Author Topic: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?  (Read 24220 times)

the_fixer

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #50 on: October 04, 2018, 04:14:15 PM »
But will more people or less people die due to the use of self driving (or driver assist) cars?

I suspect that less self driving cars will cause accidents and many of the accidents will be blamed on or due to human error.

Enter the outcry to get rid of old unsafe driver required cars for the safety of the children and add the support from the auto industry because making new / more cars adds to their bottom line.

Honestly if the technology is there and reliable it is not hard to see the case when deaths are reduced, the auto companies are lobbying to make money and the politicians get to not only get paid off but look good because they are saving lives.

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DreamFIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #51 on: October 04, 2018, 04:30:08 PM »
I suspect that when driverless cars hit the market, we'll be looking at a turnover of less than three or four years before manually driven cars become effectively worthless.

Hah, no.

Maybe in some leftist urban shithole like Seattle that decides they can claim they're being progressive while finding another way to tell anyone making less than $150k a year to fuck off.  It's yet another way to have a policy that looks good, while screwing over the poor they claim to care so much about, so I expect them to do it unless forced by lawsuit to back off.

The rest of the country?  No.

LOL   I know, right?

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Let me know when they can figure out a tractor or spreader on the road and how to pass safely.  Or deal with actual winter conditions.  And all the other stuff that reality involves.

Just be sure to start checking back after 50 years or so for that update, not that they will have it quite figured out that soon.

Cranky

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #52 on: October 04, 2018, 04:36:29 PM »
Because uber is only sort of convenient in many areas, once you get out of major metro areas, even now? And it’s notveady to maneuver if you’re handicapped or have knee deep? And what if you want to drive a long distance? Most of the mileage we put on our car is crossing state lines...

I seriously can’t imagine why autonomous cars would be cheaper, though. At least not in my lifetime. I think they’ll be a luxury add on.

Syonyk

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #53 on: October 04, 2018, 04:41:31 PM »
Many US roads are in bad repair, so expect a lot of frustration for early adopters who will find themselves beeped at to take over far more often than expected.

Another area of concern is that if the car requires the driver to "take over," it assumes the driver is able to competently do so.  For the current gen stuff, it's mostly going to older, more experienced drivers (as relatively few 16 year olds are buying $100k cars) - they have decades of driving experience to fall back on, though it decays as you don't use it.  For greater levels of automation, you'll have drivers who simply don't have any experience to fall back on asked to take over.  We've seen this in aviation, and have had a few fatal crashes that are a basic failure to fly the airplane.

Because uber is only sort of convenient in many areas, once you get out of major metro areas, even now?

You have to remember, the tech industry widely believes that the only areas that are worth living, and therefore that matter, are major urban areas.  The rest of the country is vaguely defined as "flyover country" or "a bunch of racist bigots."  Or various other similar terms.  They literally don't care about rural areas, and have no experience with them.

I look forward to Tesla's attempt at a pickup truck, because it stands a good chance of being a pickup designed by people who think the only people who drive pickups are people who "roll coal" on their way to work in a truck that they drive to look cool.  I question how it will actually handle being used as a truck.

Bateaux

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #54 on: October 04, 2018, 04:52:31 PM »
My car is already worth little.  2008 Honda Accord with 200k miles.

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #55 on: October 04, 2018, 04:53:28 PM »
Gotta have a car to have its value ruined.

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #56 on: October 04, 2018, 07:24:09 PM »
Because uber is only sort of convenient in many areas, once you get out of major metro areas, even now? And it’s notveady to maneuver if you’re handicapped or have knee deep? And what if you want to drive a long distance? Most of the mileage we put on our car is crossing state lines...

I seriously can’t imagine why autonomous cars would be cheaper, though. At least not in my lifetime. I think they’ll be a luxury add on.

Autonomous car ownership certainly would not be cheaper.

However, a full-fledged Level 5 autonomous fleet would be cheaper for an Uber service than a fleet of drivers.

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #57 on: October 04, 2018, 07:29:57 PM »
Many US roads are in bad repair, so expect a lot of frustration for early adopters who will find themselves beeped at to take over far more often than expected.

Another area of concern is that if the car requires the driver to "take over," it assumes the driver is able to competently do so.  For the current gen stuff, it's mostly going to older, more experienced drivers (as relatively few 16 year olds are buying $100k cars) - they have decades of driving experience to fall back on, though it decays as you don't use it.  For greater levels of automation, you'll have drivers who simply don't have any experience to fall back on asked to take over.  We've seen this in aviation, and have had a few fatal crashes that are a basic failure to fly the airplane.


I'd imagine the smart automakers would never go the Level 3 autonomous route or try to get between Level 3 and 4.

