XPost: rec.autos.sport.f1, rec.autos.sport.indy, rec.autos.sport.nascar

Expert answers Dori’s questions about a driverless future
Share
BY DORI MONSON SHOW
NOVEMBER 10, 2017 AT 7:46 AM

An Uber driverless car is displayed in a garage in San Francisco. The
company has been developing self-driving technology in anticipation of a driverless market. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg)
LISTEN: Former GM executive joins driverless car camp

00:00
/ 17:04

Bob Lutz knows a thing or two about the automobile industry. He began
his career in the industry the 1960s and worked up to be General Motor’s
vice chairman. Now, he’s taking his expertise and adding it to the
growing voices predicting a driverless future.

RELATED: The plan to convert I-5 to driverless only vehicles

“Autonomous vehicles, when they are on the road, they will be like a
train, then separate into individual modules and go wherever they have
to go,” Lutz told KIRO Radio’s Dori Monson. “These modules are not going to be branded Ford, or Chevrolet, or Toyota. They are going to be
branded, Uber, Lyft, or Maven.”

In a recent column in Automotive News, Lutz states, “It saddens me to
say it, but we are approaching the end of the automotive era.” He
predicts that within 20 years, travel won’t be through privately-owned
cars, but through rented modules that will seamlessly move through
traffic up to 150 miles per hour. It is similar to what others like Tony
Seba have been saying. Lutz also predicts that governments will outlaw
human driving on public roads to accommodate the driverless traffic.

But many are still skeptical of this driverless future.

Skeptical of a driverless future

While discussing the issue with Lutz, Dori had the following questions:

Question: Motorcycle riders love freedom and the experience. They won’t
want to give up that experience. How will motorcycles fit in with this
future?

Answer: I say good luck. When the feds outlaw it, you can take your bike
to a private motorcycle track and use it there, but you will no longer
be allowed to have it on a public highway. This is like gun control
opponents who say they will have to pry my gun out of my cold, dead
hands. Well, somebody is going to be prying his motorcycle out of his
hands. It’s not going to be sudden. First, in the urban areas, that’s
where private driving will be banned first. Then in suburbia, and in the
open country, that will come in stages. Ultimately, human-driven
vehicles will be banned everywhere except on private property.

Q: What about RV lovers or people who have boats and need to tow them?

A: These companies who supply modules will supply anything you want. If
you want a module that has the power and towing capacity of a Ford F250
diesel, you just order up one of those. If you need a minivan module,
you order up one of those. They will all be different power levels and
lengths. Towing won’t be a problem.

*Lutz admits he hadn’t considered the towing problem entirely.

Q: How will this affect contractors like electricians and plumbers who
carry tools and equipment in work vehicles?

A: Those are the kinds of people that are going to continue to own their
own module. But it will be a standardized module that looks like all the others, that fits into the traffic flow, that can quickly and easily be integrated into the traffic … and they’ll use it like everybody else
uses their modules. For the sake of convenience, because they have all
their tools in it, that business will own that module. There will be
well-to-do people, too, who will want to own the module, because they
will want to leave their vacation stuff in it, or their kids’ soccer
gear, so they’ll leave it parked in their garage and in their driveway.
That will be minimal and they will not be driver-controlled.

Q: What about the love-affair with cars? What about people who love the
freedom and joy of taking a drive?

A: Driving on a nice night is fine. Just order up a module, get your
girlfriend in the seat next to you, uncork a nice bottle of wine, and
tell the module to take a drive down highway so-and-so, take you past
lake so-and-so. Make it a gentle two-hour trip. Dial in the music, dial
in a movie and you are floating along in this module with your
significant other, totally enjoying yourself and not having to worry
about where the vehicle is going.

Driverless predictions

As new, driverless technology enters the automobile market, Lutz
predicts that service providers like Uber or Lyft will replace private
car ownership. It will be easier and cheaper to just order up a
self-driving car (Lutz calls them modules because they won’t have
controls or steering wheels) and get to where you need to go.

The insurance industry will take a hit. Jobs like truck drivers will be affected. Accidents are likely to go down. This will free up countless
acres of land currently used to park cars that eventually won’t need to
be parked — they’ll constantly be on the move.

“I’ll tell you what also goes away — dealers,” Lutz said. “Individual brand dealers.”

Eventually, governments will ban driving vehicles on public roads, he
says, in favor of driverless traffic. Washington state may already be on
the path to that future. The Washington State Transportation Commission
is already considering plans to convert I-5 and other freeways to
driverless only. Washington Governor Jay Inslee has already been courted
by driverless advocates.

