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This is _exactly_ the use case I think self-driving cars are perfect for: a shared fleet of cars continuously picking up and dropping off passengers within citi

This is _exactly_ the use case I think self-driving cars are perfect for: a shared fleet of cars continuously picking up and dropping off passengers within cities – eliminating the need for parking and allowing cities to reclaim that ROW for other uses (bigger sidewalks, bikeways, parklets/seating, or even dedicated bus lanes and light rail for high capacity routes, maybe even housing in some spots), finally allowing vehicles to become a crucial supplement to higher capacity public transportation rather than a competitor to it, and hopefully decrease the amount of space dedicated to cars (think highways and sprawl in addition to parking) within cities. I hope they can pull this off.

threeseed 7y ago
It is also clearly designed for airport trips given the layout of the interior cabin. Which is genius as in every city that is (a) the most lucrative taxi route and (b) the one with the newest and safest roads.
- gregoryl 7y ago
  If you ever get a chance to travel to Sydney, you'll find a nice outlier for road quality near the airport.
- bronco21016 7y ago
  > (b) the one with the newest and safest roads. What? You should try driving the roads around DTW. Bring your off-road tires. Many airports across the rust belt and northeast of the US suffer the plague of under-maintained infrastructure. CLE and BWI are coming to mind as well. And driving any highway in ATL can hardly be considered safe.
- lflux 7y ago
  >(b) the one with the newest and safest roads. Yeah that doesn't describe 101 around SFO one bit.
  - dehrmann 7y ago
    Navigating around the airport is tricky, but the roads are ok. Where it's bad is 101 after the 280 split. It's packed, the lanes are narrow, the road is windy (by freeway standards), and exits are old, awkward, and beyond their capacity.
jarjoura 7y ago
It sounds like you're describing a very sophisticated bus route that every city in the world already has.
- Dig1t 7y ago
  Except taking the bus sucks. It takes forever and I have to get harassed by crazies when I'm just trying to get home.
  - semi-extrinsic 7y ago
    It's the perfect SV solution: you have problems caused by underfunded public transport, large income inequality and homelessness? Let's not fix those underlying issues, we can just spend a ton of VC money on artifical intelligence to work around the consequences instead!
    - sriram_sun 7y ago
      I can see my city getting these to help seniors get out and about. Hmm wheelchair support might suck.
    - scarejunba 7y ago
      It actually is. When entrenched power structures prevent economically efficient outcomes, you bypass the power structures instead of reforming them. You reform by killing the king instead of helping him be kinder. And this is how progress has always looked. Life will be better for this. The market is a close analog for lightning. It's finding the fastest path. And let me tell you, the Bay Area is flush with money. Funding is not the problem.
    - closeparen 7y ago
      Within the existing civil rights framework, there is no “fixing” crazies on the bus. The state cannot lock people up or force them to take their meds just because they make you uncomfortable. Nor can it deny them public services. They have the same rights to the commons, their freedom, and their medical decision-making as you do. Smelling bad, shouting nonsense, and talking to strangers in public are not crimes. Which means if you want to be comfortable, you’re going to have to minimize time spent in the commons.
halflings 7y ago
Waymo launched a service that does just this in December 2018: https://www.businessinsider.com/waymo-one-driverless-car-service-launches-in-phoenix-arizona-2018-12 https://www.businessinsider.com/waymo-one-driverless-car-ser...
- ehsankia 7y ago
  Waymo also dabbled in these cutesy future car designs back in 2014 [0], and later just decided to stick with vans. While it is clear that self-driving cars won't have steering wheels in the future, these prototypes are jumping the gun and a waste of time. As Waymo quickly realized, you can iterate much faster staying away from these futuristic prototypes. [0] https://qz.com/1005083/the-cutest-thing-google-has-ever-made-is-dead-waymos-firefly-self-driving-cars-goog/ https://qz.com/1005083/the-cutest-thing-google-has-ever-made...
  - culturestate 7y ago
    > As Waymo quickly realized, you can iterate much faster staying away from these futuristic prototypes. Cruise has one advantage that Waymo didn't - General Motors. They don't need to build an automotive product development and manufacturing org from scratch; it's already there and it's got a hundred years of institutional memory. Since GM has been working on things like this for decades, I imagine it gives Cruise the opportunity innovate on the vehicle itself quite capably without taking their eye off the ball.
    - scarejunba 7y ago
      Yeah, but they also have a hundred years of depending on handouts to not keep going out of business so we don't really know that they know how to build a product that works long enough to keep them in business.
    - ehsankia 7y ago
