4 ms·

Is waymo (or anyone) working on autonomous buses? Seems more practical for a first deployment (~fixed route, higher capital cost, operator salary is the greates

by cozzyd 6y ago

Is waymo (or anyone) working on autonomous buses? Seems more practical for a first deployment (~fixed route, higher capital cost, operator salary is the greatest cost).

H8crilA 6y ago
That sounds like a good idea/question, but a side question from me - driver salary is really the main cost? I'd imagine fleet depreciation to be the main (non-cash) expense.
- cozzyd 6y ago
  I'm no expert, but it's what I heard. But back of the the envelope, a bus costs O($500k) and lasts O(20 years), but you have to pay for multiple FTE operators per bus. Obviously maintenance and fuel also cost money but not as much as a (typically unionized) operator. If an autonomous bus costs twice as much I think it still wins out. Maybe you still need a conductor to make sure people pay and don't act antisocially but such a person can probably be much cheaper/less skilled.
  - zdw 6y ago
    Fleet maintenance is also a huge fixed cost, and improvements to bus technology that reduce maintenance are a neutral impact when it comes to driver/driverless as options.
  - throwawayboise 6y ago
    It doesn't take that much skill to drive a bus. College kids and retirees do it for part time income. I'd think the conductor/security guard would be as expensive if not more expensive than the driver.
  - simion314 6y ago
    >but not as much as a (typically unionized) operator. Why do you need to specify the "unionized" drivers? Do they cost more? Why? because they are paid fair(like paid extra if they have to work on Christmas or extra hours)? Or maybe they union negotiated to keep the salary in sync with inflation?
    - cozzyd 6y ago
      Yes, because they get paid more compared to e.g. an Uber driver, and also there are typically things like minimum shift lengths and required breaks. It's not a bad thing, but helps explain why operator costs tend to be dominant.
aeternum 6y ago
It's pretty crazy how much city buses cost. I think I saw that NC hybrid busses cost 800k each. You can buy a lot of cars/vans for that much and probably have more capacity and happier riders since the trips will be more frequent and more direct.
- codyb 6y ago
  More capacity than a bus in cars seems unlikely given that they probably wouldn’t be packed to capacity most times. I guess if you purchased say, 40 honda civics? There’s a lot of other considerations to consider here as well. Cars and vans would both take up more space for the same amount of people which means more traffic which leads to slower speeds and more noise and air pollution. Cleaning all these cars and vans would require more workers than cleaning the equivalent number of busses either by capitol or by riders. Cars and vans require more space to park. There’d be far more maintenance for cars and vans than busses. Busses are equipped with handicap ramps, bike racks, and seats to accomodate the differently abled, as well as payment processors. These features all drive up costs. Tech only solutions can prevent access to transportation for indigent and differently abled populations. More cars and vans means more road wear. And of course the lifetimes of the vehicles may differ adding in other costs.
  - cozzyd 6y ago
    Other than road wear, I think you're right about everything else (pretty sure the road wear is much worse from a bus than any number of cars).
  - perl4ever 6y ago
    It's really hard to fill buses to capacity too. If you want people to be able to rely on the buses, then they have to go everywhere all the time. But if they go everywhere, there will be enough of them that are mostly empty that the average efficiency might be less than cars. In reality, they compromise. I live in a not-very large city. I used to rent an apartment in a suburb to the southeast just a few miles out, and the bus only made one trip in the morning to the city and one trip in the afternoon back, and if you didn't work the exact hours that you could catch the bus, like my job was 9-6 or 2-11, etc., you were out of luck. Now, I live within city limits, in the southwest, but there is no bus route going north-south to where I work (or did before covid), because most of the traffic goes east to downtown and back, so that's how all the routes go. There aren't many routes or stops to the north and west. When I was living in an apartment in a slightly different suburb, there were more frequent buses, but they were almost empty when I rode them. You can't assume that they're saving resources in any circumstance.
reaperducer 6y ago
Is waymo (or anyone) working on autonomous buses? Las Vegas had autonomous buses for a while, but they're gone. Too slow and the routes were very limited for some reason.
berkes 6y ago
Is operator salary the highest cost? I'm honestly curious, and it sounds logical. But it also sounds like a statement that just keeps being repeated without it being confirmed, or universally true.
- cozzyd 6y ago
  This is where I heard it, from a transit consultant: https://humantransit.org/2011/07/02box.html https://humantransit.org/2011/07/02box.html
einarfd 6y ago
The transport authority in Oslo (Ruter#), has been running self driving services for a few years now and there is some info about it at https://ruter.no/en/about-ruter/reports-projects-plans/autonomous-vehicles/ https://ruter.no/en/about-ruter/reports-projects-plans/auton... . I don't live in a part of town they've been experimenting in. But what I've seen indicates that what they are doing is running slow moving, small self driving busses in areas where it would not be cost efficient to use a bus with a driver. Since they are slow driving, the self driving problem is a lot easier, you don't have to see that far off, and stopping is faster so you don't need to model the future far out to be safe. In addition low speed collision are safer, which makes failures safer aswell.

by cozzyd 6y ago

Is waymo (or anyone) working on autonomous buses? Seems more practical for a first deployment (~fixed route, higher capital cost, operator salary is the greatest cost).

