Sue Halpern writes insightfully about technology for the New York Review of Books. Below are a few excerpts from an essay/review of Driverless: Intelligent Cars and the Road Ahead, by Hod Lipson and Melba Kurman, MIT Press, 312 pp., $29.95.
The article is ‘locked’ – for subscribers only. The quotes below are, I hope, within the realm of “fair use.”
For generations of Americans especially, and young Americans even more, driving and the open road promised a kind of freedom: the ability to light out for the territory, even if the territory was only the mall one town over. Autonomous vehicles also come with the promise of freedom, the freedom of getting places without having to pay attention to the open (or, more likely, clogged) road, and with it, the freedom to sleep, work, read e-mail, text, play, have sex, drink a beer, watch a movie, or do nothing at all. In the words of the Morgan Stanley analysts, whose enthusiasm is matched by advocates in Silicon Valley and cheerleaders in Detroit, driverless vehicles will deliver us to a “utopian society.”
That utopia looks something like this: fleets of autonomous vehicles—call them taxi bots—owned by companies like Uber and Google, able to be deployed on demand, that will eliminate, for the most part, the need for private car ownership. (Currently, most privately owned cars sit idle for most of the day, simply taking up space and depreciating in value.) Fewer privately owned vehicles will result in fewer cars on the road overall. With fewer cars will come fewer traffic jams and fewer accidents. Fewer accidents will enable cars to be made from lighter materials, saving on fuel. They will be smaller, too, since cars will no longer need to be armored against one another.
With less private car ownership, individuals will be freed of car payments, fuel and maintenance costs, and insurance premiums. Riders will have more disposable income and less debt. The built environment will improve as well, as road signs are eliminated—smart cars always know where they are and where they are going—and parking spaces, having become obsolete, are converted into green spaces. And if this weren’t utopian enough, the Morgan Stanley analysts estimate that switching to full vehicle autonomy will save the United States economy alone $1.3 trillion a year.
She goes on to describe the technical challenges, such as, what will a car’s “perception” be and how it will be programmed to deal with various life and death situations? She asks: “Will members of car-sharing services have to waive their right to sue if a fleet car gets in an accident? And how will blame be assessed? Was the accident the fault of software that didn’t accurately read the road, or the municipality that didn’t maintain the road? Tort law is likely to be as challenged by the advent of self-driving cars as the automobile industry itself.”
Looking more broadly at the societal issues, she notes: “It does not take a sophisticated algorithm to figure out that the winners in the decades ahead are going to be those who own the robots, for they will have vanquished labor with their capital. In the case of autonomous vehicles, a few companies are now poised to control a necessary public good, the transportation of people to and from work, school, shopping, recreation, and other vital activities.” And, “lawmakers in this country are now using the autonomous vehicle future laid out by companies like Uber and Google to block investment in mass transit.”
What of all the people who will end up on the dole – all the drivers of trucks and taxis, supporting themselves and their families, clawing their way toward a decent standard of living?
Getting into the realm of the creepy, she imagines a scenario of “Google offering rides for free as long as passengers are willing to “share” the details of where they are going, what they are buying, who they are with, and which products their eyes are drawn to on the ubiquitous (but targeted!) ads that are playing in the car’s cabin.”
I was pondering all this as I watched a UPS driver deliver a package to the house next door and imagined a driverless delivery vehicle doing this job. There was nowhere to park on the block, but he managed to double-park on the corner, make his way back to the house, negotiate its latched front gate and pacify the dog, climb the stairs and chat with the customer. Will neighbourhoods have to be redesigned to accommodate robots, or will a human ride along, maybe watching videos or updating his Facebook page, in order to make the delivery itself? There’s a job for you!
Will there ever be a time where a techno-revolution such as this will be banned for not being in the public good?
This does sound Orwellian. But we have to keep in mind who owns the road and transit systems, more importantly the land they sit on. It’s not Google or Uber. And it’s vast. In the Metro it rings in at about 320 km2.
If these private companies really feel they need to control society by controlling transportation without owning their own private roads, then they’d better be prepared to offer trillions across the continent.