      Sure, but Waymo also doesn't do manufacturing from scratch. They partner with existing manufacturers such as Chrysler for their vans, and could've easily found partners to develop more futuristic "prototypes" if they wanted. The point still stands that it's mostly a waste of time and resources while we are still years away from fully functioning self-driving cars. You could argue that if GM has artists and designers who are bored and need a side project, it may be worth the news cycle generated by the reveal, but other than that it doesn't add much to the conversation. There have been plenty of such prototypes; just at CES a few weeks ago, LG had an almost identical prototype [0]. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5SRXzAtcuY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5SRXzAtcuY
skywhopper 7y ago
How would a neverending stream of self-driving vehicles competing for access to riders free up right-of-way. If these work (which they won’t), the will only worsen traffic.
- andromeduck 7y ago
  No way. Way easier to optimize with fewer than more coordinated players and reduced demand for parking.
puranjay 7y ago
I'm really excited about this. I can't even imagine how much public space we will reclaim with zero car ownership.
kjgkjhfkjf 7y ago
Even if we agree that the technical hurdles will eventually be overcome, I think that the problem will remain that a lot of people will want to keep their cars. Uber has provided a car-on-demand service for years, and yet in cities there is still congestion on the roads and cars parked wherever you look.
- WaxProlix 7y ago
  I think you're right, but cultural values like these can take way longer than just a few years to change. Cars, car ownership, car tinkering, etc are such a part of American culture at this point that it'll take a long time for any ownership numbers to reflect the realities of shared models. I think.
- drcode 7y ago
  I would estimate if the cost of Uber cost even just 30% less than it is now it would probably see 2x greater utilization (at least I think I personally would use it 2x more often at such a price) If a self-driving vehicle like OP could hit such a price point (a big if, admittedly) I think it could make a substantial dent in inner city driving, beyond what Uber is able to achieve.
- dehrmann 7y ago
  > there is still congestion on the roads Uber has probably made this worse. The only way it's helped with congestion is fewer people looking for parking.
HenryKissinger 7y ago
What you're describing is an automated taxi service. But no car owner will want to replace their car with a Cruise Origin, because most people don't want random strangers to ride in their car all day.
fxtentacle 7y ago
You are describing a bus company ;) "a shared fleet of cars continuously picking up and dropping off passengers within cities" And just like existing bus companies, the self-driving ones will also require you to take a detour so that other passengers can be picked up or dropped off along the way. So the main novelty is that you eliminate about $0.2 per minute in salary, but in exchange you now have to maintain much more complicated vehicles with much more expensive replacement parts. Oh and have you ever considered that the same people that you hate meeting on the bus could also be combined into your ride? Except that now they are not 3 weirdos out of 80 people but 3 out of 4. So unless this is so expensive that most people cannot afford it, it'll have the same drawbacks that rich people currently hate about taking a public bus. I expect these companies to lead to more traffic, because afterwards you will have the regular poor-people bus and in addition the almost empty rich-people bus vehicles.
- djannzjkzxn 7y ago
  I’m wondering if you have ever ridden a bus, and also a shared Uber? The car gets you where you are going a lot faster than the bus, because you need to wait for at most 2 other stops instead of 17 or whatever, and you never need a transfer. Whether or not this argument convinces you, experiencing it yourself makes the difference obvious. It’s one of those things where you can actually do an experiment to find out the answer instead of just arguing about it. You could also try entering a destination into google maps and compare the estimated arrival time with bus vs Uber. The self-driving car will presumably be a similar experience to the Uber, but addresses the labor issues that are the main problem with that model.
  - marapuru 7y ago
    Getting somewhere faster doesn't necessarily mean it's better. Recently I lost my car (I used to have a company car in front of my door, but switched jobs), now I am solely using public transport and my bicycle. It takes more time, doesn't really cost me anything more than having a car and because it takes more time I have more space to clear my mind. To let my mind wander for a while to process thoughts. I'm talking about distances that typically take 5 - 20 minutes by car, that are now maybe 15 - 40 minutes by public transport. See also: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mental-downtime/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mental-downtime/

threeseed 7y ago

It is also clearly designed for airport trips given the layout of the interior cabin. Which is genius as in every city that is (a) the most lucrative taxi route and (b) the one with the newest and safest roads.

