The future of convertibles in the electric era?

ontheroad1970

ElefantEd said:

What do you think "seeing", "hearing", "smelling" and so on are, if they are not "sensory information"?

AI is getting better all the time and could certainly identify an 'object' as a 'child', with the characteristic of unexpected sideways movement, and apply some deceleration just in case. Incidents like a child running out into the road are not unpredictable - they are entirely predictable, as you've just shown! You don't know whether a specific incident might happen, but you know that it could - and just like a human a computer can be programmed to anticipate these. And could certainly be programmed to drive slowly past schools for example, unlike some humans who intentionally break safety rules.

The statistics are that autonomous cars have fewer accidents per mile than humans - it is normalised for the number of miles taken - both percentages are small, of course, fortunately, but the computers are better. You could certainly argue that the data for autonomous cars takes place under more limited circumstances and in more controlled conditions than for the general run of human controlled motoring, and clearly there needs to be a lot more testing under realistic conditions. But so far the data says that the robots are better.

As for autopilots, it's true that people like to have a human pilot ready to take over. The reality is that they aren't really needed 99.9% of the time, it's a comforting illusion. Do humans take over when landing in fog or high winds? No, they switch on autoland and make reassuring announcements!

Plane Autopilot is a less than perfect comparison.  All traffic is managed by a third party with planes, not so with cars.

Herzlos

motorguy said:

I dont get the drive (ha!) towards autonomous cars.  I'm not sure what it really achieves - free up more time for work?  More time to be on social media?  Not sure i get the point really. 

I see the bigger benefit being the reduced need for private car ownership, and the enormous amount of space needed to store cars that sit there doing nothing pretty much all the time.

With some additional capacity to handle peak load, if you can just summon a car when needed, or have it drop you outside your destination and then to off to park/charge, then you can do away with a lot of parking spaces taking up prime real estate.

Freeing up travel time would be nice, too.

Sea_Shell said:

It seems to me that the whole swing towards EV and eventually autonomous cars, is going to make travel from A to B a soulless experience in the future.

Unless you can afford something "unique" we're mostly going to have the choice of box A or box B.

Have you seen what's on the road now? Cars are almost all bland A to B machines, and everyone I know with an EV raves about how unexpectedly fun they are. You don't get the engine noises, but you get often hilarious acceleration, and the lower center of gravity with extra weight often means the EV version of a car handles better than the ICE one.

ElefantEd

ontheroad1970 said:

Plane Autopilot is a less than perfect comparison.  All traffic is managed by a third party with planes, not so with cars.

Well, obviously planes have air traffic control operating which manage the flow of planes at an overall level. But each plane has its own computer system that flies it for autoland (and other automated flying systems).

Autoland is highly accurate. In his 1959 paper,[2] John Charnley, then Superintendent of the UK Royal Aircraft Establishment's (RAE) Blind Landing Experimental Unit (BLEU), concluded a discussion of statistical results by saying that "It is fair to claim, therefore, that not only will the automatic system land the aircraft when the weather prevents the human pilot, it also performs the operation much more precisely".

I imagine things haven't got worse since 1959!

motorguy

Herzlos said:

motorguy said:

I dont get the drive (ha!) towards autonomous cars.  I'm not sure what it really achieves - free up more time for work?  More time to be on social media?  Not sure i get the point really. 

I see the bigger benefit being the reduced need for private car ownership, and the enormous amount of space needed to store cars that sit there doing nothing pretty much all the time.

With some additional capacity to handle peak load, if you can just summon a car when needed, or have it drop you outside your destination and then to off to park/charge, then you can do away with a lot of parking spaces taking up prime real estate.

Freeing up travel time would be nice, too.

Agreed.  Everyones car sits around doing nothing for pretty much 95% of the time, but we dont need to wait for autonomous cars for a solution that works.  Many other countries / cities have peer to peer / short term car hire options that really should be more prevalent here in the UK.