On the other hand, decision makers can conduct cost-benefit studies of privatization. I think they will quickly conclude it’s not in the public interest to do so in part because of the cross-jurisdictional ownership and management complexity, and next to fully walkable neighbourhoods, public transit is already one of the most efficient and affordable ways to transport people. Self-driving trains are already commonplace and go to the most common large destinations, though the routes are fixed.
Therefore, Uber, Lyft, Google and other makers of autonomous cars will have to play by the same rules as everyone else and accept limitations to their intrusions into social life. I already live in a pretty good walkable community, so I will not be divulging my personal spending habits into a microphone embedded into the dashboard of an autonomous car, let alone calling one up.
For hundreds of years we’ve lost jobs to some kind of automation and we’ve just created other jobs.
What is it (some people in) the US hates so much about mass transit? It will still play a big role even with AVs.
The UPSbot won’t have to double park because there won’t be parked cars. I’ll bet drones do the last step of the delivery if necessary. All you’ll need is a secure delivery box or some such thing that only opens with an authorized package delivery. No signature required and no flying dogs to worry about (I hope). But, yes, our cities will probably look quite different by the time AVs are ubiquitous.
“Fewer privately owned vehicles will result in fewer cars on the road overall”
WRONG!!!!
Fewer TRIPS would result in fewer cars on the road. But if people still insist on commuting by themselves in an autonomous car (and the way some people look down their noses at “public transit” suggests this may largely be the case) then congestion is going to be just as bad as it ever was.
The silver lining isn’t that individual cars will be autonomous – it’s that buses will also be autonomous. That will drastically reduce the cost of transit by eliminating the most expensive component – labour – which might, just might, attract more riders.
Nice science fiction. Why own a house or condo if you can rent one ? Yet 50-70% still own. Ditto with cars. Yes we will see more car sharing and likely less cars overall but those that can afford a car with AV features or enhanced AV mode will still want to own on and not share it with strangers. That is the same reason why many folks drive a car even if it is faster and certainly cheaper to take a subway or SkyTrain or bus.
The cost of a car is not that high as say a house or an airplane. Many will continue to chose to own as many do not want utilitarian minimum comfort cheap car sharing as that offered by Evo or Car2Go today. Where are the Mercedes, BMW, Lexus, Audi or Infiniti based car share services ?
Nothing you’ve said here makes this science fiction. Nobody said nobody will own their own AVs. Clearly there are a lot of reasons why many many people will decide not to own given this choice. So what is your point?
BTW, RON van – respect to you standing up to the bicycle helmet evangelists.
I had a brief experiment with helmet use and found it to be dangerous on many levels. Fortunately, I’ve only been harassed once by a Uniform, but it’s unpleasant knowing they can insinuate themselves into your peaceful ecological life.
Likewise, it’s irritating that some bone-headed motorist, coasting through stop signs, speeding, sucking on a coffee or cigarette, chewing on a snack, quacking on a phone, polluting our world, killing and maiming us … gets to wag their finger if we don’t wear a helmet. The sinner gets to point at a red herring.
There are two provisions for not using a helmet – wearing a turban, or for medical reasons. I wonder if doctor patient confidentiality would supercede the demands of an enforcer. If you say it’s for medical reasons, that should be the end of it.
Thanks Arnie.
A little OT but I think you have to get a doctor’s note and have it authorized by the DMV. On the other hand I know somebody who just has the doctor’s note without authorization and the cops have accepted it – at least once anyway. But it still lets the police impose on you for no good reason.
The difference between owning a house and a car should seem obvious to someone in real estate. One asset appreciates. The other does not.
As for ‘luxury’ brands (an easy way to separate dumb rich people from their money) what do they offer that I can’t find in an EVO Toyota? It’s got it all, from heated seats to lane drift and braking warnings. Does a BMW get some super secret radio station just for the wealthy? Of course Car2Go already offers Mercedes 4 door cars here in Vancouver, and Zipcar and Modo have all kinds of different models to choose from.
And if you really, really need to wave it around, there are all kinds of luxury car rental services, town car or limo options etc. Drive oneself? How gauche. It’s almost as if the various car share companies involved do their market research and decided that catering to upper class twits isn’t a money maker.
With your kind of thinking BMW, Mercedes, Lexus, Bentley, Audi, Rolls Royce etc. should all be out of business. But they are not. What does that tell you ?
