The Coffee House

[Gary A.]

Been reading up on the advancement of self driving electric vehicles and the implications for the future (Uber self driving cabs). If I were 30 years younger, I would probably be a all over this.

Think about this, in a metropolitan area an "on demand" self driving vehicle, with staging areas strategically located in the city. Via a smart phone app, (which automatically bills your credit card), you order your vehicle, plug in the number of passengers, the pickup address and destination address. The vehicle is dispatched by a central computer that considers the staging level inventories, and most logical locations, then dispatches the correct vehicle. GPS tracking automatically sends a text message to your phone at a predetermined time before it arrives. You enter the vehicle at the curb, enter a pass code supplied by your app, and off you go. It drops you at your location, then proceeds to the predetermined staging area, where it pulls into an automatic charging area, until the next dispatch. Attendants at each staging location would be notified prior to arrival and would be required to clean, wipe down interior, and release the vehicle before the system would dispatch it again.

No more cabs, no more parking fees, convenient transportation. Heck I may even come out of retirement!! LOL

What could possibly go wrong?

 

[JonA_CT]

Been reading up on the advancement of self driving electric vehicles and the implications for the future (Uber self driving cabs). If I were 30 years younger, I would probably be a all over this.

Think about this, in a metropolitan area an "on demand" self driving vehicle, with staging areas strategically located in the city. Via a smart phone app, (which automatically bills your credit card), you order your vehicle, plug in the number of passengers, the pickup address and destination address. The vehicle is dispatched by a central computer that considers the staging level inventories, and most logical locations, then dispatches the correct vehicle. GPS tracking automatically sends a text message to your phone at a predetermined time before it arrives. You enter the vehicle at the curb, enter a pass code supplied by your app, and off you go. It drops you at your location, then proceeds to the predetermined staging area, where it pulls into an automatic charging area, until the next dispatch. Attendants at each staging location would be notified prior to arrival and would be required to clean, wipe down interior, and release the vehicle before the system would dispatch it again.

No more cabs, no more parking fees, convenient transportation. Heck I may even come out of retirement!! LOL

Scary, at the same time though, too. If you can have a self-driving cab in urban environments, why not have self-driving tractor trailer trucks, too? It should be even easier...the depots you are talking about already exist. I'm sure that UPS and Fedex already have teams monitoring the progress in these areas.

The scary part isn't the autonomous part of them (because honestly...I'd probably choose a well-designed robot over most of the drivers I encounter on the road, myself included...). It's that as such moves begin to happen, it'll strip away one of the few "blue-collar" professions that still exist. The jobs that will be created as a result will be highly technical. I believe the most common job in the United States is a being a truck driver.

As it is, with automation and outsourcing, there are less and less places for people without lots of expensive and additional education to make a living. Hell, I have plenty of friends with college degrees who work in restaurants or who make $15 an hour in mid-level retail management.

Could truck drivers be re-trained to work on and maintain the equipment? Sure. Who pays for it? And what do the other 75% of those people do?

 

[Gary A.]

Buenas Dias Coffee Hosers. What a fine wonderful morning. The sun is out (@Leo: Why isn't 'sun' capitalized as it is a proper name? Gary has to find a style book. Gary guesses that sun/Sun is both a proper name and a noun. Sorta like John/john ... as in, John is in the john.) But the sun is out can also be the Sun is out. A little help here Leo.)

 

[tirediron]

Been reading up on the advancement of self driving electric vehicles and the implications for the future (Uber self driving cabs). If I were 30 years younger, I would probably be a all over this.

Think about this, in a metropolitan area an "on demand" self driving vehicle, with staging areas strategically located in the city. Via a smart phone app, (which automatically bills your credit card), you order your vehicle, plug in the number of passengers, the pickup address and destination address. The vehicle is dispatched by a central computer that considers the staging level inventories, and most logical locations, then dispatches the correct vehicle. GPS tracking automatically sends a text message to your phone at a predetermined time before it arrives. You enter the vehicle at the curb, enter a pass code supplied by your app, and off you go. It drops you at your location, then proceeds to the predetermined staging area, where it pulls into an automatic charging area, until the next dispatch. Attendants at each staging location would be notified prior to arrival and would be required to clean, wipe down interior, and release the vehicle before the system would dispatch it again.

No more cabs, no more parking fees, convenient transportation. Heck I may even come out of retirement!! LOL

I wonder how difficult it would be to put a 350 Stroker and Turbo 400 into an electric Uber car?

 

[Gary A.]

