Inner cities are better served by trolleys/buses anyhow. Self-driving taxis would work best at the edges of a city, or to fill gaps between train stations in suburbs
If safer is a realistic outcome, perhaps things would further evolve. Ride share cars today are dual-use vehicles that typically carry driver + no passenger or driver + one passenger with the capacity for 3-5. If future autonomous ride share cars turn out to be dedicated to ride share, maybe most would end up being 3-wheel with just one or two seats. Shrinking the size of a substantial potion of cars on urban roads could be beneficial to road safety, power/carbon intensity, road capacity/density (which could also lead to more equitable road use for bikes and pedestrians).
Inner cities are better served by trolleys/buses anyhow. Self-driving taxis would work best at the edges of a city, or to fill gaps between train stations in suburbs
How would self-driving taxis do this any better than taxis that already exist and aren’t relying on large tech corporations?
Cheaper, safer and one extra seat.
We’re obviously not there yet but I haven’t heard a single good argument for why we wouldn’t be in the future.
I don’t think they’d do much better besides being safer, eventually. Just saying that’s the only place where they’d make sense to go.
Edit: giving it a bit more thought, they should also have greater passenger capacity for their size
If safer is a realistic outcome, perhaps things would further evolve. Ride share cars today are dual-use vehicles that typically carry driver + no passenger or driver + one passenger with the capacity for 3-5. If future autonomous ride share cars turn out to be dedicated to ride share, maybe most would end up being 3-wheel with just one or two seats. Shrinking the size of a substantial potion of cars on urban roads could be beneficial to road safety, power/carbon intensity, road capacity/density (which could also lead to more equitable road use for bikes and pedestrians).