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posted by martyb on Monday November 13 2017, @11:00AM   Printer-friendly
from the I-prefer-the-Age-of-Aquarius dept.

Bob Lutz, former General Motors Vice Chair, opines:

It saddens me to say it, but we are approaching the end of the automotive era.

The auto industry is on an accelerating change curve. For hundreds of years, the horse was the prime mover of humans and for the past 120 years it has been the automobile.

Now we are approaching the end of the line for the automobile because travel will be in standardized modules.

The end state will be the fully autonomous module with no capability for the driver to exercise command. You will call for it, it will arrive at your location, you'll get in, input your destination and go to the freeway.
...
The vehicles, however, will no longer be driven by humans because in 15 to 20 years — at the latest — human-driven vehicles will be legislated off the highways.

The tipping point will come when 20 to 30 percent of vehicles are fully autonomous. Countries will look at the accident statistics and figure out that human drivers are causing 99.9 percent of the accidents.

Is he right? Is the age of the automobile coming to an end?


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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by knarf on Monday November 13 2017, @03:42PM

    by knarf (2042) on Monday November 13 2017, @03:42PM (#596224)

    Cue Rush' "Red Barchetta" [1], based on the short story "A nice morning drive" by Richard S. Foster [2]:

    My uncle has a country place
    That no one knows about
    He says it used to be a farm
    Before the Motor Law
    And on Sundays I elude the eyes
    And hop the turbine freight
    To far outside the wire
    Where my white-haired uncle waits

    Jump to the ground
    As the Turbo slows to cross the borderline
    Run like the wind
    As excitement shivers up and down my spine
    Down in his barn
    My uncle preserved for me an old machine
    For fifty-odd years
    To keep it as new has been his dearest dream

    I strip away the old debris
    That hides a shining car
    A brilliant red Barchetta
    From a better, vanished time
    We fire up the willing engine
    Responding with a roar
    Tires spitting gravel
    I commit my weekly crime

    Wind in my hair
    Shifting and drifting
    Mechanical music
    Adrenaline surge

    Well-weathered leather
    Hot metal and oil
    The scented country air
    Sunlight on chrome
    The blur of the landscape
    Every nerve aware

    Suddenly ahead of me
    Across the mountainside
    A gleaming alloy air-car
    Shoots towards me, two lanes wide
    I spin around with shrieking tires
    To run the deadly race
    Go screaming through the valley
    As another joins the chase

    Drive like the wind
    Straining the limits of machine and man
    Laughing out loud with fear and hope
    I've got a desperate plan
    At the one-lane bridge
    I leave the giants stranded at the riverside
    Race back to the farm
    To dream with my uncle at the fireside

      [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Barchetta [wikipedia.org]

      [2] https://www.scribd.com/doc/33762958/A-Nice-Morning-Drive [scribd.com]

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