No one is forced to buy a $80,000 car when a car for $12,000 also gets them from A to B, yet millions do. Why is that ?
What does that tell you ?
Rich people are really, really insecure and there’s a market in catering to that?
It’s hard to go broke pandering to the wealthy’s need to advertise their status. And I think they are all sub-brands of bigger companies at this point. Half these cars are just re-badged versions of some other model lower down the food chain.
None of the brands you mention even crack the top ten automakers by revenue.
80,000 isn’t even that expensive a vehicle. You can’t even buy a butt-ugly Escalade for that.
“Same Car, Different Brand, Hugely Higher Price: Why Pay An Extra $30,000 For Fake Prestige?”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/eamonnfingleton/2013/07/04/same-car-different-brand-hugely-higher-price-why-pay-an-extra-30000-for-fake-prestige/#501ad10149ee
“Rolls-Royce Motor Cars is pleased to announce that its 2015 sales were the second-highest ever recorded in its 112-year history. A total of 3,785 hand-built motor cars were commissioned by customers worldwide last year.”
Nobody beyond the rich and vapid gives a crap whether luxury marques disappear from the face of the earth.
https://www.press.rolls-roycemotorcars.com/rolls-royce-motor-cars-pressclub/article/detail/T0249766EN/rolls-royce-motor-cars-celebrates-second-highest-sales-record-in-marque%E2%80%99s-112-year-history?language=en
Envious ?
That is how socialism works. Everyone deserves the same, the same old low end crap !!
Has it occurred to you that people actually PREFER a nice car over an ugly or cheap one ? That they like it ?
Why build luxury homes with 5000 sq ft and an ocean view if a 750 sq ft 2BR condo really is all you require ?
Why not have one brand of coats too ? All grey ? Isn’t this how China or the old Soviet Union used to look like, or Cuba still does ? THIS is what you aspire to ?
You may wish to give your head a shake ! or better: get out there and live in these hell holes for a year and see why life is better here !
Has it occurred to you that that is why people from all over the world line up by the MILLIONS to get into Europe, Canada, USA, Australia or NZ to get a better life ? because they know a BMW is better than a Tata, and that is truly attainable if you come here with next to nothing and work ?
Envious? LOL. I drive pretty much brand new cars every time I get behind the wheel. Go free market! It’s working when it comes to car sharing
I note that you post another remark full of strawmen and nonsense that no one has put forth but yourself, including any suggestion of socialism.
You get no respect for your comments despite whatever money you may have accumulated. And that’s the rub isn’t it? We’re all supposed to fall under the Beyer spell and believe junk opinions are wisdom. Maybe you just need to buy something really, really expensive (I’d suggest a Porsche — but not a Cayenne which is a dressed up Volkswagen) and we’ll all fall under the spell of your deep thoughts. But I wouldn’t bet the portfolio on it if I were you.
You asked why there is no luxury car-sharing service. It was answered. You compared cars and houses. Fail. You’re offended that some of us find rich people amusing? Can’t help ya there.
All the car companies see the future of car share as a profit centre – mini-leasing as it were. Mercedes is already invested – Car2Go is their subsidiary.
Correct. We will see more car sharing. I heard that Toyota is using Evo as a test bed and then will clone Car2Go worldwide. http://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/evo-car-share-expands-borders-and-adds-more-cars-for-third-time-since-launch-581548391.html
BMW just opened, far too late, ReachNow in Seattle. http://www.bmwcarsharing.com or called DriveNow in Europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DriveNow
Yet: just because sharing is more common, like renting an apartment, does not mean that ownership will disappear. E-cars or AV will not change it all that much. Unclear also if we will see therfore fewer cars on the road. if 50,000 folks want to get from N-Van to Vancouver from 4 to 7 pm then does it matter if they are shared, owned, leased or self-driving ?
The peak usage of roads is the commute to work and back. Assuming people still need to get to work and back, the only difference driverless cars would make is that in addition to the existing commute traffic, you would also have to deal with all of the driverless cars getting to people’s houses to pick them up, and then finding somewhere to go after dropping them off.
The power of the mythology of the shiny new technology saviour is so strong in our culture that people who you’d think could manage to consider obvious facts such as the above, are completely incapable of turning their brain on for even a second.
