Automated vehicles - how soon is now?

[weltweit]

I drove 50 miles up the M4 on Friday. I was doing about 70-80 most of the way and there was a constant stream of German cars lining up to overtake me. And not just your standard BMW or Audi, the majority had custom alloys, there were M series BMWs and whatever the equivalent is for Mercedes and Audi, and a lot of tinted glass.

Why am I mentioning this? Because all these people had pride in their vehicles, they felt they were making some kind of a statement about what they drove.

While I can see electric cars coming, and some car sharing also, my bet is that there will still be a large number of drivers who want to own and operate their own vehicles, and not just a bog standard vehicles, they will still want something above the average and be willing to pay for it.

 

[urbanspaceman]

I drove 50 miles up the M4 on Friday. I was doing about 70-80 most of the way and there was a constant stream of German cars lining up to overtake me. And not just your standard BMW or Audi, the majority had custom alloys, there were M series BMWs and whatever the equivalent is for Mercedes and Audi, and a lot of tinted glass.

Why am I mentioning this? Because all these people had pride in their vehicles, they felt they were making some kind of a statement about what they drove.

While I can see electric cars coming, and some car sharing also, my bet is that there will still be a large number of drivers who want to own and operate their own vehicles, and not just a bog standard vehicles, they will still want something above the average and be willing to pay for it.

I encourage you to take a look at the report (post 55) or the video (post 58), which explain why disruption is coming. To address your anecdote:

1) many of those cars are company-funded. When self-driving cars have proved to be 10x safer than humans, corporate insurers will simply insist on self-driving cars
2) Similarly, electric vehicles are 10x cheaper to fuel and maintain. Unsentimental fleet managers will take note.
3) Younger people aren't very interested in cars, so the car-proud demographic will shrink in the future
4) Most of all, PCP. The UK is in the middle of a Personal Contract Purchase bubble. Low interest rates have fuelled PCP mania, allowing people to drive (and replace) cars far more expensive than they could have aspired to in the past, hence the striking procession of quality German machinery you mention. But, it looks like a sub-prime type crash is coming:

Drive carefully – I can see a credit car crash up ahead
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/may/08/credit-car-crash-sub-prime-crisis-cause-next-financial-collapse

Are the wheels about to fall off car finance?
www.ft.com/content/0e651206-0ee1-11e7-a88c-50ba212dce4d?mhq5j=e1

Fears of a dangerous debt bubble are growing as motorists drive off in new cars after paying a deposit of just £319
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4594382/Debt-fears-new-car-deals-need-300-deposit.html#ixzz4l8GaX3NN

I expect tech-driven disruption to hit cars, in the same way as has already happened for physical music media, wet-film cameras, instant photography, retail in general, the list goes on. One day it's business-as-usual, and (typically) seven years later, you're just a memory. Today's traffic on the M4 is no predictor of the future.

 

[2hats]

Avis have seen the writing on the wall - they have just signed a contract to manage Waymo’s car fleet (Waymo being Alphabet (aka Google)’s driverless car division).

Avis will be concerned about the future of the rental industry as car use looks set to change. As driverless vehicles become more mainstream, there’s expected to be a big shift away from car ownership and toward shared, on-demand vehicles. While communal cars may now be provided by incumbent rental firms, in the future they may be provided directly from automakers or, more likely, by ride-hailers like Uber and Lyft. Existing rental firms might find that their fleet management skills can be sold as a service to the firms that are building out autonomous-car networks.

Why am I mentioning this? Because all these people had pride in their vehicles having been brainwashed by marketing into thinking they are individuals, they felt they were making some kind of a statement about what they drove.

It won’t take advertising too long to recondition vast swathes of people. Besides, why spend a large fraction of your life obsessing over your corroding penis extension when you can spend that time having fun with your favourite human(s)?

 

[Yossarian]

No matter how hard they push it, I think there's going to be a big enough group of holdouts that politicians will continue to cater to them - one of the reasons a lot of people are scared of flying despite statistics showing it's incredibly safe is the lack of control, I think it'll be the same for a lot of people who feel uncomfortable having a robot move them through traffic in a heavy metal object at high speeds.

 

[2hats]

people who feel uncomfortable having a robot move them through traffic in a heavy metal object at high speeds.

But it won’t occur to them that they are then trying to move themselves through traffic in amongst heavy metal objects driven by ‘robots’?

 

[Crispy]

I can't wait to have the full width of the road available for things other than parked cars.

 

[Yossarian]

But it won’t occur to them that they are then trying to move themselves through traffic in amongst heavy metal objects driven by ‘robots’?

I think most people will be OK with the idea of robots taking over from all those other crappy drivers on the road, just not their own cars.

 

[kabbes]

No matter how hard they push it, I think there's going to be a big enough group of holdouts that politicians will continue to cater to them - one of the reasons a lot of people are scared of flying despite statistics showing it's incredibly safe is the lack of control, I think it'll be the same for a lot of people who feel uncomfortable having a robot move them through traffic in a heavy metal object at high speeds.