My son lives in Sydney and on the rare occasions they need a car they use a peer to peer app and pick one - that could be a minivan to go pick up some furniture or a people carrier / SUV for a weekend away with friends, or a hatchback for visiting friends and the timeframe can be from just a matter of hours to several days.  

The app shows them where the nearest cars are parked - usually just a street or two away.  

Sea_Shell

motorguy said:

Herzlos said:

motorguy said:

I dont get the drive (ha!) towards autonomous cars.  I'm not sure what it really achieves - free up more time for work?  More time to be on social media?  Not sure i get the point really. 

I see the bigger benefit being the reduced need for private car ownership, and the enormous amount of space needed to store cars that sit there doing nothing pretty much all the time.

With some additional capacity to handle peak load, if you can just summon a car when needed, or have it drop you outside your destination and then to off to park/charge, then you can do away with a lot of parking spaces taking up prime real estate.

Freeing up travel time would be nice, too.

Agreed.  Everyones car sits around doing nothing for pretty much 95% of the time, but we dont need to wait for autonomous cars for a solution that works.  Many other countries / cities have peer to peer / short term car hire options that really should be more prevalent here in the UK.

My son lives in Sydney and on the rare occasions they need a car they use a peer to peer app and pick one - that could be a minivan to go pick up some furniture or a people carrier / SUV for a weekend away with friends, or a hatchback for visiting friends and the timeframe can be from just a matter of hours to several days.  

The app shows them where the nearest cars are parked - usually just a street or two away.  

How does the insurance aspect work?

As a motoring society we seem wedded to our no claims bonuses.

Would need a shift in mindset and flexibility of insurance rules to make P2P motoring work.

Car_54

ontheroad1970 said:

ElefantEd said:

What do you think "seeing", "hearing", "smelling" and so on are, if they are not "sensory information"?

AI is getting better all the time and could certainly identify an 'object' as a 'child', with the characteristic of unexpected sideways movement, and apply some deceleration just in case. Incidents like a child running out into the road are not unpredictable - they are entirely predictable, as you've just shown! You don't know whether a specific incident might happen, but you know that it could - and just like a human a computer can be programmed to anticipate these. And could certainly be programmed to drive slowly past schools for example, unlike some humans who intentionally break safety rules.

The statistics are that autonomous cars have fewer accidents per mile than humans - it is normalised for the number of miles taken - both percentages are small, of course, fortunately, but the computers are better. You could certainly argue that the data for autonomous cars takes place under more limited circumstances and in more controlled conditions than for the general run of human controlled motoring, and clearly there needs to be a lot more testing under realistic conditions. But so far the data says that the robots are better.

As for autopilots, it's true that people like to have a human pilot ready to take over. The reality is that they aren't really needed 99.9% of the time, it's a comforting illusion. Do humans take over when landing in fog or high winds? No, they switch on autoland and make reassuring announcements!

Plane Autopilot is a less than perfect comparison.  All traffic is managed by a third party with planes, not so with cars.

Not all traffic, just that in certain defined areas. Most airspace is uncontrolled.

motorguy

Sea_Shell said:

motorguy said:

Herzlos said:

motorguy said:

I dont get the drive (ha!) towards autonomous cars.  I'm not sure what it really achieves - free up more time for work?  More time to be on social media?  Not sure i get the point really. 

I see the bigger benefit being the reduced need for private car ownership, and the enormous amount of space needed to store cars that sit there doing nothing pretty much all the time.

With some additional capacity to handle peak load, if you can just summon a car when needed, or have it drop you outside your destination and then to off to park/charge, then you can do away with a lot of parking spaces taking up prime real estate.

Freeing up travel time would be nice, too.

Agreed.  Everyones car sits around doing nothing for pretty much 95% of the time, but we dont need to wait for autonomous cars for a solution that works.  Many other countries / cities have peer to peer / short term car hire options that really should be more prevalent here in the UK.