Yesterday was a long day for Gary. His work wrapped up early and he installed/removed/replaced the plastic deck tiles in the patio. Gary has three different deck tiles hiding some cracked concrete. Two are 12" x 12" hard but flexible plastic tile but in two different patterns and the third is a soft foam 24" x 24" which feels great to tread upon, but the furniture feet sinks it making it difficult for minor adjustments/movements and it isn't UV treated, rendering those tiles in the sun/Sun to rapid deterioration. Yesterday afternoon and well into night, Gary was was moving furniture and plants around, measuring, removing, modifying, installing and reinstalling deck tiles. It was tedious work which ached his tiny, unused muscles. He needs about 40 square feet of additional 12x12 to finish the job and completely eliminate the foam tiles. Gary inspected the work this morning and it looks pretty good with no gaps between the three different tiles. As the patio doesn't conform in length or width to even feet, and the patio has a long radius on the south west corner, Gary needs to cut up a bunch of tiles for the edges.

 

[Gary A.]

Been reading up on the advancement of self driving electric vehicles and the implications for the future (Uber self driving cabs). If I were 30 years younger, I would probably be a all over this.

Think about this, in a metropolitan area an "on demand" self driving vehicle, with staging areas strategically located in the city. Via a smart phone app, (which automatically bills your credit card), you order your vehicle, plug in the number of passengers, the pickup address and destination address. The vehicle is dispatched by a central computer that considers the staging level inventories, and most logical locations, then dispatches the correct vehicle. GPS tracking automatically sends a text message to your phone at a predetermined time before it arrives. You enter the vehicle at the curb, enter a pass code supplied by your app, and off you go. It drops you at your location, then proceeds to the predetermined staging area, where it pulls into an automatic charging area, until the next dispatch. Attendants at each staging location would be notified prior to arrival and would be required to clean, wipe down interior, and release the vehicle before the system would dispatch it again.

No more cabs, no more parking fees, convenient transportation. Heck I may even come out of retirement!! LOL

I wonder how difficult it would be to put a 350 Stroker and Turbo 400 into an electric Uber car?

The robot driver would like that.

 

[snowbear115 47]

We dropped the landline a few years ago and haven't missed it one bit.

JC - The first thing I noticed in Ohio (my first trip to Monroe/Detroit) was that the hills for overpasses had to be imported. The second was the triple trailers that we don't have here.

 

[limr30 3]

Buenas Dias Coffee Hosers. What a fine wonderful morning. The sun is out (@Leo: Why isn't 'sun' capitalized as it is a proper name? Gary has to find a style book. Gary guesses that sun/Sun is both a proper name and a noun. Sorta like John/john ... as in, John is in the john.) But the sun is out can also be the Sun is out. A little help here Leo.)

'Sun' is not a proper noun. A word is simply a code that we all agree refers to a particular object. A name is what we use when we want to distinguish between different individuals of the same object. So, 'human' is the symbolic set of sounds/letters that refer to us hairless apes. Then 'Gary' is the symbolic set of sounds/letters to distinguish you from another hairless ape.

The word 'sun' refers to a giant fireball in the sky. However, it doesn't have an official name - not the way that planets have a name. One reason that it doesn't have a name is because it doesn't really need one. This planet and its inhabitants have only one sun that concerns us - which is why it is always referred to using the definite article "the" - so we don't need to distinguish it from other suns. Same thing with the moon. "The sun" and "the moon" always refer to our sun and moon. We do use names for other stars, though, because there are a ton of stars in the sky and how will we know which one will guide us to the north, or make up Orion's belt?

Apparently the International Astronomical Union recommends using a capital letter for Sun and Moon, basically saying that the regular noun should also become its official name. As for the non-astronomers, AP style (which governs the style of a hell of a lot of writing) still requires lowercase:
Does our sun have a name? | EarthSky.org

 

[snowbear115 47]

I just call the sun "Bartholomew."

 

[smoke665]

Or Fert beds and pillows

Okay, so technically Gary has a landline also. Like smoke665, it came with the cable, but it isn't hooked up. Mary Lou keeps trying to drop the landline, but the cable company insists that it is required ... Poppycock! Robocalls suck ... more Poppycock! Gary just sets the phone down and lets them run. He figures every second or two he ties up the line save some other sucker from getting a call. Sometimes he tries calling back, but usually the number doesn't work. One time Gary got a person in Venice, California. Seems the robocaller just picked a random number for display.

Well, I was seriously looking at ordering the device I mentioned above but according to this Stop robocalls and telemarketers with Nomorobo nomorobo is free for basic service. As this is the one that my ATT Uverse has been pushing. I mistakenly thought it cost you per month but according to this that's only on a cell line.

 

[smoke665]

The scary part isn't the autonomous part of them (because honestly...I'd probably choose a well-designed robot over most of the drivers I encounter on the road, myself included...). It's that as such moves begin to happen, it'll strip away one of the few "blue-collar" professions that still exist. The jobs that will be created as a result will be highly technical. I believe the most common job in the United States is a being a truck driver.

The scary part is here. UPS is already chomping at the bit for intercity robotic delivery/pickup. I can tell you from personal knowledge and experience in transportation, that putting a 10,000 lb low speed vehicle in a city operation is a whole lot different than putting an 80,000# vehicle over the road at highway speeds in varying weather and traffic conditions. While a failure in the smaller vehicle could be serious, a failure on an over the road truck would be catastrophic.

