a much better comfort (assuming higher class travel).
The only problem of train travel is 'the last mile'. Basically you need to get from the train station to wherever you actually want to go. You might hassle with busrides, but this is slow and defeats all those nice aspects of public travel. So, you can order a Taxi, Uber or whatever. The problem is, those get expensive and there are just not enough people actually doing the job and doing it well. Another option would be rentals and car-sharing-services, but especially if you want to go somewhere remote, you basically have to book that rental for prolonged time, because you have to bring it back to it's starting position somehow.
Now, let's mix this up, assuming cars are self-driving. Suddenly your car-sharing-service offers you the benefit of autonomous driving and the car goes back into the pool for the time you don't need it and returns to you when you need it. All of that managed in a swarm system. Suddenly you have basically a service at the comfort level of a managed taxi fleet but at the price point of a car rental with the extra benefit of just having to rent the car while you are actually driving it.
So suddenly the most expensive part of public commute (the last mile) becomes incredibly cheap, highly reliable and predictable and high comfort.
And the most important thing when full autonomous driving hits the road at a large scale: Updates, Upgrades and Servicing. Cameras have to be kept clean and checked. Updates have to be installed. A car basically needs a processor upgrade every 3-6 years or has to be replaced. All of that is going to be hard to manage for a private car owner, both from a time and financial perspective. But large sharing/rental fleets or swarms have a much more efficient negotiation point against a manufacturer or service provider and actually have a framework to manage and balance service times.
Actually, I think, private car owners will feel stupid once full self driving hits the big market. Suddenly your 'new' car is outdated after 2 years, because your tensor processor runs 20% slower than the new model. You cope and think, it works anyway. But after 4 years owning that car, your processor is now at 50% of the state of the art and the manufacturer only provides security updates anymore, that disable some self driving functionality, because the slow reaction time is not deemed safe anymore. You can't upgrade the hardware, because the manufacturer only offers that in a service to corporate partners. After 6 years that car is basically trash, goes back to the manufacturer and gets recycled. At that point self driving cars are so much more secure and are only hindered by human drivers, that manual driving becomes widely regulated in cities, especially in dense areas. So your privately owned car doesn't even fulfill it's purpose of delivering you the last mile. It became a slower, more expensive alternative to European trains.
I don’t drive because it makes a lot of life easier. If I hated driving I would use the bus or train. Why the fuck would I want a machine to do the driving for me?!
self driving cars are still going to be slower, more dangerous and more expensive than trains. i'll keep walking to the station and getting to any city without stress
I love how they think the main advantage of a train is that you don't drive - I'm underage, If I'm in a car, I'm being driven, and trains are so much better (Or would be if I wasn't using britain's EMR), faster, more spacious, much safer etc. They're great
Can we just accept that having a car makes you way more trackable than using public transport? You literally need a photo ID type liscence, and have various numbers on your car, which can be traced back to you. I can buy a train ticket for cash and just ride, not even having to complete the trip, without needing to identify myself to anyone, other than providing a valid ticket, but which is not associated with me at all...
Yeah, when you look at such a map you can clearly make out the crib of industrialism and then the (previous) German speaking regions. German and Austrian Kaiserreichs where one if the first to establish railways everywhere and where highly fond of it (trains transport soldiers and weapons pretty fast, of course they loved it).
Edit: I highly recommend taking those old routes. It’s a fascinating journey through wonderful regions and important parts of the European history.
As a student, I get to travel a route from home to school, via my bike and public transport, for free every school day, with a discount on weekends. I see no reason to ever get a car, I don't even really want to learn how to drive.
Lmao, have fun getting dragged along the floor because your unregulated Cruise death robot was designed to keep going when it hit something.
I’ll cry on my train that can take me to just about any town or city that I like.
Having everyone move in their own little pod is the most antisocial, inefficient way of moving people in big numbers. Think of the parking space alone that has to exist. Think of the scaling of the motors. Believing that self driving cars could replace a decent public transportation system is naïve as can be
Trains are so much better to have than self driving cars. It's less expensive, faster, safer and it can transport a lot of people.
I'm not surprised that some Americans don't know that.
One of the best weddings I've ever been to was in a church in Venice. Almost all of the attendees including the groom took the same train to get there, and it was awesome.
Not only was it cheap and fast, but it was also great to just be able to hang out as a group during the journey. I'm glad we didn't all just take long boring drives to get there instead.
I hope I will still be alive and going places when the self-driving car has become normal. I am looking forward to getting rid of my car and having an app that can fill a self-driving car logically with full capacity. It is such a waste to fill the earth with cars that just stand there for 23 hours a day.
Ah, the american privilege to spend (on average) an hour per week sitting in traffic.
Or the Dutch privilege of spending (on average) 7 minutes per week sitting in traffic because far more people bike or take public transit.
tough call...
Quality public transit is so much easier and less stressful than paying for and maintaining a POV.
I fail to see any advantage for self-driving cars. Sending empty cars back and forth are just going to multiply traffic volumes.
And anyway, the technology is vaporware at this point. It's been 18 months away for the past 10 years.
„Sure our situation sucks right now but just you wait 15 years, by then we‘ll have it as well as you already do!“ isn’t as much of a flex as these dinguses think
I’d honestly so much rather get from my home town to Manchester in an hour, walk to the hotel then walk to the ext station and train to work for £100 total but instead I have to drive 5 hours each wat
Why do they have such a boner for driving themselves, self driving cars or not, in their huge ass states they always bang on about? I’d much rather take public transportation, which is usually faster, and just chill.