I don’t agree with Thomas very often, but at least his brain hasn’t been turned into goo by the promise of shiny technology.
“Assuming people still need to get to work and back”
Which way is this trend heading?
At an even more fundamental level, the argument seems to be:
a) the technology will make it easier, cheaper, better to make a trip by car, therefore:
b) people will take fewer trips by car
If driverless cars ever happen, they will bring benefits for sure, but I don’t know why anyone takes this utopian scenario seriously.
“Which way is this trend heading?”
The trend has nothing to do with driverless cars and is thus irrelevant to the discussion here around the impacts of driverless cars.
To the extent there is a connection, the only impact driverless cars will have is to encourage more people to commute longer distances to work.
AVs might cause even more cars on the road, actually. If it costs $5 to hail an AV car then why take a bus that takes 3 times as long @ $2, say in W-Van to go shopping at Park Royal ?
Do we honestly expect Park Royal in W-Van to abandon its vast parking lot or even 50% of it if AVs can drop people off and then disappear into the neighborhood to clog those streets in search of a parking spot or another passengers? We need vast regulations where ZOVs (zero occupied vehicle) can park. Will W Van house owners cheer that ? Or will they likely complain that far too much traffic in search of a parking spot or the next passenger is now roaming the streets ? Will they allow ZOVs onto Lionsgate bridge after the owner was dropped at work from N-Van ? Will the streets of New York look any different if the yellow cab are driverless ? Hardly.
In any case, it shall be interesting !
Yes, Park Royal is likely to abandon a portion of its vast parking lots. They have been doing it steadily for years. Look at all the new construction (buildings, not car storage) in what used to be surface parking lots in front of Park Royal South.
“We need vast regulations”
It is surprising to hear you call for vast regulations, and larger government to enact and enforce those regulations, given your constant calls for less government. We don’t need vast regulations, we need appropriate road pricing. Automated. And with tolls not particularly linked to whether the vehicle being charged is moving or parked.
Tolls yes. Regulations: yes. Tolls is ONE form of regulations. Will Park Royal, like UBC, export its parking requirements onto neighborhoods ?
Actually UBC slashed private vehicle use and parking demand with the U-Pass. We’re likely to see more of that with or without AVs. Unfortunately your pals in Victoria haven’t grasped that yet.
I live at UBC. Because parking on UBC campus is indeed not free anymore but a whooping $10-12/day, many students park for free on Marine Drive and in Point Grey, then take the bus for free from there. See some pictures here how squatting in the modern car era looks like: https://pricetags.wordpress.com/2016/03/07/free-parking-is-like-squatting/ I also call this “exporting of your parking requirement onto neighborhoods”
Charge for street parking. Problem solved. Probably the only thing I agree with you on.
“The trend has nothing to do with driverless cars”.
How odd then that you have made the daily commute a key point in your argument. The trend toward automation of some jobs and ‘work-from-home’ options for many others may not be directly related to driverless cars, but both will certainly have an impact on the amount of commuters on any given day. So, I ask again, which way is the trend going?
Not only will these trends make it more likely there will be fewer daily commuters, it makes it more likely that those who only work 2-3 days a week at a central location and do the rest of their work from a home office, coffee shop, or wherever would engage with car-sharing type arrangements with a driverless component — for the few days they need a private transportation solution.
Most people could probably do the math and figure out owning a car 24/7 is pointless when one uses it for 3-4 hours a week at best. That trend is already with us and likely to accelerate. Esp. if the choice (for low-mid income workers) becomes one of buying a non-autonomous vehicle because that’s all you can afford to own, or pay a small on-demand fee for the latest and greatest robo-car a couple times a week.
“How odd then that you have made the daily commute a key point in your argument.”
The commute, yes, the trend, no. Unless the trend goes so far that the morning commute is no longer the peak of traffic (hardly imminent), then it is irrelevant.
This is not that complicated. My point is that driverless cars will make the traffic peak worse, not better.
“it makes it more likely that those who only work 2-3 days a week at a central location and do the rest of their work from a home office, coffee shop, or wherever would engage with car-sharing type arrangements with a driverless component”
Maybe, but if they do, that still mean more cars on the road, not less.