“Most people are going to be much happier sitting in a module that
drives itself. They can watch a screen, email, listen to music, play
games, or do whatever they want in that thing, including smoke a joint
and so forth.”

http://mynorthwest.com/812034/bob-lutz-driverless-future/?

Some of the 130 comments

TronSheridan • 5 days ago
Some people will go driverless, most won't. I won't. It will take
multiple generations to get a total shift to driverless transportation.
It's not going to happen over a span of 10-20 years.

"governments will ban driving vehicles on public roads" And this will
never happen. You might need a special license or some other government nonsense, but many humans have a yearning to explore, on their own, who
will always want to hit the road in some sort of vehicle for some form
of recreation (camping, going to the dunes, trail riding, riding their motorcycles which is a passion and hobby for millions of people)

I'm still waiting for my flying car and jet pack...
11
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
JimInAuburn TronSheridan • 5 days ago
"I'm still waiting for my flying car and jet pack..."

Exactly. There are flying cars and jet packs. It does not mean that they
become common place. I think the same may eventually happen with
driverless cars. And like you said, it is not going to happen in 10-20
years. It is going to be 100 years.
3
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Common Cents JimInAuburn • 5 days ago
maybe 10-20 maybe 100. But, it's going to happen.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
shambles TronSheridan • 2 days ago
"Governments" will ban privately driven cars...ummm - those government
elected positions still require getting elected.
Let's just take this concept all the way through...shall we.
We can move all humans closer to urban areas - put them in 20'x20' grey
boxes and stack the boxes as high as engineering will allow. No need for highways. If you want to get to another city...you fly there or take a
train. We can ship goods via flight or rail. I'm sure hover-crafts will
be used as-well. Again no need for highways connecting cities. With
population living in very dense urban areas - we'll need government
testing as to what kind of job you should have. Everybody must do their
part to make the urban area function. Those in government officials will
get all the luxuries and the views from the top boxes.
We get what we vote for...this could happen.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
xManBearPigx shambles • 2 days ago
Don't overlook the use of Automated Guide Vehicles (AGV's). Wires could
be placed in all the city roads for AGVs to deliver your groceries,
purchases, mail and so on. Now will we really want our emergency
services using these automated modules? Fire Truck modules?
I think the Movie IRobot will be a more realistic future - a combination
of self driving and manual driving.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic TronSheridan • 5 days ago
The many generations you speak of are already here. Older guys like
myself who have zero desire for this bleak future and youngsters who
think it sounds like paradise. They will never have to disengage from
their true sense of freedom; their phones.
.
Ask a group of teenagers if they want a license, let alone a car.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Rushfananatic • 5 days ago
Okay, done that. The answer was YES!!!

Not sure what kind of kids you know, stop looking for them at Antifa
riots maybe?

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Common Cents Imperial Snowflake • 5 days ago
That's because you presented it in such a way as to obtain the answer
you want and they are still looking at it through the current day lens.
This is a paradigm shift. Ask them if they could have a vehicle at their disposal 24/7 with a chauffeur that would take them wherever they wanted
to go and it would be cheaper than owning a car, end traffic jams, end
drunk driving deaths, end car accidents, eliminate the need for
insurance, eliminate the need to fill the gas, wash the car, clean the inside...

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Common Cents • 5 days ago
We're so different you cannot understand me.
I don't want to live in your view of a future city.
Furthermore, it's not going to happen. Airplanes can fly and land
themselves already yet pilots still take the controls instead.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Captain Dave • 5 days ago
Total BS. Another socialist utopia. ...If only everyone agreed to be a
obedient global citizen with no aspirations to be independent or own
anything. Besides, in 20 years, most mass commuting and freight will be
in the air, not on roads.
6
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
FissionZero Captain Dave • a day ago
Socialist utopia? It's libertarians and conservatives who are preaching
the "driverless car future"

The one thing the right wing can be counted on for these days: being
rudderless and inconsistent.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Captain Dave FissionZero • 20 hours ago
Yes. Free market capitalism is messy because it is a confluence of many
ideas from a limitless number of people who compete to bring the best
solutions to market. Socialism is well organized because everything is
directed from a central source by an elite group individuals who dictate
their political desires. This is why socialist and communist countries
never thrive.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Captain Dave • 5 days ago
Exactly what I thought reading it.
I really want to live far away from anybody that thinks like the author. Clearly the writer is happy about that thought of everyone being to
controlled and only live big city life.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Captain Dave Imperial Snowflake • 5 days ago
Train-brain socialist do not belive in intelectual diversity. Just skin
color diversity to buy votes. Citizens are thought to be drones who
simply do what their elite masters tell them to do through false
promises, lies and manipulation. Socialism is just a big Ponzi scheme
that always fails when they run out of other people's money.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic Imperial Snowflake • 5 days ago
If by author you mean Bob Lutz, I assure you, he is lamenting the future
he described

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic Captain Dave • 5 days ago
Yeah it is part of a Socialist Utopia. Have you been watching where we
are headed?

