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why do these boats need to be autonomous?

• Someone 8y ago
  Non-autonomous boats already service some cities (e.g. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-dhl-amsterdam-boat/in-amsterdam-packages-travel-via-canals-bicycles-idUSTRE56E2TE20090715 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-dhl-amsterdam-boat/in-ams...) MIT cooperates with the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (http://news.mit.edu/2018/fleet-autonomous-boats-service-cities-reducing-road-traffic-0523 http://news.mit.edu/2018/fleet-autonomous-boats-service-citi...), so they likely know that doesn’t need researching.
  • ghaff 8y ago
    For that matter, the Boston area has all sorts of ferries and water taxis including at least one that services the airport. There's no routine local delivery of goods by water as far as I know but there's routine commuter traffic.
• jdavis703 8y ago
  In San Francisco the typical ferry requires at least 3 crew members. There's a captain, two deckhands and sometimes a coast guard officer (I'm assuming to prevent hijackings which an autonomous system wouldn't be liable to). A few years ago when BART workers went on strike the ferry service had to call in all available workers. The people they brought in were clearly amateur, they needed a lot of supervision and seemed to struggle with assisting with the docking/undocking procedures. Boating requires a lot of labor, and it seems like there isn't much of it that's trained and ready to work.
  • spaceflunky 8y ago
    Why doesn't SF have a better ferry system? Almost everything in the bay area is within 5min of... the bay. Seems like a no-brainer. What's the hold up?
    • wristmittens 8y ago
      Outside of San Francisco, a lot of the bay shoreline is not much more than acres of foot-deep mud and salt flats. http://www.charts.noaa.gov/OnLineViewer/18651.shtml http://www.charts.noaa.gov/OnLineViewer/18651.shtml Sierra Point, Coyote Point, Redwood City are the only current viable ports along the south. Creating new ports for a ferry system would involve a lot of dredging in addition to the infrastructure construction, which is not only costly but severely impacts the already damaged wetlands that line the bay.
      • wffurr 8y ago
        Hovercraft or fan boats. Something with skis that can go on mud.
      • danans 8y ago
        I wonder if hovercraft might be an option that wouldn't require the dredging. I.e. https://www.hovertravel.co.uk/ https://www.hovertravel.co.uk/ EDIT: I guess it's been considered before in 2011 [1] But it appears that the hovercraft themselves were more expensive and carried half as many people. But compared to the cost of dredging for ferries, maybe it's still cheaper? 1. https://www.mercurynews.com/2011/11/01/east-bay-looks-to-hovercraft-for-ferry-service/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2011/11/01/east-bay-looks-to-hov...
        • mmt 8y ago
          > But compared to the cost of dredging for ferries, maybe it's still cheaper? I think the point is that it doesn't matter, if it's simply not cheap enough. The shallowness of the estuarial coastline significantly drives up the cost (be it with dredging or more exotic technologies like hovercraft), and that's the (short) answer to why we don't have more ferry service.
  • jellicle 8y ago
    Why wouldn't autonomous ferries be liable to be hijacked?