Robotaxis: The Future is Autonomous

Self-driving vehicles are the future of mobility because they improve safety and reduce costs.

I took my first ride in a robotaxi my first weekend in San Francisco. Cruise¹ and Waymo² had invite-only services in the city that operated between 10:30 pm and 5 am in specific parts of the city.

My first ride was with Cruise's Tourmaline at 11 pm on a Saturday. I ended up at a karaoke bar that was closing. Why? Because it was the longest ride that I could take and I wanted to see how the car would do.

After taking enough rides in a robotaxi, you start to appreciate how bad other drivers are at sharing roadways.

Some road safety facts

Around 40 thousand people die from motor vehicle accidents every year.

Impaired driving accidents (DUI) have been steadily falling since the early 80s due to increased enforcement, advocacy from groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), and, more recently, ridesharing services like Uber.

Distracted driving is still on the rise even though there's more awareness around the dangers of using a cell phone while driving. Infotainment screens exist in almost every new vehicle.

AI + Driving

One of the biggest utilities of AI is as a decision-making engine. Every time you get on the road, you have a near infinite number of decisions that you need to make outside of direction and speed.

On the highway, things are relatively easy. You're deciding at high speed, but your main considerations are following distances and lane changes. Adaptive cruise control systems make highway driving much more pleasant. They'll keep lanes for you and warn if you're veering off. They also slow down and speed based on following distance.

Cities are much more challenging.

You have to make decisions based on traffic lights, double-parked cars, right-of-way at intersections, cyclists, pedestrians, little kids, and pets.

Other drivers also factor into your decision-making. And they also have to consider all the things you're considering. At least they should.

The stresses of daily life never really leave the background. You just have to contend with them. And sometimes everything boils over and you get road rage.

Anecdotes on people we share the roads with...

People are buying larger vehicles as crash protection.

There's a thing called cutting up now.³

Cost

The equipment is expensive. In addition to the car, you have the numerous cameras, radar, and lidar sensors. Don't forget the onboard processors for making sense of all the measurements. They're all expensive now, but costs will likely come down over time. The tradeoff is that any improvement made to one is deployed to all almost instantaneously.

There's the regulatory cost. Rules and permissions have to be negotiated with state, cities, and municipalities. Not all priorities are aligned. And any bad news looks bad on everyone that signed off on a deployment.

Then there are the societal costs.

On one hand, it's great news for personal mobility and accessibility. The US lacks the density to really make rail work. And in a world that is increasingly becoming hostile to kids, seniors, and people with disabilities, robotaxis allow everyone to get around just fine.

There's also the fact that most private vehicles spend more than 95% of their time parked. Not a good use for such amazing machines.

On the other hand, there's the labor question. Our society is adept at making things move around with the push of a button. It doesn't happen in a vacuum. What happens to the truck drivers, taxi drivers, rideshare drivers?

I think it initially looks like ATMs and bank teller employment because it will take a while to scale the infrastructure required to make all of it workable across the country. In that intervening period, I imagine governments will find it hard to go against the safety argument and require more robust licensing rules for the roads. But improvement in robotics in other sectors and reducing costs means the upheaval will likely happen in the end.

The impact will probably be greater than the motor vehicle proliferating.

...

I'm optimistic for the future because I feel like I already live in it. After spending the past year and half getting comfortable with robotaxis, I no longer have any hesitations about where the future is headed. I think back to calling a taxi in Norman, Oklahoma in 2012 vs my first Uber ride in 2015. It's hard to think of life before rideshare. But we'll likely go beyond it in a shorter time than we've had it.

"When the car began replacing the horse, pessimists didn’t treat it like a great new tool. They called it “the devil wagon,” and said its mission was to destroy the world."⁴