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Running a bus to pick up a single person is far less efficient than having that person own a car since the most effective part of a bus is the driver. Cars sca
by EthanHeilman 9y ago
Running a bus to pick up a single person is far less efficient than having that person own a car since the most effective part of a bus is the driver.
Cars scale in smaller increments than most public transit and that is important areas that are not densely populated or during off-peak periods. You can build a nation/culture around public transit, but the path dependencies with the US are pretty deep at this point.
>Car oriented infrastructure simply doesn't scale well as demand increases.
Self-driving cars scale in very different ways than piloted cars. The biggest problems with piloted cars is accidents, congestion and parking. All of these problems fundamentally change with self-driving cars. What Musk is building is self-driving car infrastructure.
- manigandham 9y ago> Running a bus to pick up a single person is far less efficient What buses pick up a single person? They are far more efficient than cars precisely because they can move many people on optimal routes.
- maxerickson 9y agoLots of rural counties have demand response buses that do indeed pick up one person at a time. I imagine if you measured by passenger mile they don't account for a lot of public transport, but they are the transport of last resort for quite a lot of people.