6 ms·

> one notable exception being electric cars "Electric cars" are a patently ridiculous concept. I guarantee you in the future we're using personal electric vehi

> one notable exception being electric cars "Electric cars" are a patently ridiculous concept. I guarantee you in the future we're using personal electric vehicles (scooters and variations thereof), not "electric cars".

ethangk 3y ago
Could you say more? Are you thinking longer term we won't have individual cars, but the vehicles that we do have will be powered by electricity?
- otabdeveloper4 3y ago
  You don't need a 2000 kg car-shaped monster just to get one person to his office job. That's a historical artifact because ICE engines can't fit onto man-sized vehicles. In the future most vehicles will be man-sized and powered by electrical motors. "Cars" will exist only for hauling freight, and probably only ever occasionally rented, not owned.
  - lupusreal 3y ago
    You need the car if you want to go reasonably fast (much more than 20-30 mph) and stay reasonably safe. You also need the car if you want to haul enough groceries to feed a family for more than one or two meals, or if you want to transport other people who may be too old or young to go cowboying around on an electric scooter. Electric scooters are pretty much only for young urban adults with no children. Like it or not, cars aren't going anywhere. A scooter lifestyle might work for you but it doesn't work for a large enough portion of the population that your wishes for society will never come to pass. Btw, electric scooters are possibly the most idiotic form of personal electric transport; electric bicycles are much safer. The geometry of a scooter, small wheels far below the center of mass of the rider, makes them fundamentally unstable at any speed. Considering bicycles exist, scooters are completely senseless and should probably be banned outright. You are far more likely to crash a scooter by yourself, simply by losing control of it, than to crash a bicycle. Scooters really are for young people who still think they're invincible; which explains why most riders don't even wear helmets.
    - Toutouxc 3y ago
      > wheels far below the center of mass of the rider, makes them fundamentally unstable Having the wheels far below the center of mass of the whole system (rider + scooter) makes them MORE stable, a bit similar to reversing a car with a long trailer instead of a short one. Compare to something like a racing recumbent bicycle, where the center of mass is really low. Those are very hard to balance at lower speeds. You're so high above the wheels on en e-scooter (or just a regular kick scooter) that you can easily swerve (i.e. laterally displace the wheels, but not your torso) around a pothole or a puddle without changing the direction of travel. That's the opposite of instability.
      - lupusreal 3y ago
        The small wheels of scooters make them more likely to death wobble. I have personally witnessed it happen literal to the name, the rider cracked his skull because he wasn't wearing a helmet of course. Bicycles naturally stay upright. You can push one without a rider and it will roll alone until it loses speed. Try the same with a scooter and it will immediately fall.
        Toutouxc 3y ago
        Some scooters are susceptible to death wobble, that's true. The fact that you can push a bicycle without a rider and it will roll, while most small-wheeled kick-scooters will fall, is not caused by a higher center of mass, but by the geometry of the front wheel, mainly the steering angle, fork offset and trail. Without a rider, a) the center of mass isn't even that different and b) it doesn't really matter how they behave without one, because the rider is part of the system.
    - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
      > if you want to haul enough groceries to feed a family for more than one or two meals, or if you want to transport other people who may be too old or young This is a "once a week" situation. As time goes on it will become increasingly hard to justify the cost of something you use once a week, especially when other options (groceries delivery) are cheaper and more convenient. P.S. Scooters are popular because they don't need skill to ride, despite being worse in other respects. As time goes on this, too, will change; learning to ride some sort of PEV will be normal.
  - jl6 3y ago
    But people need to “haul freight” all the time - shopping bags, kids, etc.
    - defrost 3y ago
      Not all people are US families though. Many single people exist who shop using a backpack, in the peer comments there is an example of a Japanese small car of the year that suits people of a different country. Big cars are a US lifestyle choice.
      - elzbardico 3y ago
        World-wide car sales 2023: Around 70 millions Cars sold in the US in 2022: Around 13 millions. Even if you are talking only about Light Trucks and SUVs as an exclusively American choice, most customers in the BRICs and the most affluent developing countries now prefer a SUV if they can afford one. The only reason light-trucks and SUVs don't outsell light cars in those countries as much as in the USA is the income differential. Cars per-capita? Well, the US has more cars per-capita than almost anyone, but not by a so big factor, it only has 2x the number of cars per-capita then, let's say, Brazil. So, no, for what is worth, people seem to prefer to have a personal car as soon as they can afford one, and as soon as their income increases they also seem to have the same american stupid desire for trucks and SUVs.
      - philwelch 3y ago
        Single adults without children aren’t a sustainable social norm.
        defrost 3y ago
        Nor is a continuously expanding human population. Nonetheless, large families throughout time and space have somehow managed to survive without a yank tank, this suggests that while they may be desirable they are hardly neccessary.
        philwelch 3y ago
  - ethangk 3y ago
    Admittedly our experience is probably very different, I live in London where there's great public transport, so most people use that/ bicycles to get into their jobs. Despite that, I still own a car that I regularly use to get out of the city into areas that aren't remotely well served by public transport (think an airfield in the middle of nowhere). The infrastructure around renting a car is too much of a pain in the ass at the moment, and far too expensive. I think the inflection point is ~12 rentals or so per year to make it cheaper to own my crappy old car with insurance and maintenance.
  - mitthrowaway2 3y ago
