Automation is a piece of efficient transportation. However, I think driverless cars are not a solution by themselves. They bring efficiency gains in the form o

Automation is a piece of efficient transportation. However, I think driverless cars are not a solution by themselves. They bring efficiency gains in the form of reducing jams because they can drive closer, communicate with city infrastructure, etc. But these gains probably wouldn't offset the number of people who will all of the sudden gain access to a more convient (and probably cheaper, without regulation) method of transit, who will thus increase total car usage. It's going to be a challenge to reach transport homeostasis among driverless cars, driverless buses, subways, etc. Taxes or surge prices will probably need to be added to distribute people in an optimal way across multiple forms of transit so not to overload city infrastructure. I'm thinking prices are going to be driven more by physical limitations than individual operational costs (eg subway electricity usage). But this will need to be government regulated because private companies are not currently incentivized to minimze traffic (visible currently in ridesharing companies).