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posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday July 26 2017, @05:55AM   Printer-friendly
from the I'm-sorry-Dave,-I-can't-do-that dept.

[...] some experts believe as much as 95% of passenger miles could be electric, autonomous by 2030, thanks to some basic economics. Because electric vehicles cost a whole lot less to drive and maintain—but more to buy—and because autonomous vehicles greatly reduce the cost of commercial driving, a combination of the two technologies will make autonomous Transportation as a Service exponentially more cost competitive than either owning a car, or hiring a car and driver. It's also exponentially more profitable for car companies, who have long feared the loss of maintenance and service profits associated with a transition to electric cars.

This question will come up more frequently as self-driving technology advances. Will perfection of that technology make a difference, though, in the face of social behaviors that have been deeply ingrained over the past century?


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 26 2017, @01:50PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 26 2017, @01:50PM (#544628)

    Lots of sensible points, thanks.

    > One parent could go to work, then send the car home for the other one to use.

    When I was in grade school (early 1960s) we had one car. Most days my mother drove my father to work in the Beetle (8-10 minutes each way) and then had the use of the car for the day. As soon as I could drive (age 16) I would often do the afternoon pickup of my father. Note that my father was a manager, running an engineering department with 30-50 people, and at that time the pay scale was such that one car was about all he could afford (along with a house and 3 kids).