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This will be interesting. As an aging nondriver living in Yokohama, I’ve been both hoping that self-driving cars become available here before I develop mobility

This will be interesting. As an aging nondriver living in Yokohama, I’ve been both hoping that self-driving cars become available here before I develop mobility issues and wondering how feasible they will be. Since I don’t drive, I don’t have a sense of what the roads here are like from the vehicle’s perspective. But many of the streets, including in the neighborhood where I live [1], are narrow, have no sidewalks, and are shared by cars, bicyclists, and pedestrians. Very different from, say, Phoenix. [1] https://maps.app.goo.gl/CVDYknAXeeA6u4DP8 https://maps.app.goo.gl/CVDYknAXeeA6u4DP8

aitchnyu 2y ago
I admire Japanese taxis for mounting mirrors on the bonnet so they dont stick out. I'm Indian and I'm glad I had a choice of 170ish cm wide Japanese sedans meant for Asia and hate the new 180ish cars. The Jaguar is 213 cm wide.
k99x55 2y ago
Don't fall on the trap of self-driving cars will make our lives better. They won't. Building cities for people first is what will improve our lives. Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0
- tkgally 2y ago
  The city where I live—Yokohama—is very different in layout and density from the U.S. cities shown in that video. My neighborhood consists of many small plots of land, each with a different owner, separated by narrow streets. Unless it all gets wiped out by a tsunami, it’s never going to be rebuilt or have its layout changed—the landowners, many of whom live on their plots of land, would not stand for it. My house is on the side of a steep hill. If in a few years—I am now 67–I become unable to walk up that hill, the only way I will be able to go anywhere is by calling a taxi. (No one in my family here knows how to drive.) Because of demographic trends, there is a shortage of human taxi drivers now and that shortage is likely to get worse. If I do become significantly less mobile five or ten years from now, I will be able to keep living in my home only if self-driving taxis are available. So for me, in that very likely scenario, self-driving cars would make my life better. In Japan, there are millions of people in similar situations to mine.
  - ssl-3 2y ago
    You raise a very valid point, and it is a point that I do not see expressed very often. While it is "easy" (and, I think, proper) to build new areas of cities to be walkable at some point in the future, the fact remains that today cities already exist as they stand and many of them may not be very walkable. Even in already-walkable cities, it is important to consider the fact that all of us will eventually (hopefully!) live long enough to be considered old. Looking forward to when I myself may become old, I think I'll still like to be able to get from A to B (and back) with a minimum of fuss and at a time of my choosing. So it is my hope that by the time I reach that point, the world will have options for me and other old people that are better than old people have today. And that's just me, some day. But many people are old right now. They can benefit from things like self-driving cars right now, even in walkable cities.
  - k99x55 2y ago
    Cars are the most age discriminatory mode of transport of all: only 18+ and not too old can use it, and most disabled cannot use it. A Bicycles work to all ages, all abilities. In your case an ebike, trike (etrike?) or even mobility scooter might be a much lighter, cheaper, scalable option. Hey why not a self-driving e-scooter? Why does it have to weight 2 tons in the first place? Bike infrastructure is not only for bicycles: its for trikes, wheelchairs, mobility scooters, ebikes. Watch: * Who else benefits from the Dutch cycling infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSGx3HSjKDo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSGx3HSjKDo * 8 to 80, people of all ages cycling in the Netherlands: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swqaAIkGtpA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swqaAIkGtpA
    - keiferski 2y ago
      Have you ever interacted with a person over 70 that has mobility problems? Do you really expect an 80 year old to ride a scooter up a hill in the rain/snow? Getting into the car is difficult enough.
      - k99x55 2y ago
        I'm not saying to ban cars, just to de-prioritize them The use case for bicycle-and-similars is way more than the use case for cars specially urban places (also outside urban places)
- RGamma 2y ago
  That video was rather thoughtful. Almost makes me want to short SDC companies, buuut lobbying.
- Aeolun 2y ago
  Tokyo doesn’t need to be built for people. It already is.
- matthewfelgate 2y ago
