3 ms·

> Ever consider if the effective duty cycle of your car is increased the vehicle wears out quicker? Sure, but by how much? What's the average extra overhead pe

> Ever consider if the effective duty cycle of your car is increased the vehicle wears out quicker? Sure, but by how much? What's the average extra overhead per person? By that I mean, what's the average distance that a taxi would need to drive between dropping one person off, and picking the next person up. The more taxis there are, the lower the overhead, as the more likely it is a taxi will happen be nearby to someone who wants one. We're used to taxis being rare, especially outside of major cities, but if taxis were common, the overhead might be very low. I can look outside right now, and see maybe 20 vehicles parked within 50m of my home. If that were 5 self-driving taxis instead, that would be easily be enough capacity for my immediate neighborhood, at least most of the time. So you could likely reduce the amount of cars locally by a factor of 4 or 5, and I'd still have a vehicle less than a minute away at most locations. Yes, if you had a 5th of the cars they'd have to do 5 times the work; but likely not much more than that. In other words, the maintenance cost wouldn't significantly worsen, and may even improve; cars aren't immune to entropy while stationary. The other advantage of having self-driving taxis is that you can more easily specialize. I have a pretty typical 5 seater car because I sometimes need that space. But most of the time, I could make do with a 2 seater with half the mass. My choice of car is determined by the edge cases, but my choice of taxi would be determined by what I needed at the time.

morpheos137 4y ago
Overhead is the wrong metric. Depreciation over fixed costs, marginal variable cost (e.g. fuel, oil, etc), and opportunity cost are what you want to look at. If you use a car more it wears out faster and needs to be replaced sooner. It needs more fuel and more frequent preventative maintenance. If the average trip is short the rob taxi does more trips and the effect is the same. Who cleans up the car when a drunk stranger pukes in it while you are sleeping? Who fuels it or charges it? There are many reasons people don't share cars. Lacking proper control software is not one.
- weavejester 4y ago
  > Overhead is the wrong metric. Depreciation over fixed costs, marginal variable cost (e.g. fuel, oil, etc), and opportunity cost are what you want to look at. If you use a car more it wears out faster and needs to be replaced sooner. It needs more fuel and more frequent preventative maintenance. Sure, but you also need less cars, and the cars can be more specialized (i.e., smaller on average). Two 1500kg cars travelling 10km each, might be replaced by one 750kg robotaxi travelling 20km. Overall a significant reduction in fuel for the same two journeys. And then there's the question of whether it's cheaper to have one car traveling 100,000km over 5 years, or two cars travelling 50,000km over 5 years. My guess is that fewer cars travelling further would be less expensive in most cases. > Who cleans up the car when a drunk stranger pukes in it while you are sleeping? > > Who fuels it or charges it? You'd hire someone to do it? The same way it works with rental cars or taxis today. That's part of the overhead I mean: is it more efficient for companies to maintain a specialized fleet of robotaxis, or for individuals to maintain a far larger fleet of generalized vehicles?

morpheos137 4y ago

Overhead is the wrong metric. Depreciation over fixed costs, marginal variable cost (e.g. fuel, oil, etc), and opportunity cost are what you want to look at. If you use a car more it wears out faster and needs to be replaced sooner. It needs more fuel and more frequent preventative maintenance. If the average trip is short the rob taxi does more trips and the effect is the same. Who cleans up the car when a drunk stranger pukes in it while you are sleeping? Who fuels it or charges it? There are many reasons people don't share cars. Lacking proper control software is not one.

weavejester 4y ago
> Overhead is the wrong metric. Depreciation over fixed costs, marginal variable cost (e.g. fuel, oil, etc), and opportunity cost are what you want to look at. If you use a car more it wears out faster and needs to be replaced sooner. It needs more fuel and more frequent preventative maintenance. Sure, but you also need less cars, and the cars can be more specialized (i.e., smaller on average). Two 1500kg cars travelling 10km each, might be replaced by one 750kg robotaxi travelling 20km. Overall a significant reduction in fuel for the same two journeys. And then there's the question of whether it's cheaper to have one car traveling 100,000km over 5 years, or two cars travelling 50,000km over 5 years. My guess is that fewer cars travelling further would be less expensive in most cases. > Who cleans up the car when a drunk stranger pukes in it while you are sleeping? > > Who fuels it or charges it? You'd hire someone to do it? The same way it works with rental cars or taxis today. That's part of the overhead I mean: is it more efficient for companies to maintain a specialized fleet of robotaxis, or for individuals to maintain a far larger fleet of generalized vehicles?