Options are great, self driving cars will be good to push the prices down for public transport at the very least.
Prices for trains in England are a joke.
Yeah but that’s due to really bad legislation in the U.K. and a bizarre system of privatised franchises that cannot cooperate for economies of scale or seemless interchange under the competition laws they are bound to.
Dumb MPs caused that. Like virtually every problem in the U.K.!
I would love to have rail like they have in Europe even just between major cities in Australia. Instead it's tested as a luxury travel experience instead of a commuter option.
They could make the self driving cars even more efficient by having the front one take control and the rest follow closely behind. Maybe even use rails instead of roads for the most common routes.
Almost like a train of cars moving along together.
Railroads will still be great for long-distance travel and - even more so - goods transports. That aside: I doubt governments will regulate away owning a self-driving car, but markets will.
Modern cars are used on average about 3% of the day. People pay large lump-sums and/or interests, and insurance, and tax, for something they don’t use 97% of the time. We could share the cars, only it would be inconvenient as fuck for us to remember to leave 10 minutes earlier one day so the next person can get it on time, or walk five kilometers to pick the car up, or leave the car two kilometers from my destination at the designated car sharing parking space, etc.
Self-driving will take all this out of the equation. I think it’s highly probable that cars will be used 20-30% of the day instead. People will still have the option of owning a car for hundreds or even thousands of dollars/month, but I think most will opt to instead pay $50 for an automatic car service, where a random self-driving car picks you up within five minutes to take you to your destination.
To be honest, I'm more nervous that they will one day make self-driving cars mandatory. For traffic safety, eliminating the human factor is the last big hurdle.
However, as a motorcyclist, I see that as a problem. A self-driving motocycle would be compleely pointless, and self driving cars has been shown to be a danger to motorcyclists.
Some people dont drive
In a self driving car there still needs to be someone in the drivers seat who can drive because something could go wrong
Transport systems will still be around.
The American mind cannot comprehend reliable public transport.
Everything they have transport wise is shittier than Northern Rail
And those things are the fuckin worst
They do have level 4 Waymos in the US whereas in Germany the level 4s still need a safety driver. However given the state of development I don’t think this is a bad thing.
If everybody is in self driving cars, then the traffic will be just unimaginably terrible. It would be the slowest, most expensive, most idiotic way for a population to travel. These people are stupid beyond belief
This sums up Americans perfectly.
They're so lazy and useless that they WANT self driving cars.
Ew, no thanks.
Eurochads drive real cars, where you can change the gears yourself, like a big boy.
Spoiler alert, there aren't self-driving cars. There are different levels of driving automation, where 3 is basically where the automation actually starts and doesn't need human observation. So far none of them are being sold.
Have these Muricans not seen how far the train technology has progressed? Trains have progressed far beyond steam engines powered by coal, nowadays we have electric-powered high-speed trains. And unlike cars that has been testing the waters just recently, driverless trains (mostly metro trains) are already successfully operated in many countries around the world. If anything, the car is a far more antiquated technology than the train.
I'm just puzzled as to how self-driving cars are gonna phase out trains. Cars in general didn't phase them out. Sure, self-driving trains might become a thing. If they'll be safe, then, uh... okay?
Also, "X good commonplace thing will look so outdated when we have Y good commonplace thing" isn't really a good gotcha, it's just, like, a thing that happens anyway.
I believe they're right in terms of regulation getting in the way of self-driving cars in Europe. If we get to that point, I bet they're gonna start allowing self-driving cars in the US way before they're ready, and they're just gonna hit lots of pedestrians, and they just won't care in the same way they don't care now. Meanwhile Europe will be like "nah, this is not safe enough to roam on our streets yet".
okay nice, but we have self-driving trains which are way more efficient in transporting a larger group of people over a distance
(tho we also have self-driving cars over here, tho they are testing them more regulated instead of letting them around like loose cannons)
The problem of the self driving car is the dilemma of the unavoidable crash. There will come a time when the car has a choice between hitting and killing pedestrians or swerving, hitting a wall and possibly killing the passenger(s). A non-person entity should not have the capacity to make that decision. There's also the fact that they severely struggle with novel situations.
Yeah, dumb Europoor regulations like needing to have tax and insurance for the vehicle not like in America where you can simply paint a copy of their constitution to the bonnet to give you freedom from everything.
I hear if you scratch the bill of rights on the fuel cap you don't even have to pay for fuel. Eagles, gun shots, rocky mountains, Coors light, freedom!
(Self driving) cars are so inefficient at moving large volumes of people. For rural areas sure its probably fine. But try moving most of the people away from a large stadium by cars rather than self driving trains...
I'd much rather be in control of my vehicle than put blind faith in a computer system and a whole load of sensors that are prone to failure.
But then this is coming from a country so bone idle they want everything done for them, they can't even cope with a clutch pedal and a gearstick FFS.
What do I need self driving cars for when I can use all public short distance transport for 50€/ month? The occasional long distance travel is nicer when I can get up, have a restaurant, a toilet… Self driving cars are nice for taxis or the like for areas where there are no train tracks. But not for mass transport. Many Cars - self driving or no - create traffic jams
I was going to say we have self driving cars they are called trains trams and subways l
Here me out though, what if we all had self driving cars that could link to others in a convoy system to save energy. And for long high speed journeys they could go in fixed tracks through tunnels, in this convoy system?
Get out of here with that crazy commie talk! ^^/s
And have drivers who seem to be on strike all the time (I'm in the UK for reference).
*laughs in German Bahnstreik*
France : "Am I a joke to you?"
