[McAlpine5892]

We already have solutions for this called trains, buses, subways, etc. Public transportation. Yes, America is huge but look at China building out high-speed rail at an incredible pace. The amount of money dumped into self-driving could have built out an impressive amount of infrastructure for public transportation.

Not to say this isn’t a worthy problem to solve or that cars have no use. They’re great for rural life. But maybe 80% of the use-case for self-driving cars is pretty much solved by trains. They’re fast, generate no traffic, are very safe, and reduce pollution in urban areas. Even electric cars produce noxious break dust.

Addendum

The “America is too big” argument drives me nuts. (1) Again, look at China. (2) The EU is decently large and connected very well by rail. (3) We’re America. We went to the frickin moon. Defeated the Nazis. Etc. We can build trains. Not to mention what a boost it would be to the economy with all the jobs a project like that would create. Sure, we wouldn’t have an Elon but that’s fine by me.

[llbbdd]

This argument never makes a lick of sense, these are entirely different problems. Trains, buses, subways, do not go to my house, and they do not go to my destination. They (sometimes) get close, and then I have to get through the last mile somehow, often a taxi or Uber. That transfer alone is annoying and it often makes sense to just take the taxi the whole way, even if it costs more, and it's a better experience than any public transit, so why not?

Maybe that setup works in China where everyone lives on top of each other in shoeboxes and you can just route a monorail through an apartment building, but I like both having my space and living adjacent to a large city. You could put a teleporter to the train station on my boulevard and I'd stand next to it while I wait for an Uber. You could build a train station a block from my house and I'd move somewhere else. I would pay multiples of any train ticket price to get into an autonomous sleeper Waymo and wake up in a city hours away in front of my hotel. You literally could not pay me to take more public transit if I have any other option, and I don't think I'm alone in that, and building more of it doesn't solve that.

America's strength here is that it's full of great places where you can live like that, take public transit everywhere, walk everywhere else, if that's what you want, with the compromises it comes with. But instead of moving to those places people say "build more public transit", which then just sounds like "I wish public transit was more accessible to me specifically" and then we're just back at taxis, or building rail to connect the front doors of everyone on earth.

[grues-dinner]

> Maybe that setup works in China

It doesn't, really. China sells absolutely fucktons of cars domestically. There are also dozens of brands that most people have never even heard of and don't even get exported because domestic demand for a functional 10-15,000 electric car is so high. Every residential complex is absolutely rammed with cars, ranging from tiny runabouts to Tank 700 plus-sized SUVs.

That demand doesn't exist because everyone lives 5 minutes walk from work and loves the subway. Though millions upon millions of people do both, and subways have expanded probably 1000% or more in the last 15 years, million upon millions also want a car. In many cases they may not represent all the miles a person travels (eg subway to work but car for other trips).

High speed rail also is a replacement for many car miles driven because while a cross-country ticket is expensive, driving is still expensive in fuel and wear and takes days to boot.

[llbbdd]

There are definitely places in the US that I would like to see intercity high-speed rail specifically. Flying is convenient and frankly magical but always feels like a huge chore to do.

[grues-dinner]

Even in China, flying is usually cheaper than HSR, and over twice as fast once airborne (300km/hr train vs 800km/hr plane). But getting and through airports is still more of a hassle than the trains. Even when taxis are fairly cheap, there's nothing like popping out in the city.

Though it's not quite like a cosy European station near the old town: some some stations are the better part of half a mile across (not along the platforms, across), and aren't right in the city centre so there can still be some walking involved!

On the other hand, you can have takeaway food delivered to the station ahead and receive it at your seat. And it's far more comfortable even in economy.

[tuna74]

Yes, Chinese HSR is awesome!

[oldjim798]

-->You literally could not pay me to take more public transit if I have any other option

The diversity of the world truly never ceases to amaze me. Thats a wild take. Driving is an awful experience - its expensive, its stressful, cars are uncomfortable, and the whole thing is extremely dangerous.

More over, I would argue that America is very much not a place where you can live car-free. There are very few places in the country where you can live without a car, certainly if you have a family.

That being said, building more public transit everywhere would allow more people to get out of the way of people like you who will drive no matter what.

[llbbdd]

Sure, the alternative view is just as wild to me, and I've travelled plenty both ways. It's only expensive if you don't value the advantages, and even in absolute terms it doesn't cost much more. Public transit is for me way more stressful because crowds are annoying, train and bus schedules are annoying, people are inconsiderate and you have no control over it at all. The worst part of public transit is the public; I love going to the theatre but I've mostly stopped for the same reason and got a nice setup at home instead. It's not IMAX but IMAX isn't that fun anyway with a bad audience.

Cars are clean and if they aren't, there's a rating system for that. Bus is dirty? The city will surely see to your ticket eventually.

Cars are uncomfortable? Pay another couple dollars and Uber will send you an SUV just for you if you want. Try offering a couple dollars to the people sandwiching you on either side on the subway and see if it makes you more comfortable.

I've never had a license beyond a temp, my family doesn't own a car. I agree driving is stressful, which is why I prefer to pay people who drive for a living to do it for me, so it's not about driving for driving's sake, it's about what's comfortable to use and convenient. Most public transit is neither.

[jjice]

For long distance trains:

While I also love trains and public transit, China is about the same physical size of the US, but has about four times the population, so it's four times denser. Definitely makes trains more appealing for them.

> We’re America. We went to the frickin moon. Defeated the Nazis. Etc. We can build trains.

Absolutely we can build trains. It's not that we're incapable. It's that it's not financially viable based on the usage it'll get.

Again, I'd love better trains in the US, but it doesn't make sense in a lot of cases in the US still due to density and current value props for individuals. If it was valuable, someone would do it.

Now, for intra-city transit, the lack of trains also drives me insane.

[rangestransform]

There are already places in the US that can financially justify Japan-tier high speed rail (specifically the northeast corridor), but Connecticut simultaneously wants high speed rail through the coastal towns and opposes the land acquisition required to get adequately straight tracks. If American politics is unable to get out of the way in such a slam-dunk case for rail, what hope is there to bring public transit and urbanism to all of the car-dependent suburbia in the rest of the country?

[fragmede]

I'd say the success of Florida's Brightline, from Orlando to Miami, says that it's viable (or that the people in Florida are crazy), especially since it was finished in 2018 and not 1820.