The smart automakers will have really awesome Level 2 systems (driver aid where the driver is still expected to be in control at any time, but can let the highway cruising duties be simplified and have sensors for warnings)...gather data as everyone drives around with these Level 2 systems for about 5-10 years taking constant uploads to their system and then launch full Level 5 systems that should almost never require a backup driver to ever get involved.

Inclement weather is the main weakpoint at this time.  Also if too many automakers do go the Level 3 route or Level 4 "lite" - there certainly will be accidents that set it back.

BTW - Tesla's system is a Level 2 system that the end users try to treat like its a level 4 system.

While infinitely more complex than an elevator, you know a lot of the FUD that I am reading here is very similar to what people were saying when they first started making elevators autonomous...

runbikerun

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #58 on: October 05, 2018, 02:13:08 AM »
I appreciate that my estimate seems very optimistic: however, I've seen enough demonstrations of the accidental power of gigantic datasets to remain convinced that the four-year-old car in our driveway will not be replaced with a manually driven car when the time comes.

Did you know that a social network for athletes entirely accidentally built a functional test bed for speed claims on athletic equipment? Strava allows runners and cyclists to upload their GPS files, and also tag the equipment they used. Earlier this year, the New York Times downloaded the data, and were able to say that Nike's new Vaporfly shoes are 4% faster than the average running shoe. In a world where someone can accidentally build a rigorous testing system, I'm inclined to assume that the existing challenges are a case of when, not if.

GuitarStv

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #59 on: October 05, 2018, 06:57:45 AM »
I've driven a 2017 Toyota Corolla in the winter.  It has 'lane assist' which is an auto-driving feature designed to prevent a distracted driver from sliding over the lines by beeping and jerking the steering wheel in your hands back onto what it considers the correct course.  'Lane assist' flat out makes driving in the winter more dangerous.  I assume that the sensors have trouble with certain snow patterns that form on the road from the wind and ruts that cars make . . . but it will jerk the steering wheel in your hand in quite a dangerous way seemingly at random.  If you're driving in snowy conditions, it's very important that this safety feature is disabled - to safely control the vehicle.

This is an example of the current state of autonomous driving technology that was (somehow) OK'd for use on the roads . . . and it's not all as magical as it's sold.  Sure, it works fine under ideal conditions, but there are a lot of corner cases yet to be perfected.

neo von retorch

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #60 on: October 05, 2018, 07:24:45 AM »
Yup - I think most of my usual points have already been covered, but I'll brainstorm a little...

Is the electric charging infrastructure already everywhere (we are North America focused, so let's say there) - all across the continental U.S. and Canada? In rural areas?

Short of labor making service industry a place to cut costs, will autonomous driving be clearly less expensive for most people? If you have an 8 year old gas car that costs $0.20/mile, how much will it cost to replace that car with an autonomous one and pay for electric? (Will hailing an auto taxi also be cheaper per mile than an 8 year old paid off gas car?) I seem to recall that Tesla was willing to pay for electricity for their early Model S customers, but now you're on the hook for that sort of thing.

If you live 20 minutes from a grocery store, in a rural area, will a 40 minute round trip actually take you 60-80 minutes with waiting times? (Also, how good is voice commands? It's pretty good at understanding "hold on, don't go anywhere, I still have more groceries to unload?")

How far along are they on setting up autonomous cars for loading up large items at the store, 8 foot pieces of lumber, hooking up your trailer and loading it with firewood? Has a lot of research been done on this?

How "smart" are these cars, if you have to move it out of your driveway because someone is at your house to do some maintenance? Can you just say "go park somewhere that you're not in the way?"

When you go to the beach, do you keep your cooler, beach chairs, umbrella and any other "beach" specific things in the taxi while you sleep in the rented beach house, or do you need to keep moving that stuff into the house while you wait for the next taxi? (Sure some people don't have cars and they do without these things now, but for the large majority of people that currently own cars, how do they do things, and how would going without a car affect them?) When you go to a campsite, are you dropped off and can't keep anything in your car? When it starts pouring at 4AM, and you decided camping was a mistake, how far away is the closest robo-taxi?

I think pretty much every example is to say, while you might easily picture a world where you rely almost entirely on robo-taxis to move you around, you're probably forgetting a few billion hundred million (I'll stick to North America!) other people that live their lives differently than you. And those differences might be solved to the point that "not owning a car" is more common than owning a car at some point in the... distant future. But I think it requires some big blinders to think we're close to that point, and that we'll convert rapidly.

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #61 on: October 05, 2018, 10:04:53 AM »
Yup - I think most of my usual points have already been covered, but I'll brainstorm a little...

Is the electric charging infrastructure already everywhere (we are North America focused, so let's say there) - all across the continental U.S. and Canada? In rural areas?

