[browep]

You're thinking about it backwards. It's not a "better MUNI". There's no turnstiles or gates, just bays. Not 4 or 6 like a train station but 40 to 60. Boarding a few people or more likely 1 takes less than 30s. That's 2/second. Plenty of bandwidth. And these stations are smaller and more dense, not every 15 blocks in the city but every few blocks, maybe in a large building's lobby. There's no swiping, it's on your smartphone and automated ( Open app, click "go home", app says "bay 21, approx, 2 min, pod #123, 1 other passenger"). Doors close when all the passengers are present. Pod has "pad requires service" button on console if there is a cleanliness issue.

This is attractive to the NIMBY crowd, fewer cars, less non-resident parking, less noise ( electric motors ) less local pollution. Who wouldn't want local rapid transit? They're not putting in Walmarts.

[yid]

> There's no swiping, it's on your smartphone and automated ( Open app, click "go home", app says "bay 21, approx, 2 min, pod #123, 1 other passenger").

And in this hypothetical world, absolutely everyone who uses public transit has a smartphone?

[noobermin]

Let's imagine the system engineers are smarter than that: if you have a smart phone, you can use the app. If you don't, there'd be a terminal in the station you could use. I'd imagine the engineers for this could have thought of that.

[retbull]

Easy enough to just assume people have smart phones and only have it in cities where mostly people will have them even the poorer people. A cheap smart phone isn't that expensive any more.

[listic]

It's not just the cost, really: I know I can have a second hand smartphone for peanuts. There'll probably always be some people who don't use smartphones, for whatevre reason.

[egypturnash]

In the real world there are a hell of a lot of people who are homeless who have smartphones. They're getting pretty ubiquitous.