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Captain Dave Rushfananatic • 5 days ago
We are headed down the same path Detroit was on in 1962. The leftists
who took over Detroit back then had fantastic promises of public
transportation infrastructure too. None of it ever materialized since
everyone who actually built things moved away. Detroit went from being
the premier city in the world for jobs and economic opportunity to being
worse than the impoverished war ravaged cities of the middle east.
2
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Rushfananatic • 5 days ago
In ways yes, but plenty of us are not militant socialists like I'm
thinking everyone you know is.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic Imperial Snowflake • 5 days ago
Hah! I am a car loving, gun owning libertarian,
.
But I am not blind.
.
I hope I am dead before the Socialist Utopia reaches full fruition
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Rushfananatic • 5 days ago
I think you need new friends. The majority of people are still like you
claim to be.
Far too many for us all to be forced into self driving cars in 20 years.

For one, it would cost too much for everyone to buy a brand new car at
the rate it would require.

America is HUGE, much bigger than the small socialist utopias for mass
transit that lefty's try to compare us to. Tell me how this utopia is
going to work for someone in rural Montana? Will the farmers there be
banned from driving to Seattle? Their pickups are NOT going to drive
themselves taking hay to their cattle.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic Imperial Snowflake • 5 days ago
Well, thankfully, my closest friends feel the same way, but most of the "voters" live in large congested cities. I think he addresses ownership:
there won't be but a very few owners, just like in big cities (New York
for example). We'll just rent from Uber and Lyft.
.
Montana (beautiful by the way) will take much longer to get there. When
they travel to a city like Seattle, they will drop their vehicles off at Ellensburg and take a "module " the rest of the way in.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Rushfananatic • 5 days ago
No chance, I wish there was a way I could bet money on this.

I'd bet everything I have and be guaranteed a real nice retirement.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Jason W • 5 days ago
Many millions of people own RV's, ATV's, ORV's, boats, etc and they tow
them with trucks. These are HUGE industries in the US and keep lots of
people employed. These industries will definitely take interest to any government talk of taking away anyone's tow vehicles (large SUVs and
trucks) and they will lobby and sue against any effort to ban human
driving. There is no way "modules" could handle towing all of the
different kinds of gear out there that go into all kinds of remote,
unmapped locations.

And I won't give up my sports cars either, and neither will a bunch of
other people. What, who's going to stop us from driving amongst the
autonomous vehicles? Autonomous police? That'll be fun!
5
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic Jason W • 5 days ago
They may be huge industries, but their market value compared to Google,
Apple, Uber, Amazon etc is virtually nil. They are not on equal footing
power wise.
I am a lifelong car and boat guy, but I see how politically toxic these
are becoming to a growing number of people.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Imperial Snowflake Rushfananatic • 5 days ago
Please GET OUT of your social circle. I don't want to live in the world
where I can't go anywhere an electric car cannot drive me to.

That's not most of the world, get outside. Go for a hike, not around
Greenlake either.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Cheeky_Gesturton Jason W • 5 days ago
read a review on BEHIND THE GREEN MASK by Rosa Koire.
Perhaps there are those who don't want the rabble going into 'all kinds
of remote, unmapped locations.'