  Self-Driving cars will make roads safer and open up cheap travel for millions of people.
- fldskfjdslkfj 2y ago
  Who says self driving cars will need to pertain their existing form? Hopefully that fact that you wont own the vehicle will lead to companies building more minimal form factors since in most cases it's a single rider and they'll incentivised by keeping costs as low as possible.
- tim333 2y ago
  I watched part of "Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it)" and the arguments seemed pretty weak. A lot of it was along the lines of current cars cause problems in cities and self driving cars are still cars so self driving cars bad. But there's a lot of flexibility as to how they get used and regulated. Just thinking about one city issue local to me - I live near Oxford Street in London which is currently overcrowded with thousands of people plus buses and taxis and the like. They've wanted to pedestrianize it for ages and probably will but there are problems with accessibility for the handicapped and delivery of stuff to the stores. That could maybe be sorted with slow moving self driving evs picking those up? I'm not sure but at least it's another option.
- Ajedi32 2y ago
  Almost all of these "cars bad" arguments fall for the trap of focusing solely on the disadvantages of cars while completely ignoring the huge upsides that make them by far most popular form of transport in rich countries in the first place: Long distance transport directly from your home to the front door of your destination in a private, climate-controlled cabin with zero transfers or unnecessary stops. Self-driving will make our lives better because it takes that already very successful form of transportation and makes it significantly safer and more efficient without compromising any of its advantages.
  - GrzegorzWidla 2y ago
    I have no desire to educate but I have to indicate that there is plenty of research on why people prefer cars and that’s not it. Still, assuming that walking from home to a train / metro station is a problem has to come from a car centric place. It’s ridiculous. In many cities that is the best part of the day for many people. You rarely hear from people driving that car commute is the best part of their day.
    - Ajedi32 2y ago
      In very specific situations (in the summer on a sunny day in a low-crime area when its just you commuting with no small children or excessive cargo and no time pressure) walking a few blocks to and from a train station could indeed be a pleasant experience. Take away a few of those points though and cars start to look pretty attractive again. Even more so if we're talking about a hypothetical self-driving future where several of the few remaining disadvantages of cars have been mitigated.
kjkjadksj 2y ago
I wouldn’t be surprised if they just avoid those difficult cases. The algorithm is biased to be safe over assertive so people will just cut it off on foot and it will sit there. For example in LA, waymo is geofenced away from some of the hilly neighborhoods where there are narrow switchbacking roads shared with pedestrians due to a lack of sidewalk. It also does not go on freeways.
GoatOfAplomb 2y ago
Waymo is doing alright in San Francisco as well. That's not directly comparable to Tokyo, either, but I expect it's a much less distant of a comparison than Phoenix.
- bobthepanda 2y ago
  In SF you still have clearly delineated sidewalks with curbs and crossing lights. Japanese side streets are basically equivalent to alleys and cars are guests. There aren’t too many streets like that in the US at all.
- nixpulvis 2y ago
  I saw a video of a bunch of Waymos backed up on each other being too hesitant to make a turn. Kinda reinforced a fear I have of these things. Not to mention I would hate to try and wave one of these things to turn before me... or wink my headlights. IDK, like I get the appeal for driverless cars, I just still don't like them.
  - Aeolun 2y ago
    That… doesn’t sound like such a bad thing to me. I’d rather have my driverless car hesitate (in a safe location) than be too agressive.
    - nixpulvis 2y ago
      Can't wait to get locked in a waymo in a bad part of town.
  - cadamsau 2y ago
    Seeing something once doesn’t make it a real phenomenon. Besides, if that is common, Waymo will have data on it and if it’s common enough, they’ll fix it. I’ve sat in Waymos on 2 occasions, each on a separate ride, in which the car avoided collisions that would have happened due to bad human drivers. Your fear is worth examining closely as it’ll hold you back from enjoying this amazing technology.
boulos 2y ago
That's wider than the streets near me in San Francisco :). Lots of our "two way" streets, are only one vehicle wide, because we allow parking on both sides of the street, too.