Since you keep changing the subject rather than engaging my point, I’ll assume you agree with me.
Your point is that the daily commute must be considered when talking about autonomous vehicles. I haven’t changed the subject. I’ve stuck to it. In the face of some counter-arguments to your position, you are making big assumptions to support your orig. position — the most ludicrous of which is that a changing landscape for employment won’t impact rush hour. Maybe it will make it more clogged. You haven’t made any points to support this. Quite the opposite.
Seriously, how many cars are purchased with commuting in mind? And changing commute patterns shouldn’t be regarded as a factor to consider with regard to changing technology?
Whatever.
@Some Guy, your assumption that AVs would make peak traffic worse is ill-founded. It is based on the idea that there would be a lot of empty cars driving around looking for passengers or returning empty for a second trip in the rush hour direction. Seems unlikely that we would have the technology to drive a vehicle autonomously and not the technology to manage the fleet far better than we do now. Places for pausing an AV will be easy to come by with a reduced fleet.
Also, once the magic (tragic) spell of personal vehicle ownership has been broken it seems far more likely that trips would be shared far more often than now.
Chris, my point is that driverless vehicles will not help with peak traffic – note that this has nothing to do with the changing landscape for employment. All I am pointing out is that if people are getting from A to B in a car, the presence or lack thereof of a driver doesn’t affect the amount of cars on the road. Do you disagree?
Ron, unless the driverless vehicle is parked in my driveway there will be more traffic on the road than there is now. I actually agree with you that if driverless utopia were to transpire, we could free up a lot of parking space, and it’s not that I think the road usage would double or anything in this scenario.
But the argument in the original post was that AV would reduce traffic, and this is the argument being used to cut back transit funding. My point is that the number of commuter trips won’t be reduced at all by AV (it will probably increase but that is debatable), and on top of that there is some incremental amount of road use as the AV has to get to its next pickup location or resting spot. This distance may not be that far (again debatable) but it still greater than 0.
“All I am pointing out is that if people are getting from A to B in a car, the presence or lack thereof of a driver doesn’t affect the amount of cars on the road. Do you disagree?”
Yes. Here’s why. I think once we uncouple the act of steering, braking, etc from motoring, we’ve broken the spell of ownership. It’s no longer a proxy for one’s identity. So private ownership will decline and motoring as an a la carte service takes hold. And once you have a lot of AVs rolling around, patterns emerge and regular users would probably have standing orders for transportation. With information in hand, it becomes fairly straightforward (as computational tasks go) to have one vehicle doing the job of a few or more. This would also help the suppliers’ bottom lines. Deadheading trips would be anathema to them. That’s not even considering things like discounted fares for ride-shared trips.
Will it reduce investment in mass transit? That’s possible and I wouldn’t support that outcome personally. Certainly a threat to efficiency which will require vigilance and champions for this more sensible method of moving masses of people.
Also, forgot to include in my post that a big reason so many cars are on the road at peak times is due to collisions blocking them from getting where they are going. With reduced accidents, greater efficiencies, less sitting waiting for tow trucks to clear wrecks off the road, a situation which cascades throughout the system, allowing people to spend less time in cars on the road, so there does end up being fewer cars on the road at a given time.
My understanding is that even at peak rush hour, only about 1 in 8 cars are being driven. (Please correct me if I’m wrong on that.) If so, and if people see the financial benefit of not owning, then the need for parking is going to shrink dramatically. The total vehicle fleet could shrink to a quarter its current size freeing up vast parking areas for better purposes. We’re not going to have any problem finding a place to pause an AV.
It’s true that AVs may make little difference to rush hour volumes although they should make better use of the road grid. TDM will still be required and individual mobility should be priced to reflect its demand on road space. The cost of a private AV must cost far more than public transit and buses should still get priority lanes so the time difference is reduced.
AVs might have benefits… or not. If we keep doing things the way they did in the 60s and people are still insecure enough to self-identify with their car then Thomas’s dysfunctional society could be what we get.
As mentioned earlier, some folks prefer to own and not rent, even if it costs double or triple. It has nothing to do with dysfunction, but with personal preferences. Some people like pizza and some are vegan. Ditto with transportation choices. Some like luxury and some like it cheap. Will we see more shared cars: yes. Will they all be shared: no. Also see owning vs renting. A personal choice.