    In Japan, electric Kei cars do quite well at half that weight, even in rural areas with heavy snow. For example, 2022-2023 car of the year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Sakura https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Sakura
  - myrmidon 3y ago
    This appears like wishful thinking to me, because motorcycles have been available for a century, but people still almost always prefer cars if they can afford them. Cars keep you much better protected from temperature, weather and traffic; it seems very unlikely to me that people will just forgo these comforts to rent electric rollers in the future. Keeping a similar total number of privately owned cars, but almost all electric, sounds MUCH more likely to me.
    - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
      It doesn't matter if cars are more comfortable. Cars are a massive waste of energy and resources compared to other transport options we have now. Societis/cultures who ignore efficiency will be eventually forced to adapt against their will. It's just market economics. (E.g., you can be obstinate and waste a significant chunk of your income just for the perceived comfort of a car, but over a few generations these people will lose in economic competition to people who act rationally.)
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - pfdietz 3y ago
        "People won't do something if it's not efficient" is quite a take. Demonstrably wrong, too. People will happily trade off more energy consumption for personal convenience. As PV goes down its experience curve, the cost of operating an electric vehicle will fall. As batteries go down their curves, the cost of the vehicles themselves will fall. This will naturally push the equilibrium tradeoff point to larger, more energy intensive vehicles.
        bluejekyll 3y ago
        As someone who’s adopting bikes for most of my utility needs, food shopping, dropping kids off at school, one thing I can’t agree with is that cars are more convenient. In general, I find cars to be far less convenient. They are annoying to park, often get stuck in traffic, and generally are just annoying large boxes that you need a lot of space to maneuver. Using a cargo bike for most of those needs on the other hand is far more convenient. Cars are definitely more comfortable, especially on rainy days. But even on rainy days, I often choose to ride (if it’s not a crazy storm) as it’s still more convenient.
  - achow 3y ago
    Is it really true though? Earliest cars were essentially horseless carriages. I think the norm of multiple people travelling together (as a family) has been set.
    - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
      Multiple people together in a car is definitely not the norm, statistically.
      - arter4 3y ago
        The average number of people in a car is probably somewhere between 1 and 2, but if a group of people who know each other have to go from A to B, it is reasonable that they may try to get in a single car. If nothing else, because parking in major cities tends to be a nightmare, and finding a spot for one car is easier than finding N (reasonably close) spots for N cars.
        chriswarbo 3y ago
        > If nothing else, because parking in major cities tends to be a nightmare, and finding a spot for one car is easier than finding N (reasonably close) spots for N cars. A vehicle which isn't moving is not performing its job as transport; and is instead wasting space. Your scenario is better served by public transit, which doesn't require any parking (outside of official maintenance depots, etc.). It also scales to groups of several hundred, whilst a car can only take around 5 individuals (perhaps a few more in a minivan, but that just makes the inefficiency of moving it around and wasting space on parking even worse for the entire rest of its lifetime!)
  - elzbardico 3y ago
    > That's a historical artifact because ICE engines can't fit onto man-sized vehicles. My motorcycle in the garage would disagree
    - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
      A motorcyle is not "man-sized". There's a simple test - can you put it on your porch or in a hallway?
      - JumpinJack_Cash 3y ago
        > > There's a simple test - can you put it on your porch or in a hallway? If the building has ramps for handicapped and elevators you can put your motorcycle everywhere, even on floor 10 or 100 or even 1000.
  - adrianN 3y ago
    ICEs fit on model planes.
  - mcculley 3y ago
    Nobody needs monster trucks either. People will continue to use ridiculous machines as they become more affordable.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
shawabawa3 3y ago
> "Electric cars" are a patently ridiculous concept Weird take when electric cars are widespread and are for many people the best form of travel available (e.g. particularly people who live rurally with rooftop solar) They might be overhyped but to call them a "ridiculous concept" is at this point itself ridiculous
- otabdeveloper4 3y ago
  They're a legacy crutch due to the existing ICE infrastructure. Eventually clean-slate implementations will outcompete the massive waste of maintaining the infrastructure originally built for something that doesn't even make sense anymore.
- bluejekyll 3y ago
  It’s definitely important to scope where car replacements are most successful. And it’s not rural living. It’s in more dense urban and suburban areas, where most of your needs are within 2 miles, and also that there is decent public transit.
  - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
    Most of the world's rural areas use bicycles or motorcycles almost exclusively. (Or even just animals like donkeys and horses.)
adrianN 3y ago
How far in the future are we talking? It seems unlikely that we’ll manage to rebuild our infrastructure so that cars are no longer required in less than two generations.
- otabdeveloper4 3y ago
  First of all, who is "we"? Secondly, this is a timeframe of about 30 years. Making dedicated lanes for PEV's is not that hard. (I bet the urban planners in big cities are already making plans, considering how much of the delivery services have already switched to PEV's.)
  - adrianN 3y ago
    I agree that we can greatly reduce our reliance on cars in the next thirty years, but I'm certain that cars will still be a significant fraction of our transportation by then. Not everyone lives in a city and many cities have too low density to be practical for public transport and small electric vehicles alone. Changing that takes a lot of time.
justrealist 3y ago
> scooters and variations thereof I think the interesting thing about many childless people is that they literally cannot even process how the needs of a family with children may differ from their own lived experience.
philwelch 3y ago
Cities will be redesigned around the Segway!