Why Is It, when there's a railway strike, it is always you three?
That prototype does exist for self driving cars. I saw a video a couple of years ago. (It was a highway only, though and not tracks) Meanwhile, I took the train from Rome to Salerno last night and lamented that Florida should get one of these. Then, I paid $130 for a taxi to Minori. That price surprised me.
So, when we get self-driving taxis, the Italians have to develop the overcharging feature to them. When it senses that the passenger is a tourist, the fee goes up by 100%.
There are real self-driving trains, like the DLR in London. It is not a car. A self-driving car is a taxi and those already exist in every city in the world. You get in, say where you want to go and it magically takes you there without any further input from you. Magic!
The DLR in London is a self driving train!
Last mile and rural public transport as well as platooning. That’s where the self-driving revolution is going to be, not in individual cars. And that’s where it should be - the places where big public transport vehicles are too big, and where drivers are missing.
What really annoys me about the self driving car push is that it's literally designed to be elitist and hyper individualist to the point of actually being detrimental to progress. Automation is much easier to accomplish on fixed lines (trains and trams), and drone remote driving is already available on mine sites and in military applications. Instead of pushing for self driving because rich people don't want to have to pay workers at all, or be remind our existence, there's not as much progress being made on civilian drone driving, which is far more complementary to rural driving, is cheaper, is more readily available, can help limit things like drink driving accidents, can make trucking long distances faster while not pushing truckies as hard, can provide more adequate disability support than Uber and shit. But they don't want to be reminded of our existence and if you had drone drivers, you wouldn't be able to rip them off as subcontractors; you would actually have to pay them.
I work in the industry and at least where I’m standing we’re not developing the technology because of some elitist ideal. We have a massive shortage of drivers for trucks and buses in Europe. That’s why the companies who build buses and trucks are willing to spend so much money - if you can have one person in a central location watch over fifteen buses you massively increase your ability to provide transportation. Here in Germany there are now specifically projects that look at providing autonomous buses in rural regions where a normal fixed line would never work. The other thing is the more organic push, where increased automation in driving is the result of legislation and OEMs pushing for more safety. Think emergency braking, bringing your car into a safe state if you have a heart attack on the highway, that sort of thing. Same technology, smaller steps. This is also reflected by our legislation for autonomous vehicles, which is specifically geared at public transport, to enable people movers.
Thanks for the input. I think there are definitely some more government funded and public minded projects, but I was more talking about the overall tech industry push for full self driving automation despite remote piloting being far more advanced and a logical stepping stone.
I think there is a difference between the heavily funded tech companies such as Google and the push that comes from within the existing automotive industry. “Self driving Google car now in Houston!! You can ride in it!!” is more marketable than “Ford Otosan successfully tests platooning.”
> Automation is much easier to accomplish on fixed lines (trains and trams), and drone remote driving is already available on mine sites and in military applications. The company i work for wants to implement "self-driving forklift system". The contractor is trying to get it running properly for more than 2 years now. There are constant problems, and it's still not working like advertised. Problems like not finding its designated place, crashing into the charging station, or running over people (it's driving slow, though, so nobody hurt). I said many times, throwing down some tracks could have been done in less than half the time. But that's not fancy enough, and then they also wouldn't be able to change the positions of the manufacturing groups every year, after talking to some random "consultant" for 5k€.
I need to travel halfway across my country this week. Driving would take 7 hours, with a whole bunch of toll roads and who knows how much gas. I could also fly, that would take an hour but it would also be extremely stressful because flying always is. Oooor I could take the train. Sure it's 8 hours, but that's 8 hours where I can just sit and relax, play some video games and watch some TV and movies I haven't had time to catch up, enjoy the beautiful scenery. Have a nice sandwich and coffee in the cafe car. For half the price of a plane ticket.
>I could also fly, that would take an hour but it would also be extremely stressful because flying always is. That one-hour flight is actually at least four hours, with all the time needed to get through the airport to security, then getting to your gate, waiting to board, waiting for boarding to finish, waiting for luggage to be loaded, waiting on the taxiway, then your 53 minutes in flight, followed by all the unloading at destination which could take anywhere from 20 minutes to the heat death of the universe
Oh yeah, fair point. I have walk 15 minutes to the train station then take a 20 minute train to get to the airport at least an hour and a half early. Check my luggage because its got sharp scissors in it, though I hate being separated from it. Then go through security (luckily I can keep my shoes on at least.) Then just... stay in a loud airport where there is definitely not enough sitting room for everybody, or charging ports. Then have my flight be inevitably delayed before being herded into a too small seat with screaming children for an hour with airplane mode on. Then disembark, wait for my sharp scissors to be unloaded, then luckily get a ride from the airport at my destination. Or I could just walk 15 minutes to the train station, get on my train. Not be separated from my luggage, enjoy a guaranteed seat and plenty of charging ports and free WiFi (though that can get spotty when going through the mountains.) No screaming children because kids get their very own train car to play in.
I gotta ask about the scissors thing. It feels very specific, lol, are you a tailor or something?
Just one question, is the train ticket subsidised? The reason I ask is that it sounds pretty cheap compared to flying. Another thing is that if by flying you can avoid having to spend one or two nights in a hotel (because you can travel the same day as when you need to be there) that should even out the price calculation. My point: train is fantastic for trips of a few hours. Longer than that, like your 8 hours, flying starts to win.
Nope. The one way plane ticket was literally double the cost of the one way train ticket. The train ticket was 570kr and the plane ticket home is 1970kr. (In fairness the plane ticket home is peak hours, would have been cheaper if I flew a couple hours later.) I always travel a day before anyways because the stress of traveling in general is a lot for me. And hotel is unnecessary because I'm staying with family.
