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One interesting aspect about driverless cars is that they can be used for traffic optimization. http://trafficwaves.org/trafexp.html http://trafficwaves.org/tr
by iwwr 15y ago
One interesting aspect about driverless cars is that they can be used for traffic optimization.
http://trafficwaves.org/trafexp.html http://trafficwaves.org/trafexp.html
tl;dr
driving smoothly and leaving traffic gaps ahead can prevent traffic jams or slowdowns
Having just a small percentage of automated cars with traffic optimizing behavior may actually increase road capacity.
- masklinn 15y ago> tl;dr driving smoothly and leaving traffic gaps ahead can prevent traffic jams or slowdowns An other traffic optimization (which doubles down as a gas optimization) is "car trains": cars following one another very closely (much more closely than human drivers would handle)
- themrbluesky 15y agoThis won't be high on the feature list, as it's still really dangerous.
- jrockway 15y agoIf you're adding laser rangefinders and a trunk full of computer equipment, you might as well weld on a few mechanical couplers, too. They work well enough for trains, anyway.
- masklinn 15y ago> This won't be high on the feature list You could hardly be any less correct. This is by far the most major and interesting feature enabled by auto-driven and cooperative cars: http://www.sartre-project.eu/en/Sidor/default.aspx http://www.sartre-project.eu/en/Sidor/default.aspx > as it's still really dangerous. Not really.
- dodo53 15y agoI think it could help solve congestion as a problem too. Maybe cars could book their routes, and the road brokers will maximise for #cars/destination instead of allowing people to keep piling in even after the useful capacity is exceeded.
- masklinn 15y agoThat would probably be the hardest problem to solve, and it would require global cooperation, but yeah it would also be a nice end-goal. Cooperation would already go a long way to solving congestion with just local cooperation though: * higher road density (cars can pretty literally travel bumper-to-bumper) * better handling of congestion (car train can smooth local slowdowns over all its component cars) * much, much improved merging and splitting of roads (including local flow analysis e.g. a small road merging into a bigger interstate with a 3:1 traffic ratio could be managed into a "perfect" 3:1 merge frequency) * simplified urban planning (if only cooperative automated cars are on the road, you can get rid of red lights)
- webXL 15y agoIt might also increase the capacity of human productivity. I've always been amazed at the amount of collective concentration that keeps everyone in their lane and not hitting one another. Just imagine if you could channel that concentration into productive endeavors, such as answering emails, looking for a better job, or learning a new skill.
- pchristensen 15y ago..., Watching reruns of Lost, playing Solitaire, napping, reading HN, ...
- kreilly 15y agoAs a someone who commutes by train every day, I assure you that this is much, much more likely than any productive use of the time.
- reverend_gonzo 15y agoBeing able to turn off your brain for an hour a day definitely boosts productivity.
- metageek 15y agoAnd emotional stability. When I've had a rough day at work, an hour of downtime on the train really improves the face I show at home.
- webXL 15y agoSorry, I should have said "channel some of that concentration into productive endeavors"
- theBobMcCormick 15y agoIMHO, the long term implications of driverless cars are far bigger than just traffic optimization. The article mentions ZipCar, and services like a robotic ZipCar or robotic taxis are what will really revolutionize transportation. Right now taxis are only convenient in certain high density areas (city centers, airports, convention centers, etc.). Try to call one from the suburbs and the not only is the wait long, but the fee is rather high also. But with a robo-taxi, it seems like it might be cost effective for the taxi company to leave some idle taxi's in shopping mall parking lots, etc. around the city, thereby making it possible to respond to a passenger request very quickly and (hopefully) inexpensively.