The Big 'Let's sell our cars and take buses/ebikes instead' thread (warning: probably very dull)

Sure, but the braking distance is related to mass and speed, only the thinking distance is affected by switching from a human brain to a microprocessor. Radio communication between vehicles is great until it is interrupted.

Anyway, seeing as this is the public transport thread, it's worth noting that trains have been running driverless for years

I do understand that. And possibly for motorway driving, preventing the wave of brake lights would be beneficial, but that's got nothing to do with road safety and speed limits on urban/suburban roads where that phenomenon doesn't occur.

It's happening, but I agree, it's just more traffic. No benefit at all.

https://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/san-francisco-london-breed-driverless-cars-crossing-guards/3607201/

An awful lot of time and money has already been spend preparing the route, and undoing it is going to cost anyway, it seems to make sense to make the best of it, it will be twice as hard to resurrect it if it is abandoned now.

My main issue with it is the amount of damage the construction work is doing to the environment. I live close to it and it seems that the area that is being cleared of trees and substantial vegetation is way in excess of what is needed. Of course they are replanting, but it will be decades before the trees have grown enough to provide the habitats that they used to.

Nice. I just spent £368 for 8 days worth of travel this month to work and back.

This is an interesting article on the perils of heavier and heavier cars. Interestingly, it becomes a bit of a prisoner's dilemma.

A heavier car marginally improves the safety of the occupants, but at the expense of being significantly more dangerous to all other road users.

With the evolution of automous cars that charts trend will be towards zero.

Pipe down country boy and go addle your brain with some scrumpy or whatever nastiness you drink over there.

Some of us are trying to earn the big bucks - which is a good job because someone needs to pay for all the oldies as they become increasingly decrepit.

Clearly I've touched a nerve Mr Angry.

😂

Imagine the whinging we'd endure if you were on one of the more expensive lines.

I think you need considerably more sleep, you might be less of a grump as a result.

The problem in the US is as much about the nature of driving as the vehicles. It is made too easy on the whole.

Driver training is also rediculously superficial and the road signs are useless. Means there's a lot more of a free for all across rather large wide paved areas with few obstacles. Until something unusual happens, whereupon people don't notice or don't know what to do.

That’s actually a lot cheaper than I would have thought although I always think of the distance from Cambridge to London being more than it is. A similar journey for me by distance might be to Didcot which is showing as £200 for an any time journey tomorrow (oddly the journey to Swindon at the same time is showing as £10 each way which shows up the ridiculous vagaries of the British railway pricing system).

Carnet tickets are ok, especially when a family means there’s often a day in a week where you can’t come into the office.

Saves me about a grand a year.

I am a bit concerned 4 out of 10 children had been driving to school!