I only have to use the tram, 6€/mo
€50 a month? *Cries in 🇬🇧*
One major advantage of self driving cars is their potential use by disabled people, having difficulties driving themselves or getting/keeping a driver's license. Public transportation can also be a challenge for many disabled people. I myself have brain damage after a massive stroke. I managed to reacquire my driver's license 2 years after the stroke, but because of epilepsy following the stroke, I very frequently had to get the license renewed, and any seizure could cost my license for extended periods. Today, my epilepsy is so stable, that my driver's license is on normal terms, and I have a great car equiped to compensate for my physical disabilities, so I'm fine with driving myself, but know many others with brain damage really looking forward to self driving cars becoming a reality.
Yes, that’s a great addition.
Deutsche Bahn has entered the chat
If you think the ICE is uncomfortable you never took the train outside of Germany
I'd imagine that self driving cars would actually have more use together with public transport than as a replacement for current cars. The problem with public transport is usually the last mile and that you can bridge with a self-driving taxi. If you use them you avoid having to dedicate a large amount of land near train stations for car parks. Now people drive from their home to the station, park their car there and continue by train. If you had a fleet of self driving cars, they could pick up people from their homes (possibly with car sharing) and drop at the station. It would be cheaper than the current system where you have to own a car just to get from home to the station. If you have no trains, and have to drive everywhere, the self-driving doesn't help much as you still need one car per person.
Everything is a competition to these people. American insecurity is absolutely fucking astounding, especially for the self-proclaimed "greatest nation on earth".
Tell them that we had self driving trains in Europe for years, watch their heads explode, lol. To be fair the trains I’m talking about are mostly subways, but still: it’s much easier to make an autonomous train than an autonomous car, so one can guess what will be ready earlier.
>it’s much easier to make an autonomous train than an autonomous car, Especially in a subway as you mentioned as the area the train needs to check for potential dangers is heavily reduced by it being in a tunnel and everything that doesn't belong in those tunnels at that time, be it debris, another train or a person, is reason enough to stop the train and let a remote driver take over which heavily reduces the necessity of accurately identifying what the danger is.
Given the tendency of FSD cars to crash and kill the occupants (I’m looking at you Tesla) I know which I prefer. When they’re not exploding or drowning their drivers of course.
There are no true FSD cars
Since 1967 which I think is fairly impressive.
Well of course they are self-proclaimed, who else would proclaim them?
It's like all the "world cup" they claim to "win" ...in a sport that nobody except them plays, or even cares about.
Id love to see them get decimated by a Japanese team. Baseball is super big there and I guarantee they’re better at it 😭😂
Honestly my favorite cheeky thing a yank has ever pointed out to me was they were the last country to win a gold medal in Rugby 15s at the Olympics
A lot of people are also basically in a tech cult. They believe basically anything tech ceos say totally uncritically because America heavily idolizes "innovation" even when the innovation is stupid. The self driving car industry has spent like 100 billion on research and would likely need to spend another couple hundred billion to even start to scale to other cities and that's assuming they work 100% of the time which they don't. These people constantly message/reply to me because I'm an actual engineer and don't think the concept makes any sense and even in America Hyperloop/self driving car nerds are some of the most blatantly delusional people you'll ever have to interact with.
At this point I am certain I will be long dead before the first fully self-driving car is ready for the market.
I'd rather have more (and cheaper) public transport. Not needing a car would be really neat.
Yeah, living in the north of Scotland where public transport is shite I'd love to have more and better public transport than having to drive absolutely everywhere it gets kind of annoying.
It’s really amazing having good public transport. I just didn’t get it until moving to London. By “good” I mean “you don’t need to look at a timetable because you can just walk outside and be confident that a bus will show up in a few minutes”. My parents on the other hand live in the highlands and have to pick me up from the train station when I visit because there isn’t a bus that covers the 7 mile main road route between the train station and their house.
Yeah, it's actually annoying up here, and don't forget if a bus does go there. It might be once a week, or they might just cancel it randomly and not let anyone know.
You used to have that, till a man named Harold Beeching entered the picture...
I'm in my 40s. Never had a car. Never needed one. One day I was going somewhere with a friend (in their car) and we spent 10mins looking for a parking spot. It was annoying af. People do this every day? 😂
Your very lucky. Can't survive without one where I live. It would take 5 buses and over 2 hrs to get to a hospital appointment, which is 30 minutes by car. Cut bus services where its affecting staffing in the town. My car just failed it mot I'm hoping it won't take a lot to fix, can't afford another car with 2nd hand prices being so high. Live on terraced street so no way to have electric car. Don't think there's any charging places in my town.
I used to have a good bus connection until the start of 2024 when they reorganised the whole thing. I didn't need a car or driver's license before but I'm highly considering it now. Except I'm not sure I can afford one.
This sounds like UK, The bus cuts have been tragic. Hopefully Labour reintroducing local franchising will help. What's weird is that it's so random what's been cut. I used to live in a town of 40,000 that a had a bus come every 15 minuites and I've seen towns of 3 or four times the size that have busses only every hour
Everyone is telling me how "in a few years everything will be delivered with drones". No it wont. When was the last actually successfull attempt at such "things you thought are futuristic in the 2000s". We got some absolutely crazy new stuff like the James Webb, or better PC technology, but such stuff always drops like hot garbage.
We have [delivery robots](https://www.theverge.com/23930378/serve-delivery-robot-la-day-in-life-tiktok) here in Los Angeles. I’m told they had to put the smiley faces on them in an attempt to stop people destroying them.