Do you have electric service at your home?  If yes, then you have the charging infrastructure.

Pretty sure that 99% of single family homes (if not closer to 99.9%) in the USA have the necessary electric charging infrastructure.
Assuming that it is uncommon to have apartment complexes and condos in rural areas, I think rural is covered.

Apartments in California, for the most part, have electric vehicle charging "spots" available.  More of this will be needed across the US.

You have to realize the old paradigm of a gas station on every corner is not how electric vehicles work.  By the time "electric vehicles take over the world" it won't be an issue, because necessary charging infrastructure will be put in to meet demand because this is a case of no infrastructure really needed to start ownership of electric vehicles and beyond a certain breaking point, gas stations close down their gas services due to lack of profitability and only sell snacks while installing charging points.

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Short of labor making service industry a place to cut costs, will autonomous driving be clearly less expensive for most people? If you have an 8 year old gas car that costs $0.20/mile, how much will it cost to replace that car with an autonomous one and pay for electric? (Will hailing an auto taxi also be cheaper per mile than an 8 year old paid off gas car?) I seem to recall that Tesla was willing to pay for electricity for their early Model S customers, but now you're on the hook for that sort of thing.

While most autonomous are electric, you don't need to have electric to have autonomous...I would suggest one not replace their 8 year old gas car with a brand new car of any type unless they were planning to do so anyway.

On the other hand, if you were in the market for a 4-5 year old car 10 years from now (to get rid of your 18 year old car that is difficult to maintain due to lack of availability of components), an electric would be cheaper overall than any gas vehicle due to total cost of ownership (no oil changes, no oil filter, no air filter, no spark plugs, no O2 sensor, no catalytic converter, no muffler, no PCV valve, no fuel filter, no gas pump, no charcoal canister or other evap emissions trap, no vacuum hoses, no ignition coils, no gasoline (far more expensive than electricity per mile), no timing belt, no water pump under high temperature demands, no inefficient mechanical a/c compressor, no large radiator with frail fins at the front of the vehicle, no coolant under extreme heat and potentially oil/combustion byproduct contamination, no head gaskets, no oil pan gasket, no clutch, no A/T fluid, 1000 fewer moving parts to fail).

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If you live 20 minutes from a grocery store, in a rural area, will a 40 minute round trip actually take you 60-80 minutes with waiting times? (Also, how good is voice commands? It's pretty good at understanding "hold on, don't go anywhere, I still have more groceries to unload?")

Yeah, voice commands in most modern vehicles I've tried are atrocious.  In the meantime, your electric vehicle with driver's aids will take just as long as your current vehicle.  EXCEPT - you won't get stranded on an especially cold day when your gasmobile won't start or an especially hot day when your gasmobile overheats and warps the cylinder head because you didn't realize the coolant hose was cracking due to age and your coolant was leaking out little by little waiting for an especially hot day to have a total failure.

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How far along are they on setting up autonomous cars for loading up large items at the store, 8 foot pieces of lumber, hooking up your trailer and loading it with firewood? Has a lot of research been done on this?

I don't understand, the human with hands and arms loads stuff like they do now.  No research needed as a potential autonomous vehicle is not currently visualized to do all your individual chores for you - either it will be a large company doing deliveries per house or an individual driving to a store like normal (except not having to interface with steering nor pedals).  If you have an autonomous Honda Odyssey - you'll load wood the same as a non AI version.  If you have a Toyota Corolla - there is no helping you either way.

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How "smart" are these cars, if you have to move it out of your driveway because someone is at your house to do some maintenance? Can you just say "go park somewhere that you're not in the way?"

When you go to the beach, do you keep your cooler, beach chairs, umbrella and any other "beach" specific things in the taxi while you sleep in the rented beach house, or do you need to keep moving that stuff into the house while you wait for the next taxi? (Sure some people don't have cars and they do without these things now, but for the large majority of people that currently own cars, how do they do things, and how would going without a car affect them?) When you go to a campsite, are you dropped off and can't keep anything in your car? When it starts pouring at 4AM, and you decided camping was a mistake, how far away is the closest robo-taxi?

I think pretty much every example is to say, while you might easily picture a world where you rely almost entirely on robo-taxis to move you around, you're probably forgetting a few billion hundred million (I'll stick to North America!) other people that live their lives differently than you. And those differences might be solved to the point that "not owning a car" is more common than owning a car at some point in the... distant future. But I think it requires some big blinders to think we're close to that point, and that we'll convert rapidly.

Yes there are all manner of one off corner cases that won't be solved for many years to come.

However, more people live in the cities than in rural areas and likely solutions (autonomous fleets) will not be designed to serve a few ten thousand scattered across a couple counties, but rather just the 1,000,000+ populations that are centralized in the urban areas (of which there are over 50 in the US alone comprising over 180,000,000 people).

