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.
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.