[bmcusick]

And airlines are niche compared to mass market cars too, but they're still a good business!

One thing I think most people don't appreciate is that the switch to self-driving cars will transform America into a mostly-transit society. Once you don't need a car to live from day to day, you sell it. Then you take a self-driving Lyft from your house to the bus depot, train station, or airport.

The market for self-driving busses between cities will grow alongside the market for self-driving cars within cities.

[bluGill]

I don't understand your logic. Why does a self driving car free me from having to have a car to live day to day?

[VintageCool]

The prediction is that ride-hailing taxis will be ubiquitous and cheap once we have self-driving cars. Companies will be able to flood the city streets with them once they are purely a capital expenditure and they don't have to pay human drivers.

If self-driving taxis are ubiquitous enough, there could be very little wait time between hailing a taxi from an app on your smartphone and the taxi arriving at your location.

At some price point, it will stop making sense to spend $20,000-$30,000 to buy a car. And you won't have to pay for insurance or gas or wear-and-tear or parking. The car could be out making money instead of being parked 22 hours a day.

Businesses and apartments and home developers will stop building parking spaces and parking lots once self-driving taxis hit a sufficient threshold.

Finally, cars will solve transit's "last mile" problem. Instead of paying for a taxi from home to work, you can pay for a taxi from home to the Light Rail station.

[bmcusick]

Exactly right.

[paulie_a]

Considering the substantial amount of of bankruptcies by airlines, I wouldn't call it a good business.