Instead of thinking about how it won't cover 100% of the entire country in a near term think of the possibilities of going to a city and never having to deal with traffic or renting a car when you can just get into a transit network of mass transit + autonomous fleets.  That would be a low stress vacation to me.

This really is the problem with mass transit in the USA.  Many in the USA think mass transit has to serve every nook and cranny of the entire country or it is an utter failure.  In fact, mass transit should serve the highest demand routes and make it easy for many others to get to a stop along that highest demand route.  We shouldn't have a train every 2-3 hours but rather a high demand route that has trains every 15-20 minutes.  The thinking that somebody who lives in the middle of nowhere can't get a ride so the system failed is not the right way to approach the problem in my opinion.

EDITED to ADD:  I see where you are basically saying that some are predicting it is closer than it really is...and agree that is the case for 100% coverage (which will probably never happen) but 50% coverage is probably much, much closer than you realize.
« Last Edit: October 05, 2018, 10:09:02 AM by Slow2FIRE »

neo von retorch

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #62 on: October 05, 2018, 10:21:58 AM »
@Slow2FIRE
I agree your arguments are fine for serving the concentrated populations for most of their use cases. I don't see how that proves this assertion:

I suspect that when driverless cars hit the market, we'll be looking at a turnover of less than three or four years before manually driven cars become effectively worthless.

If 99% of the U.S. Population lives in metropolitan areas and just a few tens of thousands live in a "few rural counties" (I know this cannot possibly be what you're trying to say) and no one "has edge cases" then perhaps the above can come to pass.

I'm asserting that these "edge" cases are basically the everyday lives of a very large percentage of Americans, and that reality is going to turn "3-4 years" into several decades, at least.

Now, I can see the move from gas to electric moving faster than a lot of people expect, for the reason you stated - the infrastructure is... mostly kind of there. I don't know what kind amperage is needed - hopeful the large number of places with 100A service can handle this new demand. More and more people will replace gas cars with electric as the issues are solved, including range anxiety and, to cater to the U.S. market, the massive variety of taste people have in configurations. Still, the move from gasoline trucks (and perhaps, massive SUVs) could still take some time to gain momentum. Will I be surprised when the Toyota Camry/Corolla and Honda Accord/Civic drivers migrate to electric cars? Not at all! And many that choose cars for status (Prius, BMW, etc) will also find their tastes satisfied. But the market is much larger than that, and the available cars aren't there yet. I'm still waiting for that flood.

Autonomous and driverless cars, though, I think are much further off, at least at critical scale, then some predictions. That's why I don't see an autonomous Honda Odyssey in the very near future being ready for loading the large items and towing your firewood. I never said the car had to load the items for me!

Cranky

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #63 on: October 05, 2018, 12:12:54 PM »
If you are making a long trip in an electric car, do you just stand around at the rest stop for an hour and wait for it to charge? How long does it actually take to charge?

I have literally never seen a car charger anywhere in my city, though I have seen them elsewhere.

Syonyk

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #64 on: October 05, 2018, 12:19:42 PM »
Now, I can see the move from gas to electric moving faster than a lot of people expect, for the reason you stated - the infrastructure is... mostly kind of there. I don't know what kind amperage is needed - hopeful the large number of places with 100A service can handle this new demand.

For many people, you can actually charge just fine on 120V/8A and cover most of your needs.  That's about 3 miles per hour of charging, which means an overnight 12 hour charge is 36 miles - pretty close to the average daily distance driven.  If you have higher charge currents, it's better.  And on 240V, you can charge an awful lot of miles overnight.

If you are making a long trip in an electric car, do you just stand around at the rest stop for an hour and wait for it to charge? How long does it actually take to charge?

Pretty much, yes.  The Tesla system charges faster than others, but you sit around and wait for half an hour to a few hours, depending on the car and charge station.

Or you own a separate gas car for long trips.

Or you buy something like the Volt which covers short trips on battery, and has a full gas motor for longer travel.

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #65 on: October 05, 2018, 02:00:33 PM »
@Slow2FIRE
I agree your arguments are fine for serving the concentrated populations for most of their use cases. I don't see how that proves this assertion:

I suspect that when driverless cars hit the market, we'll be looking at a turnover of less than three or four years before manually driven cars become effectively worthless.


It appears that I got lost in addressing your comments without the complete context that you were addressing the 3 to 4 year turnover comment.

I agree, 3-4 years is not realistic with cars.  It took 3-4 years for the smartphone to takeover from feature phones if you mark day one as the first day the original Iphone was for sale, and there are still users of feature phones.