gregoryl 7y ago
If you ever get a chance to travel to Sydney, you'll find a nice outlier for road quality near the airport.
bronco21016 7y ago
> (b) the one with the newest and safest roads. What? You should try driving the roads around DTW. Bring your off-road tires. Many airports across the rust belt and northeast of the US suffer the plague of under-maintained infrastructure. CLE and BWI are coming to mind as well. And driving any highway in ATL can hardly be considered safe.
lflux 7y ago
>(b) the one with the newest and safest roads. Yeah that doesn't describe 101 around SFO one bit.
- dehrmann 7y ago
  Navigating around the airport is tricky, but the roads are ok. Where it's bad is 101 after the 280 split. It's packed, the lanes are narrow, the road is windy (by freeway standards), and exits are old, awkward, and beyond their capacity.

jarjoura 7y ago

It sounds like you're describing a very sophisticated bus route that every city in the world already has.

Dig1t 7y ago
Except taking the bus sucks. It takes forever and I have to get harassed by crazies when I'm just trying to get home.
- semi-extrinsic 7y ago
  It's the perfect SV solution: you have problems caused by underfunded public transport, large income inequality and homelessness? Let's not fix those underlying issues, we can just spend a ton of VC money on artifical intelligence to work around the consequences instead!
  - sriram_sun 7y ago
    I can see my city getting these to help seniors get out and about. Hmm wheelchair support might suck.
  - scarejunba 7y ago
    It actually is. When entrenched power structures prevent economically efficient outcomes, you bypass the power structures instead of reforming them. You reform by killing the king instead of helping him be kinder. And this is how progress has always looked. Life will be better for this. The market is a close analog for lightning. It's finding the fastest path. And let me tell you, the Bay Area is flush with money. Funding is not the problem.
  - closeparen 7y ago
    Within the existing civil rights framework, there is no “fixing” crazies on the bus. The state cannot lock people up or force them to take their meds just because they make you uncomfortable. Nor can it deny them public services. They have the same rights to the commons, their freedom, and their medical decision-making as you do. Smelling bad, shouting nonsense, and talking to strangers in public are not crimes. Which means if you want to be comfortable, you’re going to have to minimize time spent in the commons.

halflings 7y ago

Waymo launched a service that does just this in December 2018: https://www.businessinsider.com/waymo-one-driverless-car-service-launches-in-phoenix-arizona-2018-12 https://www.businessinsider.com/waymo-one-driverless-car-ser...

ehsankia 7y ago
Waymo also dabbled in these cutesy future car designs back in 2014 [0], and later just decided to stick with vans. While it is clear that self-driving cars won't have steering wheels in the future, these prototypes are jumping the gun and a waste of time. As Waymo quickly realized, you can iterate much faster staying away from these futuristic prototypes. [0] https://qz.com/1005083/the-cutest-thing-google-has-ever-made-is-dead-waymos-firefly-self-driving-cars-goog/ https://qz.com/1005083/the-cutest-thing-google-has-ever-made...
- culturestate 7y ago
  > As Waymo quickly realized, you can iterate much faster staying away from these futuristic prototypes. Cruise has one advantage that Waymo didn't - General Motors. They don't need to build an automotive product development and manufacturing org from scratch; it's already there and it's got a hundred years of institutional memory. Since GM has been working on things like this for decades, I imagine it gives Cruise the opportunity innovate on the vehicle itself quite capably without taking their eye off the ball.
  - scarejunba 7y ago
    Yeah, but they also have a hundred years of depending on handouts to not keep going out of business so we don't really know that they know how to build a product that works long enough to keep them in business.
  - ehsankia 7y ago
    Sure, but Waymo also doesn't do manufacturing from scratch. They partner with existing manufacturers such as Chrysler for their vans, and could've easily found partners to develop more futuristic "prototypes" if they wanted. The point still stands that it's mostly a waste of time and resources while we are still years away from fully functioning self-driving cars. You could argue that if GM has artists and designers who are bored and need a side project, it may be worth the news cycle generated by the reveal, but other than that it doesn't add much to the conversation. There have been plenty of such prototypes; just at CES a few weeks ago, LG had an almost identical prototype [0]. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5SRXzAtcuY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5SRXzAtcuY

