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I don't really see how driverless cars will change the situation for the better. Assuming drivers licenses are no longer needed, the amount of people that can
by Tiktaalik 11y ago
I don't really see how driverless cars will change the situation for the better.
Assuming drivers licenses are no longer needed, the amount of people that can drive will dramatically increase, which could result in a huge spike in the amount of cars on the road.
Any gains achieved by smoother traffic flow is likely to be dominated by this fact.
- maherbeg 11y agoI'm not convinced that's the case. I think smoother traffic flow could make a significantly larger impact than we think. Traffic jams will cease to exist if the flow is consistent.
- petra 11y ago>> the amount of people that can drive will dramatically increase Maybe it would double. But a self-driving van could easily(between many passengers/more efficient driving) could increase traffic capacity by 10x,
- Tiktaalik 11y agoThat's a pretty bold claim. What's your justification?
- marcoperaza 11y agoTraffic is a compression wave. The car in front of you accelerates, then you accelerate, then the person behind you, etc. Same for slowing down. Self-driving cars would presumably synchronize, allowing all of the cars to start moving at almost the same time. Also, people don't feel safe driving at 60mph in a densely packed road, so they don't. This should be no problem for a computer, so you could have a densely packed highway but traffic still moving at very high speeds. Basically, flow velocity could remain constant as the highway becomes more congested. Another optimization that comes to mind is that on city streets, your car would route around traffic light timing.
- petra 11y agoJitneys today carry 8 people + driver, maybe more with a wider vehicle (safe for self driving). Self-driving had all the efficiencies the other reply talked about.