ethangk 3y ago

Could you say more? Are you thinking longer term we won't have individual cars, but the vehicles that we do have will be powered by electricity?

otabdeveloper4 3y ago
You don't need a 2000 kg car-shaped monster just to get one person to his office job. That's a historical artifact because ICE engines can't fit onto man-sized vehicles. In the future most vehicles will be man-sized and powered by electrical motors. "Cars" will exist only for hauling freight, and probably only ever occasionally rented, not owned.
- lupusreal 3y ago
  You need the car if you want to go reasonably fast (much more than 20-30 mph) and stay reasonably safe. You also need the car if you want to haul enough groceries to feed a family for more than one or two meals, or if you want to transport other people who may be too old or young to go cowboying around on an electric scooter. Electric scooters are pretty much only for young urban adults with no children. Like it or not, cars aren't going anywhere. A scooter lifestyle might work for you but it doesn't work for a large enough portion of the population that your wishes for society will never come to pass. Btw, electric scooters are possibly the most idiotic form of personal electric transport; electric bicycles are much safer. The geometry of a scooter, small wheels far below the center of mass of the rider, makes them fundamentally unstable at any speed. Considering bicycles exist, scooters are completely senseless and should probably be banned outright. You are far more likely to crash a scooter by yourself, simply by losing control of it, than to crash a bicycle. Scooters really are for young people who still think they're invincible; which explains why most riders don't even wear helmets.
  - Toutouxc 3y ago
    > wheels far below the center of mass of the rider, makes them fundamentally unstable Having the wheels far below the center of mass of the whole system (rider + scooter) makes them MORE stable, a bit similar to reversing a car with a long trailer instead of a short one. Compare to something like a racing recumbent bicycle, where the center of mass is really low. Those are very hard to balance at lower speeds. You're so high above the wheels on en e-scooter (or just a regular kick scooter) that you can easily swerve (i.e. laterally displace the wheels, but not your torso) around a pothole or a puddle without changing the direction of travel. That's the opposite of instability.
    - lupusreal 3y ago
      The small wheels of scooters make them more likely to death wobble. I have personally witnessed it happen literal to the name, the rider cracked his skull because he wasn't wearing a helmet of course. Bicycles naturally stay upright. You can push one without a rider and it will roll alone until it loses speed. Try the same with a scooter and it will immediately fall.
      - Toutouxc 3y ago
        Some scooters are susceptible to death wobble, that's true. The fact that you can push a bicycle without a rider and it will roll, while most small-wheeled kick-scooters will fall, is not caused by a higher center of mass, but by the geometry of the front wheel, mainly the steering angle, fork offset and trail. Without a rider, a) the center of mass isn't even that different and b) it doesn't really matter how they behave without one, because the rider is part of the system.
  - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
    > if you want to haul enough groceries to feed a family for more than one or two meals, or if you want to transport other people who may be too old or young This is a "once a week" situation. As time goes on it will become increasingly hard to justify the cost of something you use once a week, especially when other options (groceries delivery) are cheaper and more convenient. P.S. Scooters are popular because they don't need skill to ride, despite being worse in other respects. As time goes on this, too, will change; learning to ride some sort of PEV will be normal.
- jl6 3y ago
  But people need to “haul freight” all the time - shopping bags, kids, etc.
  - defrost 3y ago
    Not all people are US families though. Many single people exist who shop using a backpack, in the peer comments there is an example of a Japanese small car of the year that suits people of a different country. Big cars are a US lifestyle choice.
    - elzbardico 3y ago
      World-wide car sales 2023: Around 70 millions Cars sold in the US in 2022: Around 13 millions. Even if you are talking only about Light Trucks and SUVs as an exclusively American choice, most customers in the BRICs and the most affluent developing countries now prefer a SUV if they can afford one. The only reason light-trucks and SUVs don't outsell light cars in those countries as much as in the USA is the income differential. Cars per-capita? Well, the US has more cars per-capita than almost anyone, but not by a so big factor, it only has 2x the number of cars per-capita then, let's say, Brazil. So, no, for what is worth, people seem to prefer to have a personal car as soon as they can afford one, and as soon as their income increases they also seem to have the same american stupid desire for trucks and SUVs.
    - philwelch 3y ago
      Single adults without children aren’t a sustainable social norm.
      - defrost 3y ago