H8crilA 6y ago

That sounds like a good idea/question, but a side question from me - driver salary is really the main cost? I'd imagine fleet depreciation to be the main (non-cash) expense.

cozzyd 6y ago
I'm no expert, but it's what I heard. But back of the the envelope, a bus costs O($500k) and lasts O(20 years), but you have to pay for multiple FTE operators per bus. Obviously maintenance and fuel also cost money but not as much as a (typically unionized) operator. If an autonomous bus costs twice as much I think it still wins out. Maybe you still need a conductor to make sure people pay and don't act antisocially but such a person can probably be much cheaper/less skilled.
- zdw 6y ago
  Fleet maintenance is also a huge fixed cost, and improvements to bus technology that reduce maintenance are a neutral impact when it comes to driver/driverless as options.
- throwawayboise 6y ago
  It doesn't take that much skill to drive a bus. College kids and retirees do it for part time income. I'd think the conductor/security guard would be as expensive if not more expensive than the driver.
- simion314 6y ago
  >but not as much as a (typically unionized) operator. Why do you need to specify the "unionized" drivers? Do they cost more? Why? because they are paid fair(like paid extra if they have to work on Christmas or extra hours)? Or maybe they union negotiated to keep the salary in sync with inflation?
  - cozzyd 6y ago
    Yes, because they get paid more compared to e.g. an Uber driver, and also there are typically things like minimum shift lengths and required breaks. It's not a bad thing, but helps explain why operator costs tend to be dominant.

aeternum 6y ago

It's pretty crazy how much city buses cost. I think I saw that NC hybrid busses cost 800k each. You can buy a lot of cars/vans for that much and probably have more capacity and happier riders since the trips will be more frequent and more direct.

codyb 6y ago
More capacity than a bus in cars seems unlikely given that they probably wouldn’t be packed to capacity most times. I guess if you purchased say, 40 honda civics? There’s a lot of other considerations to consider here as well. Cars and vans would both take up more space for the same amount of people which means more traffic which leads to slower speeds and more noise and air pollution. Cleaning all these cars and vans would require more workers than cleaning the equivalent number of busses either by capitol or by riders. Cars and vans require more space to park. There’d be far more maintenance for cars and vans than busses. Busses are equipped with handicap ramps, bike racks, and seats to accomodate the differently abled, as well as payment processors. These features all drive up costs. Tech only solutions can prevent access to transportation for indigent and differently abled populations. More cars and vans means more road wear. And of course the lifetimes of the vehicles may differ adding in other costs.
- cozzyd 6y ago
  Other than road wear, I think you're right about everything else (pretty sure the road wear is much worse from a bus than any number of cars).
- perl4ever 6y ago
  It's really hard to fill buses to capacity too. If you want people to be able to rely on the buses, then they have to go everywhere all the time. But if they go everywhere, there will be enough of them that are mostly empty that the average efficiency might be less than cars. In reality, they compromise. I live in a not-very large city. I used to rent an apartment in a suburb to the southeast just a few miles out, and the bus only made one trip in the morning to the city and one trip in the afternoon back, and if you didn't work the exact hours that you could catch the bus, like my job was 9-6 or 2-11, etc., you were out of luck. Now, I live within city limits, in the southwest, but there is no bus route going north-south to where I work (or did before covid), because most of the traffic goes east to downtown and back, so that's how all the routes go. There aren't many routes or stops to the north and west. When I was living in an apartment in a slightly different suburb, there were more frequent buses, but they were almost empty when I rode them. You can't assume that they're saving resources in any circumstance.

reaperducer 6y ago

Is waymo (or anyone) working on autonomous buses? Las Vegas had autonomous buses for a while, but they're gone. Too slow and the routes were very limited for some reason.

berkes 6y ago

Is operator salary the highest cost? I'm honestly curious, and it sounds logical. But it also sounds like a statement that just keeps being repeated without it being confirmed, or universally true.

cozzyd 6y ago
This is where I heard it, from a transit consultant: https://humantransit.org/2011/07/02box.html https://humantransit.org/2011/07/02box.html

einarfd 6y ago

The transport authority in Oslo (Ruter#), has been running self driving services for a few years now and there is some info about it at https://ruter.no/en/about-ruter/reports-projects-plans/autonomous-vehicles/ https://ruter.no/en/about-ruter/reports-projects-plans/auton... . I don't live in a part of town they've been experimenting in. But what I've seen indicates that what they are doing is running slow moving, small self driving busses in areas where it would not be cost efficient to use a bus with a driver. Since they are slow driving, the self driving problem is a lot easier, you don't have to see that far off, and stopping is faster so you don't need to model the future far out to be safe. In addition low speed collision are safer, which makes failures safer aswell.