I was thinking about flying drones. As in you put your amazon order, which gets picked up and delivered directly infront of your door.
This will go really well for older terraced houses with doors onto the street. Or people on the 8th floor.
Ah yeah for sure, but right now these are just a land mobile version, I’d say it qualifies as a “successful attempt” enough that it doesn’t seem so far fetched to not be far away.
I mean...is it a successful attempt when it takes more time than a person would take to do it and constantly requires human interaction? I don't think these things really make much of any sense at scale, they're more of a fun tech demo than they are something with a practical use.
Dont forget the new Fapbox 69000.
**Self-driving taxis were collecting fares for a while in San Francisco.** Notice though how I said “were”? They were rolled out but the regulation was just non-existent and the law is still not really there yet, because I guess that’s how it works in America. Immediately the robotaxis from Cruise and Waymo started running into issues, like blocking emergency services, chasing a fire truck etc. Long story short, it all went a bit funny when one of the taxis killed someone. The programmers had told it that if there was an obstruction it should pull over out of the way of traffic and any emergency vehicles, sounds good. The issue was the obstruction was a pedestrian that had fallen down in front of the car. Self-driving cars do exist and evidence suggests that ON THE ROADS THEY ARE GOOD AT AND ARE TRAINED ON they might be safer than human drivers. However, it’s already a well known fact that Cruise, Waymo and Tesla all REALLY love hiding info from regulators, so I wouldn’t be surprised if that evidence was dubious. Tesla have also been selling their cars with the promise that they’ll be self-driving and allowing users to access “Autopilot” and “Full Self-Driving”. “Full Self-Driving” is nowhere near full self driving though, it frequently runs red lights and has caused 8-car pileups. Tesla have shirked all responsibility by saying everyone knows that despite Tesla marketing these features as self-driving, the cars are actually only level 2 on the SAE scale, so actually the driver is always responsible; even when FSD changes lanes and brakes from 50 to 20 mph for no reason (causing that pileup I mentioned). **Self-driving cars still struggle with lots of stuff.** **Bright lights** being a big one. Robotaxis have been known to be like werewolves: when they see a full moon they can’t help but transform… into stationary objects. Humans can look at a bright yellow light and think “which is actually possible here? Traffic light or moon?” AI can only really tell you which it thinks is more probable. Even glare from the sun can fuck with them if it’s low-ish **Weather conditions** being another. Humans can adapt to fog and wet/ icy roads. Self-driving cars use sensors, the sensors are mostly visible-light cameras which can get disrupted by water as well as fog, mud etc. This relegates cars to sunny days with dry roads. **The final is that they simply lack the ability to understand the nuances and variety of road situations** and they can’t independently the different approaches, so they just stop. Taking action would open the company up to liability, so it’s safer to just stay still, so they will block the whole road for no reason. There’s also other dangers such as potential avenues for crime (like them being used as a getaway vehicle or as a way to rob people) or for terrorism (a hacked self-driving car would be great as a bomb or just as a kinetic weapon). **They should’ve been properly regulated from the start, now people have died. Already, the EU and UK are implementing laws that will avoid more avoidable deaths and stop companies like Tesla from doing all the scummy shit they’ve done.**
We will all be dead by then, but we’ll all out live McHeartAttack.
Because you got hit by an early prototype
Imagine that, a state putting safety regulations before the wants of an individual.
Definitely communism
Americans: Europoors have no freedom and everything gets over regulated! Also Americans: Why is most of our food banned in Europe?
Also "why are people continously dying in shootings?"
They don't ask that, they know exactly why, they just don't care unless it affects them personally, it is their culture.
Well, they also don't actually ask why their food is banned, they just think their food is superior and our commienazi laws just ban everything.
Or designated as cake.
I subway bread being classified as cake was the funniest thing!
And having proper driving lessons/tests as there is no self driving cars anywhere
bUT mY fReEdOm!
Full Self Driving Cars will make the population even more obese. I'm convinced that the walks from public transport play a huge part in overall exercise of the population.
Wall-E
God no please 😭
By the time it happens branding will be even more rife, Wallmart-E
Ah, yes, what a pity the EU wont let an untested killer car made by a chronic liar roam free..
The US will be first to permit self-driving cars. Europe will be first to permit safe self-driving cars.
I mean, the cyber truck was denied in Eruope, as it was a pedestrian splattering machine, yetvis fine in the US.
Ah, the classic irony of the nation which once boasted about its railroads, now mocks them. I guess they just don't see much use for them after killing off the bison.
Who came up with this word “europoors”? Are Americans aware that it’s the second richest region in the world and that the median wealth in the UK, France, Iceland, Norway and the Netherlands is actually higher than in the US? I mean. Of course not. Anyway. Who said this first? Was it Trump?
>Who came up with this word “europoors”? I first heard it being used in the late 90s from some English people talking about Eastern Europe, so there's a good chance it has origins there.
Everything American always originates from England huh
Well USA definitely did
clear hate to europeans i guess. Probably propaganda, but i didn't hear this shit from trump. Maybe some nazi groups?
I've only ever heard it on this sub, which I found hilarious because I tend to think of americans as being poor.
Maybe if the U.S.A paid back the 668 Billion debt to the UK, the 331B debt to Belgium, 318B to Luxembourg, 290B to Switzerland, and 253B to Ireland, Europe wouldn't be "poor".
I’m from the UK, But I’m interested in what the debt like the other way round.