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
BitterClinger1969 Cheeky_Gesturton • 5 days ago
Agenda 21 is real.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Jason W Cheeky_Gesturton • 5 days ago
For a while now there has been more and more restrictions on where
people can go and what they can do in remote areas.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
TheFormerChemist Jason W • 5 days ago
bah berming the forest roads around here suck,,,,,,

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Mark • 5 days ago
These were great questions asked with not great answers given because we
are nowhere close to such a reality. When people talk like this it's
clear they are living in a bubble and haven't considered how the rest of
the country works. There are about 10 million semi trucks registered in
the country. About 9 million RVs, 13 million boats, 9 million
motorcycles, and 121 million commercial vehicles. Just because you
create a vehicle that can drive itself on a clear road in perfect
condition, does not mean you will replace the enormous infrastructure of
manned vehicles.
5
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
hayduke Mark • 5 days ago
How are they going to deal with liability issues if they autonomous car
is at fault? And how about issues with hacking, which has already been done?
3
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Cheeky_Gesturton hayduke • 5 days ago
Well... currently, bribed politicians have passed laws giving
pharmaceutical corporations measures of immunity. I suspect that we'll
have to waive some rights in order to travel the king's highway

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Cheeky_Gesturton Mark • 5 days ago
CFR industrialists don't guess the future. They steamroll it, and the
press and plebeians bless it.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Chewbaccacabra • 5 days ago
This is all a pipe dream. We're no where close to having driverless
cars. Yeah they might work on closed course, with perfectly manicured
roads. Does Seattle DOT maintain such high quality conditions? (Pause
for laughter) And people aren't going to give up car ownership. Besides
cars being used for transportation, they're also used as lockers. You
can drive your kids straight from accordion practice to soccer practice
and shop at Costco in between because you can store your things in your
car. Try doing that in an Uber. And seriously, if you live North of
Denny, South of Yelser, or East of 23rd, this should be obvious to you.
8
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
hayduke Chewbaccacabra • 5 days ago
What about liability? Who do you sue if you get in an accident with an autonomous car? I would think Uber and the rest of them would want to
limit their liability.

Also, what about hacking? I know it's already possible to hack into cars
while they're actually being driven by someone.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
bobchoi • 5 days ago
Guess I better start my run for congress soon. I need to be there to get
my massive bribes from Uber. How much should I charge for my vote to ban personal vehicles?
4
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
rick ws bobchoi • 5 days ago
Lots of millions to an account in Switzerland. Have a home to move into
in Belize or Guatemala.
Take a vacation and resign.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Tech_Transplant • 5 days ago
The only thing I disagree with is the timetable. People always
underestimate how long it takes to transform fundamental infrastructure
like automobile transportation. People predicted 10 years ago that
something like 25% of cars today would be electric, and instead despite
a federal $8k tax subsidy, the number is closer to 1%. Furthermore,
there are still major technical hurdles which haven't been solved yet.
Car and Driver magazine just did an entire issue on the state of
autonomous cars and none of the existing technology was very impressive.
All of them made serious mistakes which require constant operator
supervision. Even once the tech is finally perfected, such cars will
face a slow adoption and trust building phase. 20 years to be at 100% is
too short.
4
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Dude • 5 days ago
20 years from now no way, 100 years maybe
4
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Basso Dude • 5 days ago
Yes, by then the brainwashing of our youth will be complete.
7
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Rushfananatic Basso • 5 days ago
It's already 90% completed

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Pinochets Helicopter Pilot. • 5 days ago
I rather drive than let the car do it for me.
3
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Cheeky_Gesturton Pinochets Helicopter Pilot. • 5 days ago
I know perfectly good drivers that cannot stomach being a passenger.
Motion sickness affects many adults.
1
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Pinochets Helicopter Pilot. Cheeky_Gesturton • 4 days ago
Its got its uses but same time it creates an entire generation of future
bad drivers.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Mark in Bellevue • 5 days ago
I can drive my own car, thanks.
3
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Common Cents Mark in Bellevue • 5 days ago
You can - but if it's significantly cheaper to not driver your own car
would you still?

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
JimInAuburn • 5 days ago
"The Washington State Transportation Commission is already considering
plans to convert I-5 and other freeways to driverless only. "

Why are they wasting their time on this now? Consider it when driverless
cars actually are being used....
3
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Tech_Transplant JimInAuburn • 5 days ago
I swear, they would love to find a way to force everyone to give up cars altogether to ride bicycles, and then they would blame the resulting
economic devastation on Republicans and landlords.

•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Travis Pahl • 5 days ago
I for one welcome our new module overlords.
4
•Reply•Share ›
Avatar
Demand the Truth • 5 days ago
There is no reason for me to feel comfortable sitting in a vehicle that
is 100% controlled by a machine. The machine can't die I can, the
machine is programmed to drive per traffic laws not to give a crap about
me. Machines can be hacked, there is no such thing as 100% non hackable computers. So, I have one question for pushing this crap: What is the acceptable percentage of deaths caused by these machines? 1%, 2%, 25%.
2
•Reply•Share ›

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)