When I discuss tens of thousands in a few counties, I mean across the US there are many areas (consisting of less than 100,000,000 people in total in the USA) that have only tens of thousands of people spread across a few counties.  So you have wide swaths of geography of very low density.  Not that I'm saying in total only 10's of thousands live in rural areas, but there are many rural areas of only 10's of thousands that likely won't be served in any meaningful way by autonomous fleet services (like Waymo).

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #66 on: October 05, 2018, 02:06:48 PM »
Now, I can see the move from gas to electric moving faster than a lot of people expect, for the reason you stated - the infrastructure is... mostly kind of there. I don't know what kind amperage is needed - hopeful the large number of places with 100A service can handle this new demand.

For many people, you can actually charge just fine on 120V/8A and cover most of your needs.  That's about 3 miles per hour of charging, which means an overnight 12 hour charge is 36 miles - pretty close to the average daily distance driven.  If you have higher charge currents, it's better.  And on 240V, you can charge an awful lot of miles overnight.


Even better in some cases:

Our Prius Prime gets around 5.5 miles of range per hour that it is plugged into a 120V 15Amp circuit using only the cable that comes with the car without having paid extra for any other charging equipment.  About 5.5hrs of charging for 30 miles of all electric range.  So far, we've used 4 gallons of gasoline in the last 2200 miles of driving.

If the battery were larger, based on my personal experiences, 12hrs of charging could satisfy at least 60 miles of range using a standard 120V outlet in the garage not requiring me to call an electrician or to already have 240V service.

ScreamingHeadGuy

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #67 on: October 05, 2018, 02:07:44 PM »
OP - what about you?

I don’t care.  My car is not an investment nor an asset; it is a depreciating chunk of steel, aluminum, plastics and whatever else it is cars are made of nowadays.  It is a means of conveyance.  I acknowledge this and intend to drive the vehicle until repair and upkeep is no longer feasible.

Why not ask if I’m concerned that my internal combustion powered people-moving device will lose value because it, well, has an internal combustion engine. 

zolotiyeruki

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #68 on: October 05, 2018, 02:10:29 PM »
I don't understand, the human with hands and arms loads stuff like they do now.  No research needed as a potential autonomous vehicle is not currently visualized to do all your individual chores for you - either it will be a large company doing deliveries per house or an individual driving to a store like normal (except not having to interface with steering nor pedals).  If you have an autonomous Honda Odyssey - you'll load wood the same as a non AI version.  If you have a Toyota Corolla - there is no helping you either way.
Ahem. :)  As an owner of both a Honda Odyssey and a Toyota Corolla, I can firmly state that you *can* fit 8-foot lumber in a Corolla.  Not a 4x8 sheet of plywood, but 2x4's fit quite comfortably if you fold down the rear seats.

In fact, I can *almost* fit 10' lengths of copper pipe or electrical conduit fully inside the car.  When I need to haul those, they have to protrude out the passenger's window a few inches.

GuitarStv

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #69 on: October 05, 2018, 02:35:56 PM »
I don't understand, the human with hands and arms loads stuff like they do now.  No research needed as a potential autonomous vehicle is not currently visualized to do all your individual chores for you - either it will be a large company doing deliveries per house or an individual driving to a store like normal (except not having to interface with steering nor pedals).  If you have an autonomous Honda Odyssey - you'll load wood the same as a non AI version.  If you have a Toyota Corolla - there is no helping you either way.
Ahem. :)  As an owner of both a Honda Odyssey and a Toyota Corolla, I can firmly state that you *can* fit 8-foot lumber in a Corolla.  Not a 4x8 sheet of plywood, but 2x4's fit quite comfortably if you fold down the rear seats.

In fact, I can *almost* fit 10' lengths of copper pipe or electrical conduit fully inside the car.  When I need to haul those, they have to protrude out the passenger's window a few inches.

Yep.  I have often loaded 14 2x4s in my Corolla.

YttriumNitrate

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #70 on: October 05, 2018, 04:06:02 PM »
Regardless though, betamax vs VHS was two competing similar technologies, not an old one and a new one.  A better comparison would be 35mm film to digital cameras.  Sure 35mm film cameras still exist for hobbyists or specialized purposes, but digital cameras overtook them nearly 100% about 5 years after becoming affordable.
The digital camera is probably a good comparison, but it's worth pointing out that it took about 30 years from the introduction of the first commercial digital camera to when they became comparable to film in quality and price.

The Fairchild MV-101 was a 0.01 megapixel camera that sold for $4,000 in 1975 ($19,000 in today's dollars)
http://www.digicamhistory.com/1970s.html

moof

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #71 on: October 05, 2018, 04:26:26 PM »
My car is already worth little.  2008 Honda Accord with 200k miles.
+1.  I'm a bike commuter, and the 2004 Ford Focus with 130k miles that is my backup is probably worth ~3k or so.  It gets driven about twice a month.