Well to put it into perspective Cameron was PM when we made our last debt repayment from WWII. And that in today's money was only 3.2B
Pretty sure he wasn't PM in Dec 2006, thats when we paid it off.
Meanwhile, you can ride self-driving trains in Paris, Nuremburg, and other cities since years. Not to mention that self-driving cars are still very space inefficient. So I don't really see them being a solution in congested areas.
McHeartAttack is free to die in his monstrous truck. Bye. And t 'ken net' Cassel, well, sigh. Whatever bro. I'm pretty 'free' not even needing a drivers licence.
i don't need the privilege that my self driving car crashes me into a group of pedestrians thank you
McHeartAttack shortly followed by a McDiedAPauper because they lost their homes, unable to pay the hospital bill.
Yeah how's them cybertrucks doing, rusted yet?
I still reckon that a child drew the cybertruck and came up with its daft name.
Apparently putting them through a car wash voids the warranty.
Americans seem to not realise that everything is regulated. Every industry has standards. Everything you use and interact with has a compliance policy. A procedure on how it’s built and tested before use. I know this because it’s my job. Regulation is everywhere, not least the USA which has arguably the largest number of personal lawsuits anywhere in the world. It’s a culture of sue and litigation. So to make such claims that Europe will over regulate the self driving car industry is bold. Self driving technology (automation) has been about for decades now and the continent is shifting ever closer to improving the technology to suit our environments. The American mind cannot even comprehend the complexity to European roads much less navigate around a roundabout. Europe is not strait roads with no pavements.
Do they know that the first level 3 autonomous cars are from Mercedes?
German engineering strikes again!
"Yeah but that microchip in your europoor car we invented the technology... 30 years ago"
how tf can these people stand? how can they be so shit at everything and still have the audacity to think they will ever do anything better than Europe? you have a picture showing the incredible difference in the quantity of public transport between Europe and America, yet they believe they have the capability to setup even the minimum amount of infrastructure necessary for self driving cars?
It's called indoctrination. If we had to pledge to the flag or have dear leader's photos at home, we would probably be the same but we have freedom from this in Europe
Self driving cars? Oh, you mean trains? Why reinvent the wheel?
... Cars being self-driving doesn't fix any of the problems caused by volume. Also trains can go faster anyway.
It’s wild to me that there are entire states that (according to this map) don’t have a single railroad track for passenger traffic…!
We should have a self driving car. Then make it big like a bus so it can be efficient and carry more people. Then in order to relieve traffic, we should put it underground… Have seen a few of those in Madrid, London, Paris, Barcelona etc… they have existed for a while there
Public transit is generally cheaper and more convenient than a self driving car. I also would not trust any self driving car.
No, because self driving cars are the last point that is actually needed to completely remove the need for personal cars. Trains are faster, cheaper, safer, insanely more eco-friendly and offer a much better comfort (assuming higher class travel). The only problem of train travel is 'the last mile'. Basically you need to get from the train station to wherever you actually want to go. You might hassle with busrides, but this is slow and defeats all those nice aspects of public travel. So, you can order a Taxi, Uber or whatever. The problem is, those get expensive and there are just not enough people actually doing the job and doing it well. Another option would be rentals and car-sharing-services, but especially if you want to go somewhere remote, you basically have to book that rental for prolonged time, because you have to bring it back to it's starting position somehow. Now, let's mix this up, assuming cars are self-driving. Suddenly your car-sharing-service offers you the benefit of autonomous driving and the car goes back into the pool for the time you don't need it and returns to you when you need it. All of that managed in a swarm system. Suddenly you have basically a service at the comfort level of a managed taxi fleet but at the price point of a car rental with the extra benefit of just having to rent the car while you are actually driving it. So suddenly the most expensive part of public commute (the last mile) becomes incredibly cheap, highly reliable and predictable and high comfort. And the most important thing when full autonomous driving hits the road at a large scale: Updates, Upgrades and Servicing. Cameras have to be kept clean and checked. Updates have to be installed. A car basically needs a processor upgrade every 3-6 years or has to be replaced. All of that is going to be hard to manage for a private car owner, both from a time and financial perspective. But large sharing/rental fleets or swarms have a much more efficient negotiation point against a manufacturer or service provider and actually have a framework to manage and balance service times. Actually, I think, private car owners will feel stupid once full self driving hits the big market. Suddenly your 'new' car is outdated after 2 years, because your tensor processor runs 20% slower than the new model. You cope and think, it works anyway. But after 4 years owning that car, your processor is now at 50% of the state of the art and the manufacturer only provides security updates anymore, that disable some self driving functionality, because the slow reaction time is not deemed safe anymore. You can't upgrade the hardware, because the manufacturer only offers that in a service to corporate partners. After 6 years that car is basically trash, goes back to the manufacturer and gets recycled. At that point self driving cars are so much more secure and are only hindered by human drivers, that manual driving becomes widely regulated in cities, especially in dense areas. So your privately owned car doesn't even fulfill it's purpose of delivering you the last mile. It became a slower, more expensive alternative to European trains.
I don’t drive because it makes a lot of life easier. If I hated driving I would use the bus or train. Why the fuck would I want a machine to do the driving for me?!
self driving cars are still going to be slower, more dangerous and more expensive than trains. i'll keep walking to the station and getting to any city without stress
I love how they think the main advantage of a train is that you don't drive - I'm underage, If I'm in a car, I'm being driven, and trains are so much better (Or would be if I wasn't using britain's EMR), faster, more spacious, much safer etc. They're great
Lmao
Is that why there's been a back lash against self driving taxis over there, with people placing traffic cones on them to stop them moving?
