City living trends and predictions

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thom
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby thom » May 1st, 2018, 8:34 am

If ride-sharing apps, increased transit and computer-driven cars could reduce the number of vehicles on the road maybe we could make convert more of our streets to those proposals with Northside Greenway or etc. It'll be great to get back some of that acreage. (As you mention in your article.) I personally love to bike in them since they are more interesting than streets and have less traffic. Although crossing streets can be difficult.
Ride share automonous vehicles will reduce parking needs but increase congestion (cheap trips = more trips). Ride hail Uber and Lyft being cheaper than taxis have already increased congestion in NYC and already allowing people to ditch individually owned cars. When even cheaper because driverless, impact multiplied. The super cheap door-to-door chaffeur-like service is what will make people ditch owning a car - for less than cost of insur, gas, tabs and maintainance of a paid for car, you could get driven everywhere you want to go...what's not to like unless you have lots of gear you store in vehicle.

I suspect renting an autonomous electric vehicle micro.apartments will become a thing in expensive cities, they may even drive most of time (cheap fuel and car lanes are a free commons, for now) ... or have a series of further out, cheaper real estate hubs they can "dock" at night for common amenities, gyms, party rooms, storage etc. After alkll, street-parked vans are being rented in CA and the "land"lords move them around as city requires.

To deal with congestion, we will have to have lane use fees (gas taxes will be toast) , and preferably surge prices for peak time use and pricing that enocurages shared vehicles (shuttles, buses) in most congested areas, times.

All the freed up parking in developed places will be great unless you own real estate surrounded by parking.lots. or ramps.

But the autonomous vehicles will be like swarms of sharks on our roads, always moving, unless we charge them.
I bet the current roads would handle much higher volumes if people would drive 'correctly'. Autonomous vehicles will be better drivers and much more efficient users of space than human drivers. Eliminating most of the need for private vehicle parking means that lanes used for car storage can be used by efficient autonomous vehicles. If anything, things should improve.

tmart
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby tmart » May 1st, 2018, 8:44 am

I bet the current roads would handle much higher volumes if people would drive 'correctly'. Autonomous vehicles will be better drivers and much more efficient users of space than human drivers. Eliminating most of the need for private vehicle parking means that lanes used for car storage can be used by efficient autonomous vehicles. If anything, things should improve.
A lot of the limits on throughput right now are physical. AVs will have better reaction times than humans, but there's still a need to leave a stopping distance based on your speed. (Plus, many humans are already following closer than is safe!) And ultimately, even three cars moving perfectly bumper-to-bumper would carry 3 passengers but take up the space of a bus carrying 40. Trains do better still. AVs will help, but only on the margins. They're not a structural solution to getting lots of people through crowded, valuable urban land.

thom
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby thom » May 1st, 2018, 8:49 am

I bet the current roads would handle much higher volumes if people would drive 'correctly'. Autonomous vehicles will be better drivers and much more efficient users of space than human drivers. Eliminating most of the need for private vehicle parking means that lanes used for car storage can be used by efficient autonomous vehicles. If anything, things should improve.
A lot of the limits on throughput right now are physical. AVs will have better reaction times than humans, but there's still a need to leave a stopping distance based on your speed. (Plus, many humans are already following closer than is safe!) And ultimately, even three cars moving perfectly bumper-to-bumper would carry 3 passengers but take up the space of a bus carrying 40. Trains do better still. AVs will help, but only on the margins. They're not a structural solution to getting lots of people through crowded, valuable urban land.
Sure, but a lot of the congestion that comes from merge points, etc, would be relieved, speeds could be increased in many situations, and stoplights could be integrated to run much more efficiently, etc. Once you let computers do a lot of the dirty work, a lot of the inefficiencies that we intentionally inflict into the system for safety reasons can be eliminated.

Silophant
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby Silophant » May 1st, 2018, 8:56 am

Those are also the inefficiencies that allow pedestrians and bikes to exist on the roads, though.
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mplsjaromir
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby mplsjaromir » May 1st, 2018, 8:58 am

I doubt that autonomous cars will be better at driving anytime soon. The most viable autonomous cars today require maps that need an immense amount of human input and upkeep. There is no real time table as to when AI alone will be able to create reliable maps. The cars struggle to interpret the movements of one pedestrian, they will be absolutely flummoxed by one hundred. Uber has tried shortcuts and killed someone.

The best attribute that autonomous vehicles will have is an inhuman level of patience. I would not be surprised if owners of autonomous vehicles will program that out to get a greater ROI from their investment.