aitchnyu 2y ago

I admire Japanese taxis for mounting mirrors on the bonnet so they dont stick out. I'm Indian and I'm glad I had a choice of 170ish cm wide Japanese sedans meant for Asia and hate the new 180ish cars. The Jaguar is 213 cm wide.

k99x55 2y ago

Don't fall on the trap of self-driving cars will make our lives better. They won't. Building cities for people first is what will improve our lives. Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0

tkgally 2y ago
The city where I live—Yokohama—is very different in layout and density from the U.S. cities shown in that video. My neighborhood consists of many small plots of land, each with a different owner, separated by narrow streets. Unless it all gets wiped out by a tsunami, it’s never going to be rebuilt or have its layout changed—the landowners, many of whom live on their plots of land, would not stand for it. My house is on the side of a steep hill. If in a few years—I am now 67–I become unable to walk up that hill, the only way I will be able to go anywhere is by calling a taxi. (No one in my family here knows how to drive.) Because of demographic trends, there is a shortage of human taxi drivers now and that shortage is likely to get worse. If I do become significantly less mobile five or ten years from now, I will be able to keep living in my home only if self-driving taxis are available. So for me, in that very likely scenario, self-driving cars would make my life better. In Japan, there are millions of people in similar situations to mine.
- ssl-3 2y ago
  You raise a very valid point, and it is a point that I do not see expressed very often. While it is "easy" (and, I think, proper) to build new areas of cities to be walkable at some point in the future, the fact remains that today cities already exist as they stand and many of them may not be very walkable. Even in already-walkable cities, it is important to consider the fact that all of us will eventually (hopefully!) live long enough to be considered old. Looking forward to when I myself may become old, I think I'll still like to be able to get from A to B (and back) with a minimum of fuss and at a time of my choosing. So it is my hope that by the time I reach that point, the world will have options for me and other old people that are better than old people have today. And that's just me, some day. But many people are old right now. They can benefit from things like self-driving cars right now, even in walkable cities.
- k99x55 2y ago
  Cars are the most age discriminatory mode of transport of all: only 18+ and not too old can use it, and most disabled cannot use it. A Bicycles work to all ages, all abilities. In your case an ebike, trike (etrike?) or even mobility scooter might be a much lighter, cheaper, scalable option. Hey why not a self-driving e-scooter? Why does it have to weight 2 tons in the first place? Bike infrastructure is not only for bicycles: its for trikes, wheelchairs, mobility scooters, ebikes. Watch: * Who else benefits from the Dutch cycling infrastructure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSGx3HSjKDo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSGx3HSjKDo * 8 to 80, people of all ages cycling in the Netherlands: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swqaAIkGtpA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swqaAIkGtpA
  - keiferski 2y ago
    Have you ever interacted with a person over 70 that has mobility problems? Do you really expect an 80 year old to ride a scooter up a hill in the rain/snow? Getting into the car is difficult enough.
    - k99x55 2y ago
      I'm not saying to ban cars, just to de-prioritize them The use case for bicycle-and-similars is way more than the use case for cars specially urban places (also outside urban places)
RGamma 2y ago
That video was rather thoughtful. Almost makes me want to short SDC companies, buuut lobbying.
Aeolun 2y ago
Tokyo doesn’t need to be built for people. It already is.
matthewfelgate 2y ago
Self-Driving cars will make roads safer and open up cheap travel for millions of people.
fldskfjdslkfj 2y ago
Who says self driving cars will need to pertain their existing form? Hopefully that fact that you wont own the vehicle will lead to companies building more minimal form factors since in most cases it's a single rider and they'll incentivised by keeping costs as low as possible.
tim333 2y ago
I watched part of "Watch: How Self-Driving Cars will Destroy Cities (and what to do about it)" and the arguments seemed pretty weak. A lot of it was along the lines of current cars cause problems in cities and self driving cars are still cars so self driving cars bad. But there's a lot of flexibility as to how they get used and regulated. Just thinking about one city issue local to me - I live near Oxford Street in London which is currently overcrowded with thousands of people plus buses and taxis and the like. They've wanted to pedestrianize it for ages and probably will but there are problems with accessibility for the handicapped and delivery of stuff to the stores. That could maybe be sorted with slow moving self driving evs picking those up? I'm not sure but at least it's another option.
Ajedi32 2y ago
Almost all of these "cars bad" arguments fall for the trap of focusing solely on the disadvantages of cars while completely ignoring the huge upsides that make them by far most popular form of transport in rich countries in the first place: Long distance transport directly from your home to the front door of your destination in a private, climate-controlled cabin with zero transfers or unnecessary stops. Self-driving will make our lives better because it takes that already very successful form of transportation and makes it significantly safer and more efficient without compromising any of its advantages.
- GrzegorzWidla 2y ago
  I have no desire to educate but I have to indicate that there is plenty of research on why people prefer cars and that’s not it. Still, assuming that walking from home to a train / metro station is a problem has to come from a car centric place. It’s ridiculous. In many cities that is the best part of the day for many people. You rarely hear from people driving that car commute is the best part of their day.
  - Ajedi32 2y ago
    In very specific situations (in the summer on a sunny day in a low-crime area when its just you commuting with no small children or excessive cargo and no time pressure) walking a few blocks to and from a train station could indeed be a pleasant experience. Take away a few of those points though and cars start to look pretty attractive again. Even more so if we're talking about a hypothetical self-driving future where several of the few remaining disadvantages of cars have been mitigated.

kjkjadksj 2y ago

I wouldn’t be surprised if they just avoid those difficult cases. The algorithm is biased to be safe over assertive so people will just cut it off on foot and it will sit there. For example in LA, waymo is geofenced away from some of the hilly neighborhoods where there are narrow switchbacking roads shared with pedestrians due to a lack of sidewalk. It also does not go on freeways.

GoatOfAplomb 2y ago

Waymo is doing alright in San Francisco as well. That's not directly comparable to Tokyo, either, but I expect it's a much less distant of a comparison than Phoenix.

bobthepanda 2y ago
In SF you still have clearly delineated sidewalks with curbs and crossing lights. Japanese side streets are basically equivalent to alleys and cars are guests. There aren’t too many streets like that in the US at all.
nixpulvis 2y ago
I saw a video of a bunch of Waymos backed up on each other being too hesitant to make a turn. Kinda reinforced a fear I have of these things. Not to mention I would hate to try and wave one of these things to turn before me... or wink my headlights. IDK, like I get the appeal for driverless cars, I just still don't like them.
- Aeolun 2y ago
  That… doesn’t sound like such a bad thing to me. I’d rather have my driverless car hesitate (in a safe location) than be too agressive.
  - nixpulvis 2y ago
    Can't wait to get locked in a waymo in a bad part of town.
- cadamsau 2y ago
  Seeing something once doesn’t make it a real phenomenon. Besides, if that is common, Waymo will have data on it and if it’s common enough, they’ll fix it. I’ve sat in Waymos on 2 occasions, each on a separate ride, in which the car avoided collisions that would have happened due to bad human drivers. Your fear is worth examining closely as it’ll hold you back from enjoying this amazing technology.

boulos 2y ago

That's wider than the streets near me in San Francisco :). Lots of our "two way" streets, are only one vehicle wide, because we allow parking on both sides of the street, too.