My son lives in Sydney and on the rare occasions they need a car they use a peer to peer app and pick one - that could be a minivan to go pick up some furniture or a people carrier / SUV for a weekend away with friends, or a hatchback for visiting friends and the timeframe can be from just a matter of hours to several days.  

The app shows them where the nearest cars are parked - usually just a street or two away.  

How does the insurance aspect work?

As a motoring society we seem wedded to our no claims bonuses.

Would need a shift in mindset and flexibility of insurance rules to make P2P motoring work.

When you hire the car, part of the fee is for insurance.

The mindset shift would be the difficult bit.

Even for my son, when living in a city here in the UK, he HAD to have a car (though it sat around doing nothing literally 99% of the time).   In Sydney there was a totally different mindset among his friends and work colleagues so using peer to peer came quite natually to him - even though it would have been an alien concept for him to not have a car here.

I think this is the one he uses.

https://www.carnextdoor.com.au/

Grumpy_chap

Sea_Shell said:

Would need a shift in mindset and flexibility of insurance rules to make P2P motoring work.

Yep, we'd need a "paradigm shift" in mind-set.

Plus the P2P platforms would need to be far more competitive.

I did once look at using a car from HiYa Car but the costs were no better than a conventional hire car. 

Add in the fact that a conventional hire car is a brand new model and the staff are dispassionate in the event of damage and would simply deal with any issues according to professional protocols. Right now I could get a Qashqai for £75.24 for the day.

Or, right now, I could have the use of Enxhi's A-Class, 7 yo car and, if there is any damage, an individual is more likely to be personally "hurt" or sentimental about it .  £81.78 for the day.

motorguy

Grumpy_chap said:

Sea_Shell said:

Would need a shift in mindset and flexibility of insurance rules to make P2P motoring work.

Yep, we'd need a "paradigm shift" in mind-set.

Plus the P2P platforms would need to be far more competitive.

I did once look at using a car from HiYa Car but the costs were no better than a conventional hire car. 

Add in the fact that a conventional hire car is a brand new model and the staff are dispassionate in the event of damage and would simply deal with any issues according to professional protocols. Right now I could get a Qashqai for £75.24 for the day.

Or, right now, I could have the use of Enxhi's A-Class, 7 yo car and, if there is any damage, an individual is more likely to be personally "hurt" or sentimental about it .  £81.78 for the day.

I just did a check there for a car for four hours in Manchester.

Fresh looking 208 Peugeot 5 door, £21.93 including rental fee (£3 per hour), booking fee and insurance.

EDIT: just did the same check for Glasgow, £16.53

RAV4 for £38.00 (£4 per hour plus charges).

It doesnt feel like there would be much tweaking needed (perhaps a good app / cheaper insurance fees) before that could be quite compelling for many.

motorguy

Grumpy_chap said:

Sea_Shell said:

Would need a shift in mindset and flexibility of insurance rules to make P2P motoring work.

Yep, we'd need a "paradigm shift" in mind-set.

Plus the P2P platforms would need to be far more competitive.

I did once look at using a car from HiYa Car but the costs were no better than a conventional hire car. 

Add in the fact that a conventional hire car is a brand new model and the staff are dispassionate in the event of damage and would simply deal with any issues according to professional protocols. Right now I could get a Qashqai for £75.24 for the day.

Or, right now, I could have the use of Enxhi's A-Class, 7 yo car and, if there is any damage, an individual is more likely to be personally "hurt" or sentimental about it .  £81.78 for the day.

a fresh looking mk7 Golf TDI is coming up at £69 for a days hire.  Granted, maybe a cheaper hatch isnt available where you searched but thats £12 a day cheaper. 

An Insignia SRi is coming up at £55 per day.

Take pics before and after like you would with a hire car.  Cant see any issue really, particularly given you could maybe pick up a car a short distance away rather than having to go to a car hire centre.  Cars are available to hire out of normal car hire office hours too which could be useful too.