I think there is this general misconception that autonomous cars will turn up as a result of some kind of direct marketing push that tries to persuade people to switch. In reality, technological drift tends to happen more holistically than that. Yes, marketing plays a part. But so does sheer utility value, surges of user adoption that leave you behind if you don't keep up and changing assumptions about how people interact with society. Smartphones, computers, TVs, telephones, fridges -- go back as far as you like. The ubiquity of these items was not because each individual was separately persuaded of the merits of their use. They just reached an inflexion point at which they became assumed. Eventually, it becomes too costly not to have them.

 

[DotCommunist]

maybe in the interim there will be a human needed, a rule about 'there must be 1 sober person at the wheel for emergency take-over. '

 

[Crispy]

maybe in the interim there will be a human needed, a rule about 'there must be 1 sober person at the wheel for emergency take-over. '

Nah, this is dangerous. Sitting there attentively waiting for a "human take over!" message that almost never comes? People will just zone out or ignore it.

Driving "assists" like lane centring and keeping an appropriate distance on the motorway are fine, but for anything smarter they'll have to make the leap to full automation.

"In the interim" will mean restricted areas where the vehicles operate. I can imagine the first real roll-out will be for the city limits of a 50,000 population californian town. Larger, more complex areas will get added as confidence improves.

 

[Yossarian]

I think there is this general misconception that autonomous cars will turn up as a result of some kind of direct marketing push that tries to persuade people to switch. In reality, technological drift tends to happen more holistically than that. Yes, marketing plays a part. But so does sheer utility value, surges of user adoption that leave you behind if you don't keep up and changing assumptions about how people interact with society.

True - but with self-driving cars, people like driving so much that the drift toward full adoption will probably take many decades, if it happens at all. After more than 75 years, the automatic transmission still hasn't fully caught on.

 

[kabbes]

True - but with self-driving cars, people like driving so much that the drift toward full adoption will probably take many decades, if it happens at all. After more than 75 years, the automatic transmission still hasn't fully caught on.

The reason I never bought an automatic was because it costs a load more for a benefit I don't value. Not because I like changing gear. It is in no way analogous -- nothing in society assumes that I will be driving an automatic and the cost structure has always kept automatics as being more expensive.

I am bemused by this idea that there are all these people who love driving. I don't think I know a single person that loves driving per se. Even those with really expensive cars -- they love luxury, but not the actual driving. I do know people who love to occasionally drive for a short period on a weekend and have some fancy sports car to do it. But even those people would love their general driving in their usual weekday car to be taken care of for them.

 

[kabbes]

Also , there is a type of machinery that certainly looks generically car-like but is not used for general road driving. Everything from tractors to the kind of Land Rover Defenders that are actually used to pull trailers around fields. Those kind of working vehicles are likely to remain in need of a human driver a lot longer than mass transport is. But that's fine -- if there continues to be a niche that autonomy can't fill, those niches will remain human.

 

[Yossarian]

I am bemused by this idea that there are all these people who love driving.

They're definitely out there - probably more so in North America, Australia etc. than Britain, tbf.

 

[Santino]

The reason I never bought an automatic was because it costs a load more for a benefit I don't value. Not because I like changing gear. It is in no way analogous -- nothing in society assumes that I will be driving an automatic and the cost structure has always kept automatics as being more expensive.

I am bemused by this idea that there are all these people who love driving. I don't think I know a single person that loves driving per se. Even those with really expensive cars -- they love luxury, but not the actual driving. I do know people who love to occasionally drive for a short period on a weekend and have some fancy sports car to do it. But even those people would love their general driving in their usual weekday car to be taken care of for them.

I only drive once or twice a week, or on holidays, and I do actually enjoy it. It's like a reasonably complex computer game that I've mastered and still derive satisfaction from playing through. I've only been driving for a few years though. I wouldn't want to do it twice a day for commuting.

 

[DotCommunist]

I only drive once or twice a week, or on holidays, and I do actually enjoy it. It's like a reasonably complex computer game that I've mastered and still derive satisfaction from playing through. I've only been driving for a few years though. I wouldn't want to do it twice a day for commuting.

except you only get one life

 

[kabbes]

I only drive once or twice a week, or on holidays, and I do actually enjoy it. It's like a reasonably complex computer game that I've mastered and still derive satisfaction from playing through. I've only been driving for a few years though. I wouldn't want to do it twice a day for commuting.

Right, that's kind of my expectation. Some people will like to drive *occasionally* and *under particular conditions*. Which is fine, but is not what is driving 90%+ of car sales.

 

[2hats]

I think most people will be OK with the idea of robots taking over from all those other crappy drivers on the road, just not their own cars.

Because you are the best driver you know...

I think there is this general misconception that autonomous cars will turn up as a result of some kind of direct marketing push that tries to persuade people to switch.

For an ever increasing slice of the population it will be utility/price driven. The marketing will take care of the inadequates wedded to the illusions previously sold to them by the motoring industry over past decades (by selling them new illusions).