        Nor is a continuously expanding human population. Nonetheless, large families throughout time and space have somehow managed to survive without a yank tank, this suggests that while they may be desirable they are hardly neccessary.
        philwelch 3y ago
- ethangk 3y ago
  Admittedly our experience is probably very different, I live in London where there's great public transport, so most people use that/ bicycles to get into their jobs. Despite that, I still own a car that I regularly use to get out of the city into areas that aren't remotely well served by public transport (think an airfield in the middle of nowhere). The infrastructure around renting a car is too much of a pain in the ass at the moment, and far too expensive. I think the inflection point is ~12 rentals or so per year to make it cheaper to own my crappy old car with insurance and maintenance.
- mitthrowaway2 3y ago
  In Japan, electric Kei cars do quite well at half that weight, even in rural areas with heavy snow. For example, 2022-2023 car of the year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Sakura https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Sakura
- myrmidon 3y ago
  This appears like wishful thinking to me, because motorcycles have been available for a century, but people still almost always prefer cars if they can afford them. Cars keep you much better protected from temperature, weather and traffic; it seems very unlikely to me that people will just forgo these comforts to rent electric rollers in the future. Keeping a similar total number of privately owned cars, but almost all electric, sounds MUCH more likely to me.
  - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
    It doesn't matter if cars are more comfortable. Cars are a massive waste of energy and resources compared to other transport options we have now. Societis/cultures who ignore efficiency will be eventually forced to adapt against their will. It's just market economics. (E.g., you can be obstinate and waste a significant chunk of your income just for the perceived comfort of a car, but over a few generations these people will lose in economic competition to people who act rationally.)
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - pfdietz 3y ago
      "People won't do something if it's not efficient" is quite a take. Demonstrably wrong, too. People will happily trade off more energy consumption for personal convenience. As PV goes down its experience curve, the cost of operating an electric vehicle will fall. As batteries go down their curves, the cost of the vehicles themselves will fall. This will naturally push the equilibrium tradeoff point to larger, more energy intensive vehicles.
      - bluejekyll 3y ago
        As someone who’s adopting bikes for most of my utility needs, food shopping, dropping kids off at school, one thing I can’t agree with is that cars are more convenient. In general, I find cars to be far less convenient. They are annoying to park, often get stuck in traffic, and generally are just annoying large boxes that you need a lot of space to maneuver. Using a cargo bike for most of those needs on the other hand is far more convenient. Cars are definitely more comfortable, especially on rainy days. But even on rainy days, I often choose to ride (if it’s not a crazy storm) as it’s still more convenient.
- achow 3y ago
  Is it really true though? Earliest cars were essentially horseless carriages. I think the norm of multiple people travelling together (as a family) has been set.
  - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
    Multiple people together in a car is definitely not the norm, statistically.
    - arter4 3y ago
      The average number of people in a car is probably somewhere between 1 and 2, but if a group of people who know each other have to go from A to B, it is reasonable that they may try to get in a single car. If nothing else, because parking in major cities tends to be a nightmare, and finding a spot for one car is easier than finding N (reasonably close) spots for N cars.
      - chriswarbo 3y ago
        > If nothing else, because parking in major cities tends to be a nightmare, and finding a spot for one car is easier than finding N (reasonably close) spots for N cars. A vehicle which isn't moving is not performing its job as transport; and is instead wasting space. Your scenario is better served by public transit, which doesn't require any parking (outside of official maintenance depots, etc.). It also scales to groups of several hundred, whilst a car can only take around 5 individuals (perhaps a few more in a minivan, but that just makes the inefficiency of moving it around and wasting space on parking even worse for the entire rest of its lifetime!)
- elzbardico 3y ago
  > That's a historical artifact because ICE engines can't fit onto man-sized vehicles. My motorcycle in the garage would disagree
  - otabdeveloper4 3y ago
    A motorcyle is not "man-sized". There's a simple test - can you put it on your porch or in a hallway?
    - JumpinJack_Cash 3y ago
      > > There's a simple test - can you put it on your porch or in a hallway? If the building has ramps for handicapped and elevators you can put your motorcycle everywhere, even on floor 10 or 100 or even 1000.
- adrianN 3y ago
  ICEs fit on model planes.
- mcculley 3y ago
  Nobody needs monster trucks either. People will continue to use ridiculous machines as they become more affordable.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