Even Epic Freaking Winsauce Engineer Elon Musk has admitted that excessive AI and automation at Tesla has been a mistake. Autonomous cars a useful distraction to people who refuse to grapple with the issues of land use, pollution/CO2 concentration, congestion etc. Also the broader AI/Automation evangelism is useful to those who want to discipline labor. "Don't ask for a raise because a robot is gonna take your job!"

amiller92
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby amiller92 » May 1st, 2018, 9:09 am

Sure, but a lot of the congestion that comes from merge points, etc, would be relieved, speeds could be increased in many situations, and stoplights could be integrated to run much more efficiently, etc. Once you let computers do a lot of the dirty work, a lot of the inefficiencies that we intentionally inflict into the system for safety reasons can be eliminated.
Sounds lovely for everyone not in a car.

Even with better operators (if that ever actually comes to pass), adding lanes and increasing speeds is the exact opposite of what we should be doing in the city, unless we want to continue killing it with cars. Even if they don't continue to massacre people who aren't in them (which right now it doesn't look like they are able to avoid), they aren't going to be pleasant to be around.

tmart
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby tmart » May 1st, 2018, 9:34 am

I want to draw a distinction: AVs are rapidly getting better at driving, even if the "AVs operate highways at peak efficiency" Futurama is still far off in the distance. Waymo (Google) is buying tens of thousands of vehicles and testing them without drivers on public roads. And as soon as one company starts revenue service, we should expect at least a few others (hi, Uber) to rush to market whether they're ready or not.

The time to regulate AVs is now. The political will will only be harder to muster once people incorporate them into their daily routines, and tech companies are not going to wait for governments to get their acts together before turning these things loose.

We should have city ordinances on the books dictating where they're allowed to go, how they're allowed to behave when they're not serving passengers, where they are allowed to pick up and drop off, and what fees they pay the city for use of public infrastructure. We should have a prohibition on net new lane-miles, whether autonomous-only or otherwise, in the city limits. We should strongly consider designating facilities for unused AVs to discourage idle circulation, and charging per-mile for unoccupied travel to encourage the use of these spaces.

And we need state laws dictating how many million miles of test travel are needed to begin revenue service, separate test requirements for operating in snow or ice, what rate of incidents-per-million-miles is permissible, what emissions are permissible (I vote zero), and what the penalty and procedure is when these things get in accidents.

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mplsjaromir
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby mplsjaromir » May 1st, 2018, 9:52 am

Waymo has figured that if you manually map all possible areas where a autonomous will travel, a vehicle can be okay, albeit slower than a normal taxi. Do I foresee entire cities being manually mapped and then constantly updated by Waymo? No. Impossible to know if they are anywhere near being profitable. Waymo could easily go the way of Goodle Plus and Google Glass. Neat exercises in technology but no pathway to profitability. Waymo is referred to under the category of "Other Bet" in Alphabet's filings to the SEC.

I am totally on board with getting ahead and heavily taxing autonomous vehicles.

Bob Stinson's Ghost
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby Bob Stinson's Ghost » May 1st, 2018, 9:58 am

In 10 years this discussion of the technical problems of AV's is going to look pretty quaint. The real obstacles are social ones, like the fact that to achieve the theoretical efficiency improvements they will have to be fully occupied during rush hour, meaning a lot of time in close proximity to strangers. Sharing a cab is far more intimate than riding a train.

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mplsjaromir
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby mplsjaromir » May 1st, 2018, 10:06 am

Who knows? Back in 1970s when autonomous vehicle testing began the timeline to full automation was estimated to be 10 years.

There are people who have paid Tesla $3,500 for a self-driving mode that doesn't exist. PT Barnum had a famous saying in regards to people like that.

tmart
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby tmart » May 1st, 2018, 11:01 am

Waymo has figured that if you manually map all possible areas where a autonomous will travel, a vehicle can be okay, albeit slower than a normal taxi. Do I foresee entire cities being manually mapped and then constantly updated by Waymo?
Google already drives cars covered in cameras around every corner of every major city for Street View, and has for over a decade. We make assumptions about technical and economic readiness at our own peril.

I'm not guaranteeing that AVs are going to be ready ASAP, but I do think there will be serious attempts to put them in wide public use and make money off of them soon. The right attitude IMO is to overestimate their readiness when it comes to regulating and preparing for costs and risks, but underestimate their readiness when it comes to solving traffic and parking problems. Plan for the worst, hope for the best.

We underestimated how quickly widespread adoption of cars would unravel urban life. We all wish a more skeptical approach had been taken when building 35W and 94, and when ripping out the streetcars and intercity trains. There is definitely a vocal lobby that wants to use AVs as an opportunity to give cars an even greater role in our society, our land use, our laws, and our infrastructure. Government's role is to ensure they are a natural, iterative improvement over the cars we have today, and not a massive disruption like cars were.

mattaudio
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby mattaudio » May 1st, 2018, 12:10 pm

Add me to the camp that believes autonomous vehicles are more likely to make streets and cities far far worse.