Getting back to UPS, they are already using electric golf carts with trailers, to deliver packages in upscale neighborhoods that ban trucks. Wouldn't be much of a stretch to go automated there.

 

[waday]

Been reading up on the advancement of self driving electric vehicles and the implications for the future (Uber self driving cabs). If I were 30 years younger, I would probably be a all over this.

Think about this, in a metropolitan area an "on demand" self driving vehicle, with staging areas strategically located in the city. Via a smart phone app, (which automatically bills your credit card), you order your vehicle, plug in the number of passengers, the pickup address and destination address. The vehicle is dispatched by a central computer that considers the staging level inventories, and most logical locations, then dispatches the correct vehicle. GPS tracking automatically sends a text message to your phone at a predetermined time before it arrives. You enter the vehicle at the curb, enter a pass code supplied by your app, and off you go. It drops you at your location, then proceeds to the predetermined staging area, where it pulls into an automatic charging area, until the next dispatch. Attendants at each staging location would be notified prior to arrival and would be required to clean, wipe down interior, and release the vehicle before the system would dispatch it again.

No more cabs, no more parking fees, convenient transportation. Heck I may even come out of retirement!! LOL

Scary, at the same time though, too. If you can have a self-driving cab in urban environments, why not have self-driving tractor trailer trucks, too? It should be even easier...the depots you are talking about already exist. I'm sure that UPS and Fedex already have teams monitoring the progress in these areas.

The scary part isn't the autonomous part of them (because honestly...I'd probably choose a well-designed robot over most of the drivers I encounter on the road, myself included...). It's that as such moves begin to happen, it'll strip away one of the few "blue-collar" professions that still exist. The jobs that will be created as a result will be highly technical. I believe the most common job in the United States is a being a truck driver.

As it is, with automation and outsourcing, there are less and less places for people without lots of expensive and additional education to make a living. Hell, I have plenty of friends with college degrees who work in restaurants or who make $15 an hour in mid-level retail management.

Could truck drivers be re-trained to work on and maintain the equipment? Sure. Who pays for it? And what do the other 75% of those people do?

With the advent of engines/motors/automobiles, horses were removed from streets and farms. Generally speaking, horses are now a luxury item that are used as recreation. This will probably be the same with cars, where if you want to drive "manually", you'll need to take your car to a track to do it safely. It's exciting technology and definitely an exciting future.

While this may sound a bit brash, my main concern isn't with the "loss of jobs" (although, that will be a major problem). While a lot of jobs will be highly-technical, there will still likely be a need for all job types.

My concern is with the cost of the technology. If automated cars become a regulatory requirement (that is, manually driven cars will no longer be permitted on certain or all streets), then cars must be available at prices that are affordable by all income brackets, NOT just the top 1%. I'm sure there'd be a phase-out, but automated cars will be more expensive to purchase and maintain over the life of the car. How will this impact the lower income brackets (i.e., the majority of the country)?

Also, infrastructure will need to be added, updated/retrofitted, and maintained. Who is going to pay for this? Undoubtedly, our taxes will increase. Again, how is this going to impact the lower income brackets, who can't afford higher taxes? Again, it'd likely be phased-in, rather than immediately employed, but it's still a matter of how it impacts ALL people, rather than just those that can easily afford the technology. Not every city has major public transportation systems. Interesting to know what would happen in suburban and rural areas; how would those be affected?

Jon your questions and mine are all ones that we'd need to answer, and I hoping that all income brackets will be considered when discussing this.

 

[snowbear115 47]

The cost of the technology will get cheaper as it becomes more commonplace. When airbags first came out, how many were only found in the higher-end vehicles? Does anyone remember how expensive desktop computers were 20 years ago? What about cell phones - now they give them away.

Though I agree with you, Infrastructure needs to be updated and maintained. One of our Deputy Fire Chiefs just returned from Puerto Rico (FEMA deployment). One of his comments was "When you don't maintain infrastructure, you don't have infrastructure."

 

[smoke665]

My concern is with the cost of the technology.

Unfortunately that cost of technology is already driving the cost up. Go buy a new car today, even lower end $15k, mid level $25-$30K, what used to be full size $40-$50k and luxury approaching $100k or more. For many it's reached the point where new vehicles are no longer possible. Interesting article The End of Car Ownership suggest that one day private ownership of vehicles may become obsolete, in favor of either self driving vehicles, or some sort of "rental" type program. I found the "subscription ownership" interesting. Years ago I was involved in a similar type program with some other business people in an airplane. Actually worked quite well.

 

[vintagesnaps]

I don't think I've seen triple trailers, hardly ever double. You must've been way farther north than me Charlie if you saw man made 'imported' hills! lol I know what you mean, I went to college 'up north' - flatter than a pancake and yep, the overpass and the one 'ski hill' they built are the only things taller than a mole hill.

I have an AP style book, ran across it recently and went, oh yeah I forgot I had this. Obviously I don't exactly use it regularly.