If autonomous cars drive down the cost of an eventual replacement, great.  I don't expect it to happen any time soon.
« Last Edit: October 05, 2018, 04:36:15 PM by moof »

swampwiz

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #72 on: October 05, 2018, 05:18:56 PM »
I take the other view, that insurance will be much higher for self-driving vehicles. With major decisions left to a machine, who will ultimately be held responsible? DUI's, manslaughter, property damage. If it falls back on the owner for not maintaining control (will there still be manual controls?) then owning such a vehicle may not hold as much appeal. There will be cases where these vehicles will take human lives, based on calculations made that instant. That life may be your own. Are you comfortable with that? Are you (and your insurance company) willing to accept the results?

It would seem to me that the manufacturer would have the liability, unless some entity decided to take on the liability; I don't think regular folks would allow themselves to self-indemnify.

swampwiz

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #73 on: October 05, 2018, 05:23:04 PM »
If autonomous cars quickly reach ubiquity in production, used cars will become luxury items.

Actually, the one thing that might keep older cars going is the fact that they will have such low value, especially for folks that don't have any assets, and can simply carry minimum liability insurance.

swampwiz

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #74 on: October 05, 2018, 05:29:35 PM »
When an autonomous Uber-equivalent is cheaper than driving my own car, why would I drive my own car? At the very least, why would 99% of multiperson households have more than one personal vehicle?

I view an autonomous Uber-equivalent as the true killer app, not privately owned autonomous vehicles.

This is exactly my point.  There will no cost difference between owning one's car and hiring a car, since there will be no taxi driver in the loop.  The insurance/fuel/depreciation cost will the same.  And a taxi company will have the advantage by being able to depreciate the car's value at a much higher rate, thereby lowering the finance cost (i.e., a 2 year loan or opportunity cost rather than 15 years for an owner-operator), to say nothing of efficiencies in service, powering, etc.

swampwiz

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #75 on: October 05, 2018, 05:33:38 PM »
Because you have child seats you don't want to haul into the grocery store with you?

Because you have other stuff you wish to carry with you to multiple appointments?

Because you live 20-30 minutes away from where cars are likely to show up and don't believe they'll actually show up when you request one because it's inconvenient?

Because you don't think a self driving car will be able to make it down your driveway in the winter?

You'll be able to order up a car with child seats.

You might have some stuff, but you could put all that in backpack.

Being out in the sticks might be an issue - but if there is demand for folks out in the sticks to get into the local town, that could be enough for Uber to provide that service.

Winter driving could be an issue, but then so it is with regular cars.

swampwiz

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #76 on: October 05, 2018, 05:42:00 PM »
Also, if it's an uber-like service, that means that you have to make sure the car is spotless every time you get out.

I know that my car will always be in the garage, waiting for me to use it.  I don't have to worry about forgetting something in it.  I don't have to worry about someone messing with the seat, or whether I've left it clean enough for the next user.  I don't have to worry about whether it'll be there.  It's old, yet reliable, and it costs nearly nothing.  I'm fine driving around my 24-year-old beater, but I'm not a typical consumer, and a newer (shared, autonomous) car still has lots of value that needs to be paid for by its fares.  Over the 15 years and 140,000 miles I've had this car, its purchase price has come out to about 3.2 cents per mile.

At the UberPeople forum - who obviously are scared sheetless about driverless cars - they like to bring up the fact that driverless cars will become like dirty bathrooms.  Of course, they don't understand that the seating area can be made quite watertight and easily washed like a pool toy.

The true cost of owning a car includes maintenance, repair & insurance.  I know that my beater (a regular VW) has lately cost about $0.35/mile (counting fuel) with all the little things that have needed to get fixed, in addition to insurance.

swampwiz

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #77 on: October 05, 2018, 05:55:05 PM »
OP - what about you?

I think that the driverless car - and taxi - will bring about a much higher level of interest in mass transit, especially town to town, as the driverless taxi will get rid of the "last mile" problem, so I think that the cost of medium-distance travel will go down.

I will keep tabs on the REAL cost to operate my car, and the cost of hiring a driverless taxi, and obviously when the costs get close, I will simply park my old car in the backyard with a cover on it.  I truly expect for the last time I use my car to be chasing the 2024 solar eclipse (i.e., being able to drive to wear it's a clear day) in Texas.

jim555

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #78 on: October 06, 2018, 12:01:17 AM »
I don't want every movement tracked by some Johnny cab. 

kpd905

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #79 on: October 06, 2018, 06:09:50 AM »
Yes, I'd be so worried that the value of my Kia Forte would drop from $10,000 to $0 that it would keep me up at night.