shawabawa3 3y ago

> "Electric cars" are a patently ridiculous concept Weird take when electric cars are widespread and are for many people the best form of travel available (e.g. particularly people who live rurally with rooftop solar) They might be overhyped but to call them a "ridiculous concept" is at this point itself ridiculous

otabdeveloper4 3y ago
They're a legacy crutch due to the existing ICE infrastructure. Eventually clean-slate implementations will outcompete the massive waste of maintaining the infrastructure originally built for something that doesn't even make sense anymore.
bluejekyll 3y ago
It’s definitely important to scope where car replacements are most successful. And it’s not rural living. It’s in more dense urban and suburban areas, where most of your needs are within 2 miles, and also that there is decent public transit.
- otabdeveloper4 3y ago
  Most of the world's rural areas use bicycles or motorcycles almost exclusively. (Or even just animals like donkeys and horses.)

adrianN 3y ago

How far in the future are we talking? It seems unlikely that we’ll manage to rebuild our infrastructure so that cars are no longer required in less than two generations.

otabdeveloper4 3y ago
First of all, who is "we"? Secondly, this is a timeframe of about 30 years. Making dedicated lanes for PEV's is not that hard. (I bet the urban planners in big cities are already making plans, considering how much of the delivery services have already switched to PEV's.)
- adrianN 3y ago
  I agree that we can greatly reduce our reliance on cars in the next thirty years, but I'm certain that cars will still be a significant fraction of our transportation by then. Not everyone lives in a city and many cities have too low density to be practical for public transport and small electric vehicles alone. Changing that takes a lot of time.

justrealist 3y ago

> scooters and variations thereof I think the interesting thing about many childless people is that they literally cannot even process how the needs of a family with children may differ from their own lived experience.

philwelch 3y ago

Cities will be redesigned around the Segway!