I am sure that you have all seen
the recent headlines. This year of 2016 is taking off with a rush
with news about driverless autos. I have been fairly skeptical in
the past in my writing about them but there has been much progress
lately.
One of the first headlines that
I saw was this “Uber Makes Deal to Expand Its Reach Into
Public Transit.” Uber wants
to let the traditional transit systems remain the “middle miles”
of transportation while they take over the “first and last miles”.
In this way buses can concentrate on the spines of the system and
Uber make the door to door runs for transit riders. This could work
in the total absense of fully autonomous vehicles. Just how it plays
with the expense of daily trips for the lower income riders will
remain to be seen.
Then
came the announcement that “GM Invests $500 Million in
Lyft, Plans System for Self-Driving Cars.” Ford Motor Co. has
also made rumblings of additional research toward driverless vehicles
but without a dollar figure.
Then, on
the heels of Obama's final State of the Union address, in which he
made little mention of the recent FAST Act transportation bill signed
on Dec. 4, 2015 yet spoke of actions on the horizon, came this
announcement. “U.S. Proposes Spending $4 Billion
(over 10 years) on Self-Driving Cars.”
It would look as
though the Obama Administration is getting into the promotion of
autonomous vehicles. Anthony Foxx, the
Secretary of Transportation, made the first move during the Detroit
Auto Show with a statement about an “ongoing effort to see
connected and automated vehicles developed, deployed, on the market,
and available to US drivers.” Under the President's proposal the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) will be in
charge in drafting the framework for autonomous driving technology
that would encourage consistent rules across all 50 states.
Mr. Foxx declined to say whether he
expected bipartisan support for the proposed $4 billion
driverless-car investment in the president’s budget, but given the
Republican's penchant for rejecting anything with Obama's name on
it, I believe that there is doubt. Is this where the GOP rises up
and begins a campaign against the devastating and job-killing “war
on cars”?
Some people are already on that
track if you consider this, Self-driving
cars will kill the auto industry
“The trouble is, the traditional auto makers, no matter how hard they try, are not likely to survive in an era of self-driving automobiles. If there is one thing the history of technological disruption teaches us, and we have seen a heck of a lot of it in the last couple of decades, it is that when there is a decisive shift from one technology to another, it is new companies that learn how to use it, not the old ones.”
How quickly will the self-driving car
take off?
There has been a lot of investment, and
a lot of interest, but so far there are not many cars that you can
actually buy. Millennials seem to be shunning the industry as it is
since the expense of owning an auto on top of their anticipated
student loan payment could break their budget.
Those in the lower income levels are rapidly being priced out of car
ownership.
People
of my generation bought cars for the thrill of driving on the open
road. They have also lived with the drudgery of congested roadways
and traffic jams. They have struggled with the endless search for
limited downtown parking, yet kept the dream of technology that was
still in the sci-fi books only a few years ago alive.
How will they
deal with it when it becomes a reality?