Our current traffic nightmares have everything to do with dysfunction. Note that my assumption above had a significant fraction of people still owning. The exact numbers are pure speculation. But AVs will almost surely reduce the total fleet and reduce demand for parking.
yes, less parking requirements but similar OR HIGHER driving / use requirements as more folks switch from (slow, wobbly, dirty, noisy, crowded) buses to AVs !
As I said, Thomas can have his dysfunctional society if we choose to be dumb about pricing.
“his” ?
You seem to relish the idea that we can’t get smarter.
Yes, I too agree with Thomas on this one. However at $10 to $12 per day, parking is probably still subsidized. A few years ago I had a conversation with the head of parking and she assured me that parking was definitely not subsidized. When I asked her if parking rates covered land costs/values, she admitted that it dd not. Also pathetic is the free parking on NW Marine. Super pathetic is the parking strip which was created on SW Marine near Camosun for several $100,000, some of which came from TransLink’s cycling budget!. This is double bad, because they are spending money on free parking while diminishing the effectiveness of Upass.
It occurs to me that we ought to stop using the word “car” when describing these driverless contraptions. They can be better thought of as a fictional evolution based on riding around in mama’s tummy, to riding on the outside of mama’s tummy, to being pushed around in a baby carriage, then riding around in the stroller, to riding in the latest promise of complete indulgence; the driverless carriage, a coddled life for the me generation lost in the elevator wasteland of the urban core. That’s what the narrative looks like to me.
If anyone thinks that the driverless contraption is seriously the future, then they don’t really understand the novelists’ craft; this is all pure fiction. It sells books at $30 apiece and nearly as fast as Fifty Shades of Grey. Real men drive cars and trucks with V-8 engines and smokin’ tires, they drive tractors and plow fields, ride horses and rope cattle, they fly helicopters and crop dusters. And when the crops have been harvested, processed and so forth, and the farm animals fattened up, the cows milked and the eggs collected well then it all rolls down the Trans-Canada Highway in one big traffic jam to your nearest grocery store in diesel trucks of all sizes. After all that is done those men take their wives and families and get into their 40 foot Winnebago’s with V-12 gas guzzling engines and drive off somewhere for a vacation of sunshine and fishing.
Don’t you all want to grow up and take hold of the wheel of life, shift the gears and squeal the tires instead of whining about your buggy getting stuck in traffic on the way to the latest Mad Max Road Warrior Movie?
There should be a concern about expanding transit, if indeed autonomous vehicles are coming soon. Especially if the article writer is right and these vehicles will be just a click on an app away and cheap too. Door-to-door is always the favourite.
A bus costs about 20 times more than a car and carries about 20 times more people on average, but has twice the lifespan. During peak times a bus may transport 40 (or more) times that of a car. Pricing for a SOAV should therefore be double and perhaps 4 times more than that for taking the bus based on the vehicle alone.
At peak times a bus takes up three times as much space as a car but carries 40 (or more) times more passengers. Allowing for the greater wear and tear of a bus an SOAV should cost about 8 times more than a bus ride for the road infrastructure.
So, in very rough numbers, a ride in a SOAV should cost up to 32 times more than a ride in a bus at peak times.
Not that cheap.
Well today a EVo or Car2Go ride is about $10, and a bus is $2.10. Five times as much at 2x to 3x the speed. So what takes 45-60 minutes by bus might be 20 min by car. A $8 difference. If your value per h is $20 or more and you save $8 then it makes sense to use Car2Go or EVo or the future AV.
Very rarely does a transit trip take twice as long as motoring, let alone three times. Especially within the service areas of EVO and Car2Go.
No accounting for the time required to make the money, or the lost opportunity to use that money in other ways, or the additional freedom transit allows to do other activities while being chauffeured to a destination equals an incomplete equation. It’s never so clear cut. Factor in rapid transit like Skytrain, or transit priority in curb lanes at peak hours and motoring really loses its lustre for many destinations.
That’s because EVO and Car2Go are heavily subsidized just like all other SOVs. If we priced the road correctly the car costs would skyrocket and more people would flock to transit.
