[cyberax]

> We have something similar to self driving cars. Taxis and other public transport!

No we don't. Taxis are not a solution because they are INCREDIBLY dirty. You might as well be riding on train-cars worth of coal.

And public transit is worse, because it's inevitably slow and inflexible.

Edit: taxis are expensive not because they are cars, but because they need dedicated drivers. And here in the US even taxi drivers earn a somewhat liveable salary, and as a result they have a huge carbon footprint. But if you're OK with semi-slave labor, then it can work, agreed.

[Lvl999Noob]

By taxis, I don't mean Uber drivers. We have auto-rickshaws here. They go from any point in the city to any point (so you have the flexibility of private vehicles) but they mostly follow common routes and they pick up and drop off people anywhere along the way. So they end up more efficient since they are nearly always at full capacity rather than your SUV that's burning more fuel carrying itself than any people and stuff inside it.

Public transit is excellent when you design for it. It can be fast and flexible. The problem is when the implementation is half hearted. Transit systems are things that become better with scale. The more you invest in them, they better they get.