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I am in full support of this vision. However (and unfortunately), I think the practical answer will resemble robotic trains more than robotic cars operating on the current network of roads. Plus, the main benefits of an improved transportation system will involve restructuring the way cities and communities are built when they are not sliced apart and divided by acres of roadways.

First of all, while there has been some limited success in building autonomous cars, but we can't even get autonomous airplanes accepted into our air transportation system even though planes have practically been able to fly themselves for decades. Hell, most cities can't even get people to accept conductor-less subway trains, and have to hire college students or bums to sit in the front cabin.

The robotic vehicle would have to be completely isolated and separated from unpredictable human traffic and other sources of interference, if only for liability issues.

The best first step in widespread use of robotic cars might just be on the interstate highway system, where they could construct a special lane designed only for robotic vehicles. So you could drive your car/truck onto an interstate, auto-merge into the robotic lane, set the autopilot for your destination exit, and take a nap or otherwise entertain yourself until an alarm wakes you up to exit.

For incursions into urban areas, you'd want something similar to the Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) systems everyone was investigating in the 70's. Take a look at the CabinTaxi system at: http://faculty.washington.edu/jbs/itrans/cabintaxi%20photos.htm . There are modern PRT systems finally being planned for deployment recently in Heathrow and Dubai... however, they seem to be limited to airport shuttles and aren't really large enough to meet the promise of a large distributed network with many stations.

Speaking of Dubai, the biggest obstacle will be financial, of course. The road and highway system is expensive, but a lot of the infrastructure is paid for by the user in purchase and maintenance of their own personal vehicles. While the city as a whole would find the entire system cheaper if the government would purchase and maintain a smaller number of shared vehicles, good luck convincing them to finance both the network and the vehicles if they can just build the network and have the users pay for their own vehicles. Of course, car sharing companies such as Flexcar / Zipcar offer something of a shared vehicle, they only have limited potential unless they'd allow one-way rentals... where you can pick up a Zipcar at one "station" and drop it off at another "station", where someone else could make use of it. You'd need some way of getting the cars back to empty stations, but that would realize benefits in terms of reducing the area of pavement needed for parking if everyone had their own personal vehicle.

However, I don't think advanced transportation is the magic bullet that will solve all of our problems... I think much greater benefits will be realized by redesigning cities to be denser, more human friendly, and carfree (check out http://carfree.com/ ), so people simply don't need to travel so far from a nice home to a nice place to work.

So yes, I'm an Arcology nut (check out my MSSE thesis on my homepage). I think the Dantzig / Saaty "Compact Cities" book from 1971 had the most comprehensive plan for constructing a city that I have seen in my research (you'll have to look it up in a good library, it's fairly rare).

In any case, I agree that this kind of development should be a national priority, since there is a *lot* of room for improvement. But since improving the place you live and how you get around are kinda mundane, "infrastructure" issues, I figure we'll see little to no advances in the Western world until China develops the technology and discipline and manages to dust us with their production efficiency, and maybe eventually a high standard of living (said only half-jokingly).

The problem really is that US cities and suburbs were designed ONLY for cars, and not for pedestrians. To buy stuff there aren't local stores (except maybe in big cities like NY) where you can buy misc stuff for your house. No, you have to get in the car, drive for N minutes to the nearest Walmart, park, get your stuff, rinse, repeat.

Right now I just googled for "pedestrian unfriendly" and got to this blog:

http://nishantkashyap.blogspot.com/2007/07/pedestrian-and-poor-unfriendly-us.html

The first thing that strikes you about any US suburb is the landscaping - beautifully manicured patches of green all along the road and absolutely no sign of dust - perfect settings to take a stroll or if your office is close enough may be take a walk to the office. But lo and behold, where do you walk? There are absolutely no footpaths, no pedestrian crossings and as if that was not enough you have absolutely no public transport as well- a total anti-thesis of a city like NYC and that is true for all such places in US - a lesson for those who get mesmerized by cities likes NYC and Chicago and start cursing our poor cities. Any day I am happy taking a cycle-rick in hot and dusty Lucknow or Amritsar than risking my life walking on the side of the picturesque road here where traffic may be moving at 100 kmps minimum. Everyone here keeps a car and absolutely no one walks - there are some crossing which have a no pedestrian sign - something which I saw for the very first time in my life.

With absolutely no provisions for pedestrians or public transport - I wonder what do the poor do here. Everyone is forced to buy a car - no wonder US is the biggest contributor to greenhouse emissions and also leveraged 3 time over because you absolutely have to buy and maintain a car. Moreover, due to lack of basic exercise like walking US is also facing obesity crisis and has been forced to spend a good amount of funds on health care and low cal diets.

Then I googled for "car free cities" and got to this website:
http://www.carfree.com/cft/i003_qz.html

After reading that, you'll begin to understand what really is wrong with car pollution in the U.S.

Don't people have to get to work somehow?

Telepresence. See the Wikipedia telepresence article.

