Uh, no. What makes trains unsafe is that they are trains ... which means that -- like everything else in life -- they never have a 0% failure rate.
It's really that simple.
Here's a perfect case in point ...
Don't take the exact numbers here at face value, but I read somewhere that the average person in the U.S. who gets a driver's license at the age of 17 and drives for 60 years will depress a brake pedal three million times while driving forward, and will get in three motor vehicle crashes that would have been prevented if the brakes were applied correctly. That's a "failure rate" of one in a million, or 0.0001%. Can you think of any automated product that operates this efficiently?
You obviously distrust technology, while I on the other hand distrust the average American.
I envision the technology being used almost exclusively on the interstates, and executed so well that it wont have to be “pushed” on anyone.
Thousands or heck MILLIONS of cars linked via computer and programmed properly could make rush hour interstate traffic a distant nightmare relic of the past. Robocars could travel safely at extreme speeds and merge and unmerge flawlessly if all the other cars are also linked and the actions of all are coordinated.
Now.. off the interstates... or especially on small rural roads... maned driving will be the norm for many decades to come.