[no-name-here]

It's a good goal to have, and to continue working towards. At the same time, we shouldn't let that goal cause massive numbers of unnecessary deaths because we're avoiding the thing that can save lives along the way.

1.35 million people die per year due to road traffic.

You mentioned that billions are being invested in solving self-driving and electric cars, but that "for far, far less money you could do a huge amount to change the actual structure of how transportation works" - is that true/source?

The cost of a single subway line can cost multiple billions of dollars per mile, a high-speed rail line in a single state can cost hundreds of billions of dollars, etc. - and there are a lot of miles in the US, a lot of states, etc.

And the other big difference is about who pays for it - even if billions of dollars are being invested in solving self-driving and electric cars, it's a lot of private money doing that, whereas building public transportation is mostly taxpayer funds.

Again, they probably are good things to continue investing in, working towards, etc. - but I don't think we should delay solving even a tiny percent of the 1.35 million deaths per year in order to wait for public transportation to be solved. (And per the OP article, it's more like 94% reduction already with the existing self-driving technology, and it keeps getting better.)

[panick21_]

> At the same time, we shouldn't let that goal cause massive numbers of unnecessary deaths because we're avoiding the thing that can save lives along the way.

The argument here is that political capital and time should be invest to change people mind about self driving cars.

My argument is that political capital and time should be invested in changing people mind about the fundamental approach to land use and transportation.

> is that true/source?

There is a whole field of study on every aspect of this. Basically the medical community, the city planning community, the ecological community and the transport planners (outside of the US) all generally reach the same conclusions.

Bike lands, road diets, and bus lanes, bus priority are very cheap. Basically free. They are mostly political reallocation's of space. The politics are the hardest part, not the cost.

Rezoning is essentially free, or actually produces huge amounts of value. Its very, very well document what the problem with US land use patterns and transportation systems are.

See Strong Towns or Urban3 analysis for example.

Many of the choice that cause a lot of death, like stroads, are also economically idiotic.

> The cost of a single subway line can cost multiple billions of dollars per mile, a high-speed rail line in a single state can cost hundreds of billions of dollars, etc. - and there are a lot of miles in the US, a lot of states, etc.

The US operates on such a low level, there is so much you can do before even getting to those things. Like we are talking minimal competence of running bus lanes in a modern way, or having basic signaling priority.

The cost large infrastructure is a bigger topic, but that's not mostly what I am talking about. Those things are such a insignificant part of US transportation currently it barley worth talking about.

> And the other big difference is about who pays for it - even if billions of dollars are being invested in solving self-driving and electric cars, it's a lot of private money doing that, whereas building public transportation is mostly taxpayer funds.

You are ignoring the larger structure, the road network and the electricity network are deeply political and public. And even beyond that, electric cars have seen political support. But of course the whole reason why so much public investment flows into these things is because the infrastructure is design in a way where there is a gigantic market for cars that you can sell into. The market is downstream of higher level choice in terms of infrastructure and land use. The under taxing and over support of parking alone accounts for many, many