"We must imagine a future without cars."
Designing a city without any cars.
Orson Scott Card on 'walking neighborhoods' (I first thought he was talking of some scifi idea, such as moving neighborhoods, haha.)
Carfree (?)
Monorail Opportunity in Seattle, Washington (1998)

From #19302663:

People got along for thousands of years without cars, so maybe you should consider getting rid of yours.

Also, from #10313790:

This is what I think... There won't be cars in the future. There will only be personalised vehicles to transport each individual. Roads, the larger they are, will not allow single vehicles. There has to be two or more (depending on the road) vehicles required to travel together. Probably the smallest road will allow individual vehicles to travel by themselves. As more vehicles travel together the overall fuel consumption will decrease and fuel efficiency will increase. Individual vehicles will be able to break off from this combined unit as they reach their destinations.

Creating car free cities dupe with >1k comments.

Post #5975896 gets it right:

Even with "emission free" cars, you still expend the energy to move the car to being with. Getting rid of pollution is an important goal, but the ultimate goal should be to conserve the environmental resources required to produce and operate cars. By creating a city in which cars are less necessary, you reduce the energy consumption of the average citizen, even after you factor in the energy required to operate the 24-hour mass transit systems.

Just an interesting tidbit here: "It's things like cars that take people out of public spaces and make a community less safe."
Arcosanti, an interesting experimental town supposedly as an alternative to urban sprawl.
Argument that car-free is too expensive.
An interesting problem in #5975908:

1) People like cars. Tell them they can't use thier cars anymore, and you're liable to be voted out of office.
2) If you get rid of cars, you have to have an alternative system of transportation in place. Unfortunately, the only place to PUT that system will many times be where the roads are now. Result: you can't build the system until the cars are gone, and you can't get rid of the cars until the system is ready!

Apparently Venice is not the solution, either.
Small steps needed to make the change.
Pipes from Futurama? Or maybe, dare it be said, ...

We need better designed cities, not better designed cars.

Cars are certainly the most flexible way to get around. But we should not have to use them for our daily commute through rush hour traffic or even for running most common errands or to go out and play or dine out.

The problem really is with the way we (esp. the US) design cities. Instead of spending money on public transit-oriented communities, it's much, much cheaper for the municipalities to just pave a stretch of concrete and let individual citizens pay for the cost, maintenance, and operation of personally-owned vehicles. On top of that, condo construction here is pretty lousy, whereas if single family home construction is lousy at least your immediate neighbors are farther away from the noise.

Unfortunately, we don't really have a simple way to measure how much energy people can save in cities with alternative transit as opposed to people who live in cities where they have to drive even to the nearest postal mailbox.

In the mean time, the exciting progress in the transportation field ought to be things like transit oriented design:
http://www.transitorienteddevelopment.org/
http://www.carfree.com/

Progress in these areas of urban development will get us closer to constructing sustainable colonies in space than any improvement in individually run cars.

Since 1975 though, the global mean surface temperature has been on a strictly upward trend. Oil production/consumption started spiking in 1960/65... and I don't think it's surprising that one atmospheric effect lags another by 10-15 years.

"Why do we still drive cars that use an internal combustion engine and only get 30 miles per gallon?"

The question should be: Why do we still drive cars?

Certainly in urban areas this is the most inefficient way of getting people from point a to b.

Check out http://www.carfree.com/ for a non mainstream look at this issue.

This would be a good chance to address real questions and not just come across as another "rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic" type endeavor.

car is technology and in detail is a kind of dangerous technology for the user and other people around. i consider cars a kind of technology that should be avoided as much as possible and government should help people to have mobility services with minimal use of personal cars.

i find this website so interesting: http://www.carfree.com/

privacy should be paranoid only when related to phisical person only: health, politics, sex.

i agree about the idea that if u want to use a weapon, like a car, u should be prepared to declare anything about that use.

i also agree with rfid systems and black-box for cars.

surely i think that travelling by train, cabs and pedal-bikes shouldn't be monitored no-way.

bye

ppp

Let's say we do build all new residential areas with pedistrian only walkways. Who'd pick up the trash/recycling? No powered vehicles allowed, remember. How would you get that grand piano to your house? Or that large, stylish sofa? Or pool table? Or the bandsaw that weighs 400 pounds, like is in my garage/workshop? (along with an even heavier milling machine, lathe, two more bandsaws, a freaking heavy as crap spot welder (made in the 30s!), sheet metal brake, welders, and a table saw that weigh at least as much, most weigh more)

Some thoughts here: carfree.com

"Carfree Cities" by J.H. Crawford was an excellent read. In it, you can see there is a great deal to be relearned from pre-automobile cities, which were themselves solar powered. There are picturesque and quantative comparisons between cities like Venice, Italy and Los Angeles with the former being closer to the author's ideal. Crawford describes a new type of districting and city planning that includes emphasis on mixed-use residential areas, ubiquitous rail transport, and intimate pedestrian-only streets and squares characterizing each district.

I also find the website engrossing... It's full of information, images, links and there are regular updates including a newsletter.

The US is still very dynamic. The Puget Sound region is expected to grow by 1.2 million people over the next 20 years (a big increase for us).

