Posted on 11/07/2017 8:24:03 AM PST by Hojczyk
It saddens me to say it, but we are approaching the end of the automotive era.
The auto industry is on an accelerating change curve. For hundreds of years, the horse was the prime mover of humans and for the past 120 years it has been the automobile.
Now we are approaching the end of the line for the automobile because travel will be in standardized modules.
The end state will be the fully autonomous module with no capability for the driver to exercise command. You will call for it, it will arrive at your location, you'll get in, input your destination and go to the freeway.
On the freeway, it will merge seamlessly into a stream of other modules traveling at 120, 150 mph. The speed doesn't matter. You have a blending of rail-type with individual transportation.
Then, as you approach your exit, your module will enter deceleration lanes, exit and go to your final destination. You will be billed for the transportation. You will enter your credit card number or your thumbprint or whatever it will be then. The module will take off and go to its collection point, ready for the next person to call.
Most of these standardized modules will be purchased and owned by the Ubers and Lyfts and God knows what other companies that will enter the transportation business in the future.
A minority of individuals may elect to have personalized modules sitting at home so they can leave their vacation stuff and the kids' soccer gear in them. They'll still want that convenience.
The vehicles, however, will no longer be driven by humans because in 15 to 20 years — at the latest — human-driven vehicles will be legislated off the highways.
(Excerpt) Read more at autonews.com ...
Bob Lutz is quite the car guy, loves Trump and thinks Tesla will go bankrupt. While I think he’s jumping the gun considerably (by decades) I have no doubt that it’s heading in exactly the direction he describes. Do I think it’s a “good” think individually? No, I hate it. I’m very suspicious and the prospect of self-driving cars just leaves me cold. But from a societal standpoint, I can see why it’s regarded as very appealing. It just doesn’t appeal to me, not right now. Check back in thirty years when my reflexes have slowed, my feet might be numb due to neuropathy, my vision is shot and I might not even be capable of driving anymore. Then, it would make perfect sense and be very appealing.
That depends on where you live. I can take you on many a road trip where highway overcrowding is not close to being a problem.
People like the author, and some in this discussion, seem to think that the environment in their immediate vicinity is indicative of the country/world at large.
There are places in this country where having few cars on the road would be a good thing.
There are places in this country where having a car can mean the difference between life and death.
You will never legislate individual transportation out of existence. There may be areas where use will be limited (probably by making it cost prohibitive with tolls and taxes) and few individuals in that area will own cars, but to suggest that the days of car ownership are numbered is ludicrous.
“For hundreds of years, the horse was the prime mover of humans”
Far longer than that plus other animals such as the camel.
Lutz is wrong.
A reaction to technology managing every move of our day is going to be the next revolution, and a necessary one in order to put technology into service we need and seek instead of us being managed into adopting what serves the arrogant technologists more than anyone else.
Do you suppose such advances will be made widely available when TPTB seem determined to reduce global population? I don’t.
So Bob Lutz is the 0bama of the auto industry?
I lived in a small town in OK, rush hour around 4 pm resulted in a car ahead of you at the light, maybe one behind you too.
No, he’s not. That’s the really dismaying part.
The complexity of newer cars with their electronic garbage and emission/global warming restrictions will go along way twoard conditioning folks to not even wanting to keep their cars.
The automoblike, muscle cars, PU Trucks of the past have all now been bastardized to the point that it (the personal car/truck, etc. is no longer a symbo and or means of our last vestige of...dare I say it—FREEDOM! That’s a stretch!
Conditioning, overwhelming, robbing, etc. we the folks isn’t even noticed anymore. Try explainin thaat to these younger beings that now vastly outnumber us former Americans, now AINOs!
Enuff! Y’All get the Pic!
Gunny G @ Planet WTF!
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Obama wanted us little people to all live in projects.
Dependent on his government for everything.
Never more sure of any vote that I ever cast.
I can see the government abuse this would invite....
Citizen: "Car. Take me to the my kid's school."
Car: "Redirecting to Doctors Office."
Citizen: "No I said my KID'S SCHOOL and hurry up, I'm running late to pick them up"
Car: "Unable to comply. Code Blue Override. Redirecting to Doctor's Office"
Citizen: "Why are you unable to comply?!? What is a Code Blue Override?!?"
Car: "Searching....You failed to attend your last three scheduled Obamacare physicals. By order of DHHS Code Blue Override all but emergency travel is locked until a Doctor's office visit is completed."
Sci-Fi, maybe in 100 years, 150 years, but not in our children’s lifetime.
I have read this scenario in many Heinlein, Asimov and Clarke novels, dating back to the 40’s.
But individual transport will not change appreciably.
Even if we go 100% total electric, run time will improve, charge times will shorten, batteries will last longer and people will go places..............................
I know people who live in places where cell phones don’t work, police response time is maybe 30 minutes and such. Do we really think there will be a pod just waiting for them?
The other day, I decided I needed to replace some old socks and underwear. I left the house and hopped into my car, drove to the store and bought them.
Instead, I’d have to think ahead and then decide if I want to spend the transport money. I also can’t make multiple stops because there is nowhere to store what I bought at one store while at the next.
There’s a reason I don’t live in a row house downtown. I desire freedom and not being at the mercy of Uber, Checker or the bus
The car problem is growing and the highways are overcrowded
Unless Immigration is enforced, in which case the United States has a declining population jus like Europe. In that case we don’t.
Go Trump!
Until you go to dirt/gravel/rock roads or off road.
Never happen.
WHERE IS MY FLYING CAR????
I think you make some good points, but to me, this is just the climax of the left’s wet dream.
For decades they have cajoled and tried to get the government to demand that we all get herded about in buses, trollies, and various other public transit schemes, including carpool lanes. Self driving cars, especially those owned by some company or corporation, will distinctly lesson individual freedom and my guess is that self driving cars are just a stone’s throw away from legislating people to ride share - at best, or turning this all into public transportation.
It’s not hard to imagine the government in the hands of leftists outlawing individual cars and mandating how people will move, i.e., may not move alone unless under strictly limited circumstances to avoid “obscene waste and harmful environmental impacts, such as globull warming”.
No, I have little or no problem with trucking companies developing and using driverless vehicles (assuming safety), but on a mass scale? Only in some totalitarian dystopia.
What a boat load of crap. Maybe, just maybe in heavily populated areas which is likely the bubble this pre-DICK-tor lives in.
The best possible computer there is for controlling a motor vehicle in all types of conditions and locations is the human brain. It’s self programming by a method called experience.
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