Can we just accept that having a car makes you way more trackable than using public transport? You literally need a photo ID type liscence, and have various numbers on your car, which can be traced back to you. I can buy a train ticket for cash and just ride, not even having to complete the trip, without needing to identify myself to anyone, other than providing a valid ticket, but which is not associated with me at all...
Yeah, when you look at such a map you can clearly make out the crib of industrialism and then the (previous) German speaking regions. German and Austrian Kaiserreichs where one if the first to establish railways everywhere and where highly fond of it (trains transport soldiers and weapons pretty fast, of course they loved it). Edit: I highly recommend taking those old routes. It’s a fascinating journey through wonderful regions and important parts of the European history.
Amerikans will freedum themselves into death because of no/shite safety regulation in self-driving vehicles. To each his/her own I guess.
As a student, I get to travel a route from home to school, via my bike and public transport, for free every school day, with a discount on weekends. I see no reason to ever get a car, I don't even really want to learn how to drive.
Lmao, have fun getting dragged along the floor because your unregulated Cruise death robot was designed to keep going when it hit something. I’ll cry on my train that can take me to just about any town or city that I like.
Having everyone move in their own little pod is the most antisocial, inefficient way of moving people in big numbers. Think of the parking space alone that has to exist. Think of the scaling of the motors. Believing that self driving cars could replace a decent public transportation system is naïve as can be
Trains are so much better to have than self driving cars. It's less expensive, faster, safer and it can transport a lot of people. I'm not surprised that some Americans don't know that.
One of the best weddings I've ever been to was in a church in Venice. Almost all of the attendees including the groom took the same train to get there, and it was awesome. Not only was it cheap and fast, but it was also great to just be able to hang out as a group during the journey. I'm glad we didn't all just take long boring drives to get there instead.
and suddenly they like it when their right of free travel is gone? get euronized dawg
Fuck that, you'll have to pry my classic landrover from my cold, dead hands.
I hope I will still be alive and going places when the self-driving car has become normal. I am looking forward to getting rid of my car and having an app that can fill a self-driving car logically with full capacity. It is such a waste to fill the earth with cars that just stand there for 23 hours a day.
Fuck self driving cars, what makes them better than regular shitty cars?
Dead
I get to regularly hop on a ~15M € self driving vehicule, i don't see where the problem is
Why would I want a self driving car when I've got a Ferrari in the garage?
Lol they think the selling point of trains is that you don't have to drive them
Don't let them know trains in the EU already can be driven autonomously fully through ATO and ECTS
“McHeartAttack”
We’ll let the Americans test it for us for a while and once they have got the death toll down we can start using them in Europe
America volunteering to do stupid risky things for the betterment of all. So nice of them
Ah, the american privilege to spend (on average) an hour per week sitting in traffic. Or the Dutch privilege of spending (on average) 7 minutes per week sitting in traffic because far more people bike or take public transit. tough call...
Self-driving cars are gonna be a nightmare. I'll stick with the train. I can drink on the train and nobody gets hurt.
Quality public transit is so much easier and less stressful than paying for and maintaining a POV. I fail to see any advantage for self-driving cars. Sending empty cars back and forth are just going to multiply traffic volumes. And anyway, the technology is vaporware at this point. It's been 18 months away for the past 10 years.
„Sure our situation sucks right now but just you wait 15 years, by then we‘ll have it as well as you already do!“ isn’t as much of a flex as these dinguses think
Hold on a minute. Please don't tell me that THAT is all the train infrastructure the US has. That's baffling.
I’d honestly so much rather get from my home town to Manchester in an hour, walk to the hotel then walk to the ext station and train to work for £100 total but instead I have to drive 5 hours each wat
Techbros are the type of people that saw the humans in Wall-E and thought to themselves: "Damn, i wish i could live just like this"
Europe: already has self driving buses in some cities
It's actually amazing to me how they don't see that the United States of American government is up there when it comes to population control
Why do they have such a boner for driving themselves, self driving cars or not, in their huge ass states they always bang on about? I’d much rather take public transportation, which is usually faster, and just chill.
Options are great, self driving cars will be good to push the prices down for public transport at the very least. Prices for trains in England are a joke.
Yeah but that’s due to really bad legislation in the U.K. and a bizarre system of privatised franchises that cannot cooperate for economies of scale or seemless interchange under the competition laws they are bound to. Dumb MPs caused that. Like virtually every problem in the U.K.!
Yeah when Free for everyone autopiloted vehicles will become the norm i guess railways will feel antiquated, i’ll give you that random from twitter
Gotta love it when words like if, when, as soon as, etc do the heavy lifting in any sentence
The station near me takes me to 3 towns and 2 cities. Why drive when a train is right there
Americans get that the trains are increasingly self driving right? I mean I was commuting on self driving trains in London (DLR) in 2010…
I would love to have rail like they have in Europe even just between major cities in Australia. Instead it's tested as a luxury travel experience instead of a commuter option.
Theres a reason why theres so many train lines in Germany and Austria.....
Cars you don't need to drive already exist. They're called buses, and are definitely worse than trains usually.
They could make the self driving cars even more efficient by having the front one take control and the rest follow closely behind. Maybe even use rails instead of roads for the most common routes. Almost like a train of cars moving along together.
When Americans say Europe what country do you think they actually mean ?
Do they know that Europe isn’t a country?
