Lyft Says Robots Will Drive Most Of Its Cars in Five Years (recode.net)

A week after its rival Uber began rolling out self-driving cars in Pittsburgh, Lyft has said it also expects to roll out its self-driving by next year. Its president John Zimmer outlined a "three-phase" plan for the company, noting that self-driving cars will be made available to Lyft users in the first phase. But in this phase, it only plans to roll out self-driving cars that can "drive along fixed routes" and that the "technology is guaranteed to be able to navigate." Recode adds: In the second phase, the self-driving cars in the fleet will navigate more than just the fixed routes, but will only drive up to 25 miles per hour. As the technology matures and the software encounters more complex environments, Zimmer wrote, cars will get faster. The third phase, expected to happen sometime in 2021 or 2022, will be when all Lyft rides will be completed by a fully autonomous car. Shortly after that phase begins, car ownership will see a steep drop-off, according to Zimmer. Zimmer, who has long been a vocal proponent of ending car ownership, set a date for the death of the personally owned car in major U.S. cities: 2025.

Comments

So a guy that runs a ride sharing company.

[sims 2]

Says that self driving cars will put an end to car ownership.

It could put a dent in it but unless this makes people so broke that they can't own their own car I think personal space will still win out.

Re:So a guy that runs a ride sharing company.

[PIBM]

Reason #1 it won't happen; families.

Here I have 4 kids, each requiring different car seats size / adjustments. We are bringing and keeping different stuff for the kids (Stroller, diapers, their favorite movies) which stay with us without needing to grab it at our Xth destination. Keeping our previous purchases safe while we go for our next stop, and the items we don't need at that stop (no stroller at the grocery store) is a major win that lyft rides won't provide.

It might definitely help reduce the percentage of ownership, but it certainly can't sign the death certificate.

Re:So a guy that runs a ride sharing company.

[drinkypoo]

Says that self driving cars will put an end to car ownership.

Even the automakers are expecting ride sharing to put a major dent in auto sales. Their analysts have been talking about this for years and most of them are invested in ride sharing. They are definitely talking about self-driving cars being part of this equation, and again, have been for years.

People who can't really afford to own a car responsibly often own one anyway, because they can't function without one in a world so dependent on private transportation. Most nations fit that description; people using public transportation suffer badly compared to vehicle owners because of public transport's many deficiencies. Self-driving cars have the potential to eliminate virtually all of those deficiencies. You can get a car when you want one, you don't have to worry about whether the driver is fit to do his job because there isn't a driver, and the vehicles don't inherently cause traffic flow problems with other vehicles, decreasing the overall efficiency of the system.

Since the economy isn't exactly improving, you can reasonably expect vehicle ownership to continue to decrease. The age of the U.S. fleet in particular continues to increase to ever-higher record levels. People are buying less cars, that's a fact. They're buying less cars both because they can not afford as many cars because the economy is still in the toilet, and because they can better function on public transportation than in the past because some new options have opened up under the name of "ride sharing". Whether they are ride-sharing or not isn't really the point here (though they aren't) but that they now exist when they didn't before. Yes, those are private transportation systems, but anyone who does not abuse them can use them.

Automatic elevators were first

[mi]

How sad to see the nice, well-groomed and jovial men operating elevators replaced with the soulless automation.

We are going to miss the nice, well-groomed and jovial cab-drivers too...