Last week, I provided a book review of Autonomy—The Quest to Build the Driverless Car—And How it Will Reshape Our World. This week, I’m following up with what this might actually look like.
First, it should be stated that the traditional car companies are all working on this, but they are behind the tech companies, particularly Waymo (Google). They perceive this potential new system as an existential threat to their businesses. They should as it is.
Second, computer modeling has shown that the number of vehicles needed under a shared-use model is roughly 15 percent of the current number of vehicles in private use. Reducing the fleet by 85 percent, or perhaps 75 percent because some of us just like cars, will have a tremendous impact.
Third, electric, autonomous vehicles, could be built much smaller and more simply than current vehicles. The reduction of the fleet size and simplifying the vehicles in use would have enormous repercussions on the auto, petroleum and other industries. Think auto dealers and repair shops.
As a reminder, this new model would be the result of these trends coming together:
- Electric vehicles.
- Transportation as a Service (TaaS) becoming the accepted model, rather than private car ownership.
- Right-sizing of vehicles to the task.
- Fully autonomous vehicles, with no need for human intervention in case of an emergency.
The solutions potentially provided include:
- 90 percent of collisions eliminated.
- Congestion largely eliminated.
- Parking problems eliminated.
- The overall cost of transportation to each individual/family reduced by 60 to 80 percent.
The cost savings will be, in my view, what will finally make this happen. Most decisions on this sort of thing eventually come down to money.
What Would This Look Like?
Imagine this: When you need a vehicle to go to work or school or shopping for you or your family, you will call one using your smart phone app. Modeling says that a fleet that is 15 percent the size of the current privately-owned fleet, could provide your chosen vehicle to where you have requested it in under two minutes; in most cases it would be about one minute. Vehicles would be pre-positioned based on use patterns.
When the vehicle shows up in front of your home, you hold your phone up to the car (like car sharing services already do) and the door slides open. You and/or other family members enter the vehicle and sit down. You’re greeted by a computer voice which welcomes you and confirms your destinations (which you entered when you hailed the vehicle with your phone app).
Once seated, you close the door via voice command. The vehicle won’t move until everyone is belted in. Once the vehicle is closed and the occupants seated and belted, the vehicle warns you that it is about to move. And off you go.
You are a passenger and free to do what you like. You and your family can work, play video games, do homework, read, enjoy the view, or (gasp) talk. Every vehicle is a WiFi hotspot. In any case, you have recovered your commuting time for activities other than driving.
At the point of arrival at your destination, the vehicle will slide open the door, you or other family members leave. You don’t have to find or pay for parking; you’re just dropped off. The computer voice tells you how much the charge for that trip will be on your subscription account. The vehicle then goes on to serve others.
You might protest: but I like driving! I love driving, but I hate commuting. What is likely to happen is that a family like mine, where we have three cars for two drivers, would have one car rather than three. For routine commuting, I would never use my own car; it would be too expensive and too inconvenient compared to the alternative. But I would use my car for a weekend drive in the country or when I want to drive at the race track (my current hobby). This would be similar to horse ownership. People own horses for pleasure riding but I don’t know anyone who commutes on a horse.
Will this brave new world of transportation ever become a reality? I think so. Look at Uber and Lyft. Their current business models don’t make money and never will. But that changes if the cost of the human driver is eliminated. That is where they are going. The convenience and cost savings will eventually reach a tipping point. How long will it take? I really don’t know, but I do think it is coming.
And if it happens, there will be a lot of winners and losers. I think this revolution in transportation could be as disruptive as the internet has been to our world. It’s potentially a very big deal.
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