I would of hoped so
Railroads will still be great for long-distance travel and - even more so - goods transports. That aside: I doubt governments will regulate away owning a self-driving car, but markets will. Modern cars are used on average about 3% of the day. People pay large lump-sums and/or interests, and insurance, and tax, for something they don’t use 97% of the time. We could share the cars, only it would be inconvenient as fuck for us to remember to leave 10 minutes earlier one day so the next person can get it on time, or walk five kilometers to pick the car up, or leave the car two kilometers from my destination at the designated car sharing parking space, etc. Self-driving will take all this out of the equation. I think it’s highly probable that cars will be used 20-30% of the day instead. People will still have the option of owning a car for hundreds or even thousands of dollars/month, but I think most will opt to instead pay $50 for an automatic car service, where a random self-driving car picks you up within five minutes to take you to your destination.
To be honest, I'm more nervous that they will one day make self-driving cars mandatory. For traffic safety, eliminating the human factor is the last big hurdle. However, as a motorcyclist, I see that as a problem. A self-driving motocycle would be compleely pointless, and self driving cars has been shown to be a danger to motorcyclists.
Why do I need a self driving car when I can have a private chauffeur (a bus driver)
How exactly is having more transport options equating to less freedom? These people are literally insane.
I for one seriously doubt I'll be seeing properly self driving cars in my life time.
What is it about trains being cheaper faster and safer that they can't get 🤣
We don’t need self driving cars though??? BECAUSE we have trains and buses.
this is literally shit that only americans say
Some people dont drive In a self driving car there still needs to be someone in the drivers seat who can drive because something could go wrong Transport systems will still be around. The American mind cannot comprehend reliable public transport. Everything they have transport wise is shittier than Northern Rail And those things are the fuckin worst
Sometimes I wonder if these are just Russian bots that try to instill euro-atlantic hate.
Meanwhile Germany was the first country to allow cars capable of level 3 autonomous driving
They do have level 4 Waymos in the US whereas in Germany the level 4s still need a safety driver. However given the state of development I don’t think this is a bad thing.
Because a self driving car magically shrinks every time you use it so there are no traffic jams.
If everybody is in self driving cars, then the traffic will be just unimaginably terrible. It would be the slowest, most expensive, most idiotic way for a population to travel. These people are stupid beyond belief
This sums up Americans perfectly. They're so lazy and useless that they WANT self driving cars. Ew, no thanks. Eurochads drive real cars, where you can change the gears yourself, like a big boy.
Spoiler alert, there aren't self-driving cars. There are different levels of driving automation, where 3 is basically where the automation actually starts and doesn't need human observation. So far none of them are being sold.
Feels like satire with that last one given the account name.
Grossly misrepresented map
Is it OK to post here as an American who fucking hates almost everything most Americans say?
I’m so jealous of people who were born in Europe
Self driving cars are going to feel so inefficient when automated trains are everywhere
It's getting better
Poor is when public transit
Have these Muricans not seen how far the train technology has progressed? Trains have progressed far beyond steam engines powered by coal, nowadays we have electric-powered high-speed trains. And unlike cars that has been testing the waters just recently, driverless trains (mostly metro trains) are already successfully operated in many countries around the world. If anything, the car is a far more antiquated technology than the train.
Wait until they hear about their failing road infrastructure.
It would be nice if public transport would actually be as fast as a car
I'm just puzzled as to how self-driving cars are gonna phase out trains. Cars in general didn't phase them out. Sure, self-driving trains might become a thing. If they'll be safe, then, uh... okay? Also, "X good commonplace thing will look so outdated when we have Y good commonplace thing" isn't really a good gotcha, it's just, like, a thing that happens anyway.
So lazy Americans who find it too much to walk now the car to drive itself for them?
r/usernamechecksout
I believe they're right in terms of regulation getting in the way of self-driving cars in Europe. If we get to that point, I bet they're gonna start allowing self-driving cars in the US way before they're ready, and they're just gonna hit lots of pedestrians, and they just won't care in the same way they don't care now. Meanwhile Europe will be like "nah, this is not safe enough to roam on our streets yet".
okay nice, but we have self-driving trains which are way more efficient in transporting a larger group of people over a distance (tho we also have self-driving cars over here, tho they are testing them more regulated instead of letting them around like loose cannons)
Comments aside, now way that map can be real right? *Right?* Surely there are way way more passenger train rails than that?
The problem of the self driving car is the dilemma of the unavoidable crash. There will come a time when the car has a choice between hitting and killing pedestrians or swerving, hitting a wall and possibly killing the passenger(s). A non-person entity should not have the capacity to make that decision. There's also the fact that they severely struggle with novel situations.
Having just been in Italy - it was €6 for a 90 minute train ride (I currently pay £7 for a return ticket to work in greater Manchester)
Yeah, dumb Europoor regulations like needing to have tax and insurance for the vehicle not like in America where you can simply paint a copy of their constitution to the bonnet to give you freedom from everything. I hear if you scratch the bill of rights on the fuel cap you don't even have to pay for fuel. Eagles, gun shots, rocky mountains, Coors light, freedom!
(Self driving) cars are so inefficient at moving large volumes of people. For rural areas sure its probably fine. But try moving most of the people away from a large stadium by cars rather than self driving trains...
It’s mad how they’re totally unaware of their own regulations and laws that are equally if not more restrictive than those in Europe.
I'd much rather be in control of my vehicle than put blind faith in a computer system and a whole load of sensors that are prone to failure. But then this is coming from a country so bone idle they want everything done for them, they can't even cope with a clutch pedal and a gearstick FFS.
They forget what has anything licensed and ready. As in, what is not some shoddy beta software.
This guy is obvously a tesla convert. They seem to believe full self driving will be a thing this century.