Well, Venice may not be a large commercial or industrial center, but they also don't have a metro system in place (underground railway). Venice itself may not be able to scale well, but if you have a system with a fast, high-capacity rail, then it can accommodate a lot of people and move them around fast. Most US cities are not much larger than 1-3 million. The greater Seattle area is falls between that range. Also, if we need super large cities like LA, then you can link six or so of these cities together in a large loop (putting the station at the central hub of each smaller area). (I can't find the picture that illustrates this)

Huge super stores could still have a place in a car free city (well, it would be harder to transport your items home, though). If they aren't too gaudy, they could be put in with the normal buildings in the city, else just put them on the outer rim along with the heavy industry. I don't think everything is moving towards the huge super retailers, though. A lot of urban people are against Walmart and there seems to be a lot of people where I am from that prefer smaller, more local stores. I personally would rather by fresh herbs from a local store than travel a few districts over on the subway to get a pound of cilantro for $.15.

People could still have their own house and lawn in these cities, although it would become more expensive. The zoning laws wouldn't have to require multistory, multifamily buildings, but then you wouldn't have much density in those areas without.

I think there are people who would want to live in car free neighborhoods. There is a bunch of redevelopment happening in Seattle now, and one thing I think they should do is shut off a few square blocks of roads (some roads don't get much traffic at all as it is) and build a little car free community. The outside buildings would be exposed to the streets, but the inside buildings and (car free) streets would be quiet. I believe people would buy this, as there is already one apartment building in town that offers a courtyard and advertises it like an Italian villa. People like peaceful sanctuaries in cities. We wouldn't have to design cities from scratch, even thought it would be ideal. Here is a plan for putting a high coverage rail system in the city of Lyon, France. The beauty about the reference design (and remember, that is just a reference) is that each lobe would only need one set of rail tracks (one going each direction) and no matter where you were going in the city, it would require only one transfer. There are three 'central hubs' which help distributed the load around. BTW, that Paris rail system is huge! I'd love to visit there sometime (I've been to NYC which also has a nice rail system).

That is the idea, though. If we build these rail systems in urban areas (or other very efficient means of transport, although underground rail is still the most ideal), people will congregate around the stations. If you put a station in a more suburban area, it is likely that over the years more dense housing would be built around it. People would eventually want to move where transport is good, especially if it is hard to get to the station with a car (or if it is too congested for parking near the station).

I've lived in a suburb my whole life (although now I live on a university campus). I hope to move to the city this summer (well, I'm in a city now, but it is only temporary, and I am sent home over breaks) and I don't plan on returning. I didn't mind growing up in the suburbs until about halfway through high school when I got annoyed with how hard it was to visit places away from home (because I don't like driving). When I think back, though, it would be easier to live in a city and travel. I've been to Venice and it was a wonderful city, I'd love to live in a European-style, huma

As has been said elsewhere, the average hike is less than a mile. Many people in large cities already walk a mile or more to get to the subway. Remember, a half mile walk is about 10 minutes. Most everyone on the far east side of NYC is a 10 minute walk from the subway.
As for heavy goods, this system could be adapted to accomodate some of them. Freight cars could be interspersed with commuter cars. A city like Venice has long adapted to the lack of roads, and still manages to get heavy goods in and out. In fact, the myth that "we need trucks to survive" is perpetrated by the trucking industry. http://www.carfree.com/

you mean like this?

...or make sacrifices so you can afford to live downtown somewhere with everything packed together.

Most inner city neighbourhoods here are quite nice, but property costs are easily 2-3x what they are in the suburbs, which puts them completely out of my reach - the "average" suburbian cost is approaching $220K, so an extra 400K mortgage would be financial suicide. Check out http://www.carfree.com/ for a few great ideas about how cities should be built. :)

Look at this city design. Instead of trying to create better routing of commuters, it eliminates the whole problem of commuting.

I agree: no form of transportation has been developed that can outdo walking.

Automobiles are a miserable option for urban environments, and the US census claims that the vast majority of Americans live in metropolitan areas (though mostly in the horrific suburbs).

But anyone who is forced to use a car every single day, or for every trip they make out of the house, really suffers. If cities were designed so that cars could be used once per week or less, we'd have a much higher quality of life. (I'm in LA. The car-induced smog causes 10,000 locals to die of cancer each year. Don't forget lung and heart failures, asthma, etc. But no one cares about the aggregate, only about their immediate convenience.)

This is where I would prefer to live:
Carfree.com

Sustainable, healthy, quiet, pleasant. Sure beats the schlock that's been built in the USA for the past 50 years!

check out carfree cities.

Plus, their logo is Tux.

Check Carfree.com.

Amen, brother

In fact, I'm a big supporter of public transportation. I vote for it whenever I have a chance. I don't drive, and I take public transportation everywhere.

car free cities

Frankly I wish cars would cease to exist.

Yes, me too. Check out this website, and the book on the site.

car free cities

Frankly I wish cars would cease to exist.

Yes, me too. Check out this website, and the book on the site.

car free cities

carfree website

carfree cities, book