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #80 on: October 06, 2018, 08:24:57 AM »
I don't want every movement tracked by some Johnny cab.

In case you weren't aware, just about every police department in the USA uses license plate recognition cameras on their patrol vehicles and a high percentage have been found to be improperly cataloging people's movements (not flushing the data as expected).

https://www.aclu.org/issues/privacy-technology/location-tracking/you-are-being-tracked

rdaneel0

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #81 on: October 06, 2018, 09:20:44 AM »
No, there are still issues with buy-in for autonomous driving TESTING. It's a ways away. Also, what's a new car?

HBFIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #82 on: October 06, 2018, 01:11:41 PM »
does anyone even add their car value to their net worth?  I just consider it lost money in the same way I don't add up the value of all my appliances to my net worth.
« Last Edit: October 06, 2018, 01:13:49 PM by dustinst22 »

DreamFIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #83 on: October 06, 2018, 01:39:26 PM »
does anyone even add their car value to their net worth?  I just consider it lost money in the same way I don't add up the value of all my appliances to my net worth.
I don't, but then I'm usually just concerned with my stash which is invested for drawing down using the 4% rule, not my net worth that includes my home that I will be living in.

jim555

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #84 on: October 06, 2018, 01:55:23 PM »
does anyone even add their car value to their net worth?  I just consider it lost money in the same way I don't add up the value of all my appliances to my net worth.
I do.  I could get probably $4K fairly easily for it, so why not include it.

HBFIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #85 on: October 06, 2018, 01:57:07 PM »

I do.  I could get probably $4K fairly easily for it, so why not include it.

Yeah but thats if you sell it now before it further depreciates and won't need to replace it.  To me its not money I'm going to tap into, so why include it?  Even if I do sell it, I'll need to then replace it.  I consider it in the same way I'd consider any household appliance -- that is, a necessary expense without value.
« Last Edit: October 06, 2018, 02:04:39 PM by dustinst22 »

jim555

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #86 on: October 06, 2018, 02:10:52 PM »

I do.  I could get probably $4K fairly easily for it, so why not include it.

Yeah but thats if you sell it now before it further depreciates and won't need to replace it.  To me its not money I'm going to tap into, so why include it?  Even if I do sell it, I'll need to then replace it.  I consider it in the same way I'd consider any household appliance -- that is, a necessary expense without value.
I was actually thinking about going car free.  It mostly just sits now.  Maybe get a scooter or motorcycle.

WhiteTrashCash

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #87 on: October 06, 2018, 02:14:27 PM »
Driverless cars are just the latest technology designed to make people completely helpless and dependent. I don't mind convenience, but when the price is losing the ability to do anything for yourself, it's just too much.

GuitarStv

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #88 on: October 06, 2018, 02:44:16 PM »
does anyone even add their car value to their net worth?  I just consider it lost money in the same way I don't add up the value of all my appliances to my net worth.

I consider my car to be a net negative to my worth . . . it costs me x$ per month, even if I don't use it at all.  Necessary evil though.

nick663

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #89 on: October 06, 2018, 02:58:09 PM »
I've driven a 2017 Toyota Corolla in the winter.  It has 'lane assist' which is an auto-driving feature designed to prevent a distracted driver from sliding over the lines by beeping and jerking the steering wheel in your hands back onto what it considers the correct course.  'Lane assist' flat out makes driving in the winter more dangerous.  I assume that the sensors have trouble with certain snow patterns that form on the road from the wind and ruts that cars make . . . but it will jerk the steering wheel in your hand in quite a dangerous way seemingly at random.  If you're driving in snowy conditions, it's very important that this safety feature is disabled - to safely control the vehicle.

This is an example of the current state of autonomous driving technology that was (somehow) OK'd for use on the roads . . . and it's not all as magical as it's sold.  Sure, it works fine under ideal conditions, but there are a lot of corner cases yet to be perfected.
FYI - The sensor technologies currently used for lane keeping are inferior to Lidar technology that every OEM minus 1 is pursuing so I would not judge the capabilities of autonomous vehicles off of that.

HBFIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #90 on: October 06, 2018, 03:03:37 PM »


I consider my car to be a net negative to my worth . . . it costs me x$ per month, even if I don't use it at all.  Necessary evil though.

Yeah exactly, it just goes in the expenses column.

shuffler

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #91 on: October 06, 2018, 04:36:52 PM »
Driverless cars are just the latest technology designed to make people completely helpless and dependent.
Or maybe it's designed to save many thousands of lives every year.

scottish

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #92 on: October 06, 2018, 05:23:29 PM »
I've driven a 2017 Toyota Corolla in the winter.  It has 'lane assist' which is an auto-driving feature designed to prevent a distracted driver from sliding over the lines by beeping and jerking the steering wheel in your hands back onto what it considers the correct course.  'Lane assist' flat out makes driving in the winter more dangerous.  I assume that the sensors have trouble with certain snow patterns that form on the road from the wind and ruts that cars make . . . but it will jerk the steering wheel in your hand in quite a dangerous way seemingly at random.  If you're driving in snowy conditions, it's very important that this safety feature is disabled - to safely control the vehicle.