Transit is subsidized too. But the subsidies for cars are what keeps people in them – not the true cost of transit.
I will admit to a gross accounting error that nobody picked up on yet. I should not have multiplied the road cost with the vehicle cost earlier. They should have been added.
That still makes the real cost of a private car trip 10 to 12 times higher than a bus trip.
True if we had RAPID transit from places like UBC or N-Van or E-Van or deep in Richmond or Surrey. But we do not. Buses are not an option for many due to speed, wobbliness, being crowded and often too hot (or too cold).
cars are so much more civilized. A/C too. Choice of music and no one is coughing in your face.
A train is faster and less wobbly and has A/C .. 3 major advantages over a bus !!!
Civilized behaviour is putting up with some absolutely minor inconveniences for the benefit of all, not expecting society to cater to your wobbly ankles and antisocial attitude.
Indeed everything has a price and comes with characteristics, and that is why the lowest common denominator in healthcare, education or public transit is not used by all anymore, specifically those that aspire to a better standard. Once size does not fit all needs. That is why airlines, for example offer at least two, sometimes four classes of service at different price points. That is why there are so many choices of cars, for example, from low end to very high end. As such, why would a one size fits all education, healthcare or public transit system be used by all then ?
Thomas misses the point again. If a bus costs $2.10 then a car share vehicle should cost $20-$25 for the same trip. It doesn’t because most of the real cost of the trip is paid for by the taxpayer.
Roads like education or healthcare benefit all and as such are paid by taxpayers. We can debate the subsidies or degree of additional user charges on each, of course. I pay for your knee surgery and you pay for my road use. Isn’t that why we pool $s ?
wrong. wrong. wrong.
roads are paid for by taxes
my education is paid for by tuition fees
my healthcare is paid for by premiums I pay
you Thomas Beyer do not pay for my knee surgery
you Thomas Beyer do not pay for my road use
get over yourself Thomas Beyer
off topic as usual.
@jolson: Get a grip my (young?) friend. Why am I wrong ? Perhaps your perspective needs to widen ? Who is paying for your knee surgery if you are a student ? The tax payer (e.g I) is ! The $120 pp healthcare premium does not cover the healthcare costs. It would need to be about TENfold. As such, it is subsidized by general tax revenue. Healthcare and education swallows up almost 70% (!!!) of the provincial budget. Roads less than 10%. See here http://bcbudget.gov.bc.ca/2016/default.htm Roads, healthcare and education is paid by (almost) all. Tuition at universities is paid roughly 25% by students, rest by government, donations or endowments. K-12 is free last time I checked in BC.
As stated: we can and should debate the degree of co-payment for each, for road use, healthcare use or education. For example: do we need to provide free education past grade 9, as that is sufficient education for a basic trades job ? Perhaps 10-12 should have a co-pay like university ? Education benefits society but primarily the recipient. It is an investment. Why not charge for it ? Are university tuitions too low ? Should we charge $20 per doctor visit ? Should we charge 10 cents per km driven in MetroVan – over and above the 30 odd cents we already per per liter of gasoline ? I’d say yes as Teslas, Volts, Leafs and soon electric AVs (even if empty) also deteriorate the roads and clog the bridges and do not pay gasoline taxes.
So the road toll is upon us in some form eventually, yes. But why not for healthcare and education too ? Roads, healthcare and education benefit all but are used more by some than others and as such the form of free vs co-payment is a relevant question my (young?) friend !!
I am not your friend, and
I do not need knee surgery.
you are off topic again.
“You” in the context of “other people’s”. Knee surgery as an example of other ails. You and I pay taxes so you and I and society as a whole benefit from a wide variety of free or heavily subsidized services such as roads, public transit, healthcare, education, policing etc .. As stated co-payment should to be discussed, both for AVs or road use which is this blog entry’s topic or other services areas such as education, healthcare etc ..
Which services do you use, for free, paid for by taxes if not knee surgery ? Do you use a bus or the SkyTrain, do you walk on the sidewalk on occasion, do you go to university or perhaps do you expect the garbage bins at Jericho beach to be emptied ? All this, and more, is paid for by taxes although you might not use all or even some of them. What makes road tolls so much more important vs say healthcare co-payment or higher university tuitions ?