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mplsjaromir
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby mplsjaromir » May 1st, 2018, 12:16 pm

Waymo has pay people to rectify images and data collected from LIDAR. It is a time consuming task that has to constantly performed as cities are dynamic.

A concern would be the owners of maps lobbying cities to prevent them and land owners from making modifications that would inconvenience the owners of the maps. Basically legislating that cities remain static.

thom
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby thom » May 1st, 2018, 1:17 pm

Do I foresee entire cities being manually mapped and then constantly updated by Waymo?
Google also has Streetview. Why wouldn't they just integrate Streetview cameras onto the Waymo cars so that the cars can keep the maps updated in real time?

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mplsjaromir
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby mplsjaromir » May 1st, 2018, 2:05 pm

They already use streetview. It is not enough, the streetview images have to be manually referenced to LIDAR data. Google themselves admit they have no ideas on how that process could be automated.

karen nelson
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby karen nelson » May 8th, 2018, 6:47 am

The time to regulate AVs is now. The political will will only be harder to muster once people incorporate them into their daily routines, and tech companies are not going to wait for governments to get their acts together before turning these things loose.

We should have city ordinances on the books dictating where they're allowed to go, how they're allowed to behave when they're not serving passengers, where they are allowed to pick up and drop off, and what fees they pay the city for use of public infrastructure. We should have a prohibition on net new lane-miles, whether autonomous-only or otherwise, in the city limits. We should strongly consider designating facilities for unused AVs to discourage idle circulation, and charging per-mile for unoccupied travel to encourage the use of these spaces.
This abive, times a thousand.

We could end up with as Comcast is to ISP, Uber will be to ride-hailed AVs, with much bigger stakes than simply overly expensive, slower internet than rest of world enjoys, our whole day to day city life and transportation systems will be on the line.

Look how hard customer protections for internet have been to get in legislation, regulations for stuff like net neutrality that polls bery popularly.

When Austin played tough, and asked for Uber etc to vet their drivers as well as taxi companies had to Uber left in fit and everyone was mad they didn't have Uber.

Imagine a city that makes a stand as Waymo or Uber AVs become popular and beloved, the city asks for common sense stuff that will only slightly eat into profitability of AV systems and yet make world of difference for the city. If that city makes a stand the citizens cant get Waymo or Uber like the people in X city do, what do you think will happen?

One city is not enough, we have organize our arse off and do it right quick or we will miss a once in 50-100 year chance to do this in best way possible.

With ride-hailed electric AVs state and cities will lose gas tax revenue, parking ticket revenue, car tabs, moving violation revenue, so we will have to make up for that. When ICE cars became a thing, gas taxes spread to many states.

So new tax regime to pay for our roads will be needed and we need to get this right.

Surge pricing, congestion pricing seems appropriate and if the AV systems have enough competition that could naturally go into subsidizing off peak use but if there isn't competition, (see Comcast) then we need to tax congestion to capture that revenue ourselves AND discourage wasteful use of road. We can also charge higher tax for single occupant vehicles, small deliveries using whole vehicle, and heavy trucks that do most damage to roads, whatever makes sense to make sure of street resources efficiently. We can make ride share shuttles free and individual occupant vehicles at peak times cost. We can tax per miles, trips etc.

NYC is allergic to congestion tax but they rightly have made the ride share companies share all their data with the city.

We need to have a good plan to democractically shape this massive tech change for the better and we need multiple cities to make similar stands in United front and we need to keep state legislatures and federal government from pre-empting cities doing this.

If we do it well from beginning, it will end up being accepted as okay and good and helpful and even conservatives will protect, (such as public internet Chattanooga or public water systems, public utilities etc) but if we wait and let these companies get entrenched, we will have missed an amazing opportunity.

Anondson
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby Anondson » July 1st, 2018, 10:48 pm

On the growing trend in some new developments towards “walkability”.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-makes ... 1530065220

Chef
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby Chef » July 23rd, 2018, 9:16 am

On the subject of ridesharing, it is important to remember that Uber and Lyft have never turned a profit and are not close to turning a profit. Currently they are using venture capital to subsidize cheap rides. That probably isn't a viable long term business strategy. Also they are using the independent contractor status of their drivers as an end run around labor laws. If some future government decides that their drivers need to be considered employees they will probably be done as companies. The food delivery company Postmates has already settled a class action suit on this subject that claimed that they were using independent contractor status to circumvent minimum wage laws.

bubzki2
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Re: City living trends and predictions

Postby bubzki2 » October 9th, 2018, 1:14 pm

Bloomberg: The Midwest Tells Us an Interesting Growth Story

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles ... -recession

Some interesting data points here.

Anondson
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City living trends and predictions

Postby Anondson » October 9th, 2018, 1:25 pm

Good stuff in there.

Anyone know the data for Rochester’s growth since 2000?


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