This is an example of the current state of autonomous driving technology that was (somehow) OK'd for use on the roads . . . and it's not all as magical as it's sold.  Sure, it works fine under ideal conditions, but there are a lot of corner cases yet to be perfected.
FYI - The sensor technologies currently used for lane keeping are inferior to Lidar technology that every OEM minus 1 is pursuing so I would not judge the capabilities of autonomous vehicles off of that.

Yeah, but lidar is a ranging mechanism isn't it?    It won't help recognizing lane markings in the snow.

Is there an independent oversight body certifying any of this tech yet?   

scottish

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #93 on: October 06, 2018, 05:24:27 PM »
Driverless cars are just the latest technology designed to make people completely helpless and dependent.
Or maybe it's designed to save many thousands of lives every year.
Alternatively it's designed to encourage people to buy new cars with new gadgets.

runbikerun

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #94 on: October 07, 2018, 01:35:29 AM »
Driverless cars are just the latest technology designed to make people completely helpless and dependent.
Or maybe it's designed to save many thousands of lives every year.
Alternatively it's designed to encourage people to buy new cars with new gadgets.

About 35,000 people a year die on American roads. Driverless cars offer the possibility of reducing that to near zero, and almost entirely remove the eleventh largest cause of death in the US.

Syonyk

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #95 on: October 07, 2018, 04:05:58 AM »
Possibility is a good term. Let me know when they actually work year round in places that have a real winter.

Slow2FIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #96 on: October 07, 2018, 08:06:31 AM »
Driverless cars are just the latest technology designed to make people completely helpless and dependent.
Or maybe it's designed to save many thousands of lives every year.
Alternatively it's designed to encourage people to buy new cars with new gadgets.

Okay, how about some numbers for you?

Estimated cost of collisions in the US over $800,000,000,000 on an annual basis. 
(NHTSA 2014)

Blind Spot Monitor reduces lane change accidents by 14% and reduces lane change accidents with injury by 23%
Automatic Emergency Braking reduces front to rear accidents by 50% and reduces these accidents with injury by 56%
Lane Departure warning reduces single vehicle, sideswipe and head on crashes by 11% and the same with injuries are reduced by 27%
Rear view cameras reduce backing accidents by 17%
Rear cross traffic alert reduces backing accidents by 22%
(IIHS numbers from about 20+ different sources as listed on their website, assuming most of the data is 2015 or newer)

Looks like all these "expensive gadgets" could save the economy quite a lot more money then it costs to purchase the gadgets in the first place.

zolotiyeruki

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #97 on: October 07, 2018, 09:14:08 AM »
$800 billion? 5% of GDP? I find that hard to believe.

HBFIRE

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #98 on: October 07, 2018, 10:17:17 AM »
$800 billion? 5% of GDP? I find that hard to believe.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/05/29/steep-economic-toll-of-crashes/9715893/

Looks like part of the amount is estimated (societal harm).  Still, thats a massive number.  Certainly reducing the risks associated with driving would be very good.
« Last Edit: October 07, 2018, 10:19:34 AM by dustinst22 »

BuildingFrugalHabits

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Re: Are you afraid your new car's value will be ruined by the driverless car?
« Reply #99 on: October 07, 2018, 10:41:38 AM »
I can't wait for self driving technology to mature and I'm also excited about the transition to electric cars.  The primary advantages I see are that the entire vehicle fleet would have a much higher utilization factor instead of sitting idle for 90% of the time.  This will result in greater efficiencies, lower overall costs and less space devoted to vehicle storage.  I think it will encourage many people to go car free or at least downsize to a single car per household.  Sure, there's going to be niche cases such as camping where vehicle ownership (or at least short-term rental) makes sense.  But hopefully, the vast majority of trips can be covered by autonomous self driving cars.  We can reclaim parking lots and street parking in favor of green space and bike lanes. 

The fleet will turn over much more quickly resulting on faster adoption of safety and technology features.  Greater flexibility during travel and multi-modal transport.  I can send for whatever vehicle is necessary, pickup truck, van, compact car etc depending on my needs for that particular trip.  Hopefully it's the next big revolution that society experiences and we as bicycle wielding mustachians will be well positioned to take advantage of it.  There will always be folks who opt for car ownership and maybe even stick with gas power but they will probably end up paying a significant premium in fuel, parking and insurance to do so.