True - but with self-driving cars, people like driving so much that the drift toward full adoption will probably take many decades, if it happens at all.

Covered that some time ago. The self driving car can provide a realistic in-journey drive sim so the fully committed fossilfuelhead can waste their life playing out their favourite supercar fantasies; everyone’s a winner.

 

[kabbes]

Look far enough ahead and petrol engines will become obsolete due to a lack of the refuelling infrastructure needed to support them.

 

[Yossarian]

Because you are the best driver you know...

I don't even have a license, but I definitely get the impression that 95% of the people on the roads believe they are the best drivers they know.

 

[kabbes]

I don't even have a license, but I definitely get the impression that 95% of the people on the roads believe they are the best drivers they know.

They're right too

 

[Yossarian]

I can see cars with self-driving capabilities becoming fairly standard within 10 or 20 years - but fully driverless cars with no option for the human to take control? We'll probably have flying cars first.

It might be a different story in European cities but in North America, where a lot of places were built around cars and stuff like the "road trip" is deeply embedded in the culture, it will be many many years before people will want to give up driving. This survey from Canada sounds about right:

While one in four find "autonomous driving" appealing, the number significantly declines if the feature cannot be used after drinking alcohol.

Canadian drivers embrace safety feature concepts on futuristic connected cars

 

[mauvais]

Also , there is a type of machinery that certainly looks generically car-like but is not used for general road driving. Everything from tractors to the kind of Land Rover Defenders that are actually used to pull trailers around fields. Those kind of working vehicles are likely to remain in need of a human driver a lot longer than mass transport is. But that's fine -- if there continues to be a niche that autonomy can't fill, those niches will remain human.

I'm no expert but it seems to me that tractors and agri machinery are prime candidates for automation long before 'broad spectrum' vehicles. A lot are already GPS driven with a human supervisor.

 

[Dr. Furface]

I can see the technology maybe taking off in a few cities or small countries, but I don't think people in places like Texas are going to give up driving any sooner than they'll give up their guns.

That's probably right, in spite of all the statistics... Texas Car Accident Statistics - 2015-2016 | Rasansky Law Firm

 

[Idaho]

Look far enough ahead and petrol engines will become obsolete due to a lack of the refuelling infrastructure needed to support them.

They will be like vinyl bores

 

[DotCommunist]

and like us smokers they will be made to feel guilty for their crimes

 

[urbanspaceman]

From the RethinkX report:

"Mainstream analyses predict that individual vehicle ownership will continue as the principal consumer choice — the business-to-consumer model. This is due to a number of reasons, including the belief that “we love our cars” (like we loved our horses), and the fact that these analyses do not perceive the extent of cost savings from switching to TaaS."

The average US household will save $6,000 per year (after tax) by switching to EVs. Within that figure is embedded a 90% reduction in maintenance costs and a 90% reduction in insurance premiums. To resist the TaaS switchover is analogous rejecting a $10k pay rise - not rational behaviour. The report does suggest that 5% of the population will refuse to switch, composed of: a) really remote rural users, b) really rich folk, c) obsessive/ideological holdouts.

Even more intriguing is the prospect of completely free TaaS. Shared usage of a driverless minibus/car/cab/shuttle/module (what to call it ?) reduces prices so much that trips could be advertising-supported. Or perhaps there would be robo-Starbucks at the back, which would subsidise the trip. It's even more difficult to resist free transport.

The hundreds of millions of conventional cars aren't going to just vanish. One can imagine them sitting valueless and unsellable on driveways and in garages, throughout the 2020s, as people justify continued ownership for the annual road trip or whatever, but with actual mileage driven collapsing, as these cars age out, and people acclimatise to the new TaaS model.

Anecdote alert: I know a German car nut family, with a bunch of Porsches, etc. The son told me that he and his father fully expect to keep driving their much-loved toys - on track days, probably loading the cars onto robot transporters to ferry them to the track. So conventional cars will become their weekend hobby, just as their horses are now.

 

[Idaho]

and like us smokers they will be made to feel guilty for their crimes

Smokers feel guilty all by themselves. They know they are killing themselves but can't stop. The tension this causes is externalised as the world being against them.

 

[tim]

Plus, driving is great. it brings a level of personal freedom that cannot be matched by anything else.

I wouldn't have my current freedom to read or snooze on the way to or from work if I had to drive myself.

 

[Yossarian]

The average US household will save $6,000 per year (after tax) by switching to EVs. Within that figure is embedded a 90% reduction in maintenance costs and a 90% reduction in insurance premiums. To resist the TaaS switchover is analogous rejecting a $10k pay rise - not rational behaviour. The report does suggest that 5% of the population will refuse to switch, composed of: a) really remote rural users, b) really rich folk, c) obsessive/ideological holdouts.

When has driving ever been linked to rational behavior? If people were being all rational about it, the fact that fossil fuel use is destroying the planet would have changed people's ways.