skywhopper 7y ago

How would a neverending stream of self-driving vehicles competing for access to riders free up right-of-way. If these work (which they won’t), the will only worsen traffic.

andromeduck 7y ago
No way. Way easier to optimize with fewer than more coordinated players and reduced demand for parking.

puranjay 7y ago

I'm really excited about this. I can't even imagine how much public space we will reclaim with zero car ownership.

kjgkjhfkjf 7y ago

Even if we agree that the technical hurdles will eventually be overcome, I think that the problem will remain that a lot of people will want to keep their cars. Uber has provided a car-on-demand service for years, and yet in cities there is still congestion on the roads and cars parked wherever you look.

WaxProlix 7y ago
I think you're right, but cultural values like these can take way longer than just a few years to change. Cars, car ownership, car tinkering, etc are such a part of American culture at this point that it'll take a long time for any ownership numbers to reflect the realities of shared models. I think.
drcode 7y ago
I would estimate if the cost of Uber cost even just 30% less than it is now it would probably see 2x greater utilization (at least I think I personally would use it 2x more often at such a price) If a self-driving vehicle like OP could hit such a price point (a big if, admittedly) I think it could make a substantial dent in inner city driving, beyond what Uber is able to achieve.
dehrmann 7y ago
> there is still congestion on the roads Uber has probably made this worse. The only way it's helped with congestion is fewer people looking for parking.

HenryKissinger 7y ago

What you're describing is an automated taxi service. But no car owner will want to replace their car with a Cruise Origin, because most people don't want random strangers to ride in their car all day.

fxtentacle 7y ago

You are describing a bus company ;) "a shared fleet of cars continuously picking up and dropping off passengers within cities" And just like existing bus companies, the self-driving ones will also require you to take a detour so that other passengers can be picked up or dropped off along the way. So the main novelty is that you eliminate about $0.2 per minute in salary, but in exchange you now have to maintain much more complicated vehicles with much more expensive replacement parts. Oh and have you ever considered that the same people that you hate meeting on the bus could also be combined into your ride? Except that now they are not 3 weirdos out of 80 people but 3 out of 4. So unless this is so expensive that most people cannot afford it, it'll have the same drawbacks that rich people currently hate about taking a public bus. I expect these companies to lead to more traffic, because afterwards you will have the regular poor-people bus and in addition the almost empty rich-people bus vehicles.

djannzjkzxn 7y ago
I’m wondering if you have ever ridden a bus, and also a shared Uber? The car gets you where you are going a lot faster than the bus, because you need to wait for at most 2 other stops instead of 17 or whatever, and you never need a transfer. Whether or not this argument convinces you, experiencing it yourself makes the difference obvious. It’s one of those things where you can actually do an experiment to find out the answer instead of just arguing about it. You could also try entering a destination into google maps and compare the estimated arrival time with bus vs Uber. The self-driving car will presumably be a similar experience to the Uber, but addresses the labor issues that are the main problem with that model.
- marapuru 7y ago
  Getting somewhere faster doesn't necessarily mean it's better. Recently I lost my car (I used to have a company car in front of my door, but switched jobs), now I am solely using public transport and my bicycle. It takes more time, doesn't really cost me anything more than having a car and because it takes more time I have more space to clear my mind. To let my mind wander for a while to process thoughts. I'm talking about distances that typically take 5 - 20 minutes by car, that are now maybe 15 - 40 minutes by public transport. See also: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mental-downtime/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mental-downtime/