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I read the blog post, and all I can think is that I have never, ever, ever thought of using a self-driving car in the way proposed in the blog post. It does see

I read the blog post, and all I can think is that I have never, ever, ever thought of using a self-driving car in the way proposed in the blog post. It does seem that fairly simple models for pricing road use (including just taxing vehicle fuel, if the self-driving car uses an engine that burns fuel) would be enough to respond to the hypothetical problem mentioned in the blog post.

joesmo 11y ago
Another option is a tax on miles driven, or perhaps a higher tax only on miles driven without any passengers. That way, one can ride wherever for free but when sending the car out by itself, it'd cost enough to discourage such behavior. In fact, this latter option is almost a given, IMO, not only to reduce congestion but also energy use (even if the cars are not running on fossil fuels). Some incentives for city parking garages to make them cheaper would also help. There's absolutely no need whatsoever for anyone to send their car back home just to get it parked when there's guaranteed parking within a couple of miles, only a few minutes away for the car.
scotty79 11y ago
What if the car is electric? This fuel is really cheap and you can't tax it without taxing everything else. If there's is shortage of parking spaces you won't even have to tell the car to circle the block while you shop. It will do the same by itself looking for parking spot. Also if your wife starts work hour later then you do it's just common sense to send the car back so she can use it. Buying another one would be silly if power is cheap.
- ams6110 11y ago
  Easy enough to tax electricity used for charging cars. Simply require a separate electric meter for that use, and tax the power used. It will happen anyway with or without self-driving cars, assuming electric vehicles replace gasoline-fueled ones. A big part of the retail price of gasoline is tax and some way will be found to make up for that. It hasn't happened yet because EVs are still a negligible fraction of vehicles on the road.
  - scotty79 11y ago
    And what would prevent people from charging cars through the normal meter? It's not uncommon now to use heating oil or vegetable oil in diesel engines because they are cheaper due to diesel fuel being taxed heavily.
Tiktaalik 11y ago
Absolutely road pricing would solve the worst case scenario mentioned in the blog post, but the author raises a good point that we've had congestion problems for decades and we still aren't using comprehensive road pricing to solve our traffic problems. How bad do things have to get before we do? It's deeply troubling to think that as traffic rises with the introduction of self driving cars, instead of bringing in road pricing, we may continue to rely on the same old approaches that are proven failures, such as road widening.

joesmo 11y ago

Another option is a tax on miles driven, or perhaps a higher tax only on miles driven without any passengers. That way, one can ride wherever for free but when sending the car out by itself, it'd cost enough to discourage such behavior. In fact, this latter option is almost a given, IMO, not only to reduce congestion but also energy use (even if the cars are not running on fossil fuels). Some incentives for city parking garages to make them cheaper would also help. There's absolutely no need whatsoever for anyone to send their car back home just to get it parked when there's guaranteed parking within a couple of miles, only a few minutes away for the car.

scotty79 11y ago

What if the car is electric? This fuel is really cheap and you can't tax it without taxing everything else. If there's is shortage of parking spaces you won't even have to tell the car to circle the block while you shop. It will do the same by itself looking for parking spot. Also if your wife starts work hour later then you do it's just common sense to send the car back so she can use it. Buying another one would be silly if power is cheap.

ams6110 11y ago
Easy enough to tax electricity used for charging cars. Simply require a separate electric meter for that use, and tax the power used. It will happen anyway with or without self-driving cars, assuming electric vehicles replace gasoline-fueled ones. A big part of the retail price of gasoline is tax and some way will be found to make up for that. It hasn't happened yet because EVs are still a negligible fraction of vehicles on the road.
- scotty79 11y ago
  And what would prevent people from charging cars through the normal meter? It's not uncommon now to use heating oil or vegetable oil in diesel engines because they are cheaper due to diesel fuel being taxed heavily.

Tiktaalik 11y ago

Absolutely road pricing would solve the worst case scenario mentioned in the blog post, but the author raises a good point that we've had congestion problems for decades and we still aren't using comprehensive road pricing to solve our traffic problems. How bad do things have to get before we do? It's deeply troubling to think that as traffic rises with the introduction of self driving cars, instead of bringing in road pricing, we may continue to rely on the same old approaches that are proven failures, such as road widening.