The impact of driving with no hands

This is an article from Timothy Lee who writes an excellent online Tech column for Forbes.  The online article - - How Self-Driving Cars Could Reshape Cites - - is provided below.  Interesting, especially when you start to see the connections and impacts to other parts of the urban infrastructure matrix.  For example, any reduction in parking has a profound impact on stormwater quality and quantity - - for the better.  This is important for engineers to study and think about - - new technology reshaping how we think about something as firm, stable, and historic as a city.

"Randal O’Toole suggests that self-driving cars will mean the death of mass transit. Matt Yglesias counters that the primary effect will be to dramatically reduce the number of parking spots. Here are some other likely effects on land use and commuting patterns:

• Greater density around suburban subway stations. Right now, suburban subway stations tend to be surrounded by a sea of parking lots in order to accommodate riders who live too far from the station to walk to it. And that’s unfortunate because massive parking lots deter developers from building high-density housing within walking distance of the station. Self-driving cars solve this problem by making taxi rental cheaper than car ownership. In a world of ubiquitous self-driving taxis, there’s no reason to provide any parking spaces on the valuable real estate near a subway stop. So subway ridership is likely to go up even as more land is opened up within walking distance of suburban subway stations for apartments and businesses.
• Virtually no parking spaces. Matt’s right about this, but I think he’s understating the phenomenon. It’s likely that once all cars are self-driving, we’ll barely need any off-street parking spaces at all. During peak periods, virtually all cars will be on the roads driving people around. During off-peak periods, cars will still be on the roads, they’ll just pull over to the side of the road and stop. As Brad Templeton points out in the middle of the night cars could double- or triple-park on 6- or 8-lane boulevards, park in front of driveways, and so forth. This won’t be a problem because they’ll be able to instantly get out of the way if they’re blocking the path of another car. So the only people who need off-street parking will be rich people who insist on spending extra for a private car rather than going the more affordable taxi route.
• Higher road density. One of the benefits of self-driving cars will be that people can take exactly the right vehicle for each trip. Once likely consequence is that small, light vehicles will become viable for use in urban areas. And given that most cars at rush hour have a single commuter in them, that will create a market for half-width, single-occupant cars. These cars, combined with the superior driving skills of computers, will make it possible for two cars to drive side-by-side in a single lane. Also, the superior reaction times of self-driving cars, and their ability to warn each wirelessly about impending stops, means that self-driving cars will be able to safely maintain smaller following distances than human drivers can. Both of these effects will increase the throughput of each traffic lane, reducing congestion and making driving more attractive relative to mass transit.
• More nimble “buses.” Current bus systems are designed to economize on one of their most expensive components: the human driver. Contemporary buses are enormous and run infrequently. At off-peak times, they’re almost empty. Buses that drive themselves will be dramatically cheaper to operate, which means that we’ll be able to afford many more of them. Instead of a full-size bus stopping every 15 minutes, it’ll be feasible to have a van stop every 3 minutes. And because each mini-bus will pick up fewer passengers, travel time will be lower. Indeed, it’s not clear that the concept of a “bus” will even make sense in a self-driving world. More likely, when you order a self-driving taxi with your smartphone, you’ll be offered several options. You might be offered a private taxi for $3, a taxi shared with one other person for $2, or a carpool van with several other people for $1. The dispatching software will be able to automatically group together passengers taking similar trips at the same time, so the carpool options shouldn’t add much time to the trip. With those low-cost options available, it’s not clear anyone would want to ride a bus.

To return to O’Toole’s original claim that self-driving cars will reduce demand for rail transit, I think it depends on which cities you’re talking about. In smaller metro areas, self-driving cars will likely make recently-built light rail systems look even more like white elephants, as the falling cost of taxi service and the reduction in congestion causes many rail customers to switch to them. As self-driving taxis become affordable even for poor commuters, smaller metro areas are likely to become even more car-focused and sprawling than they already are.

On the other hand, in larger metro areas the emergence of affordable taxi service may actually increase subway ridership, as more suburban residents take a taxi to their local subway stop and ride to work in the central business district. Indeed, the greater efficiency of self-driving transportation has the potential to dramatically increase the size and density of our largest cities. And that will make the rail transit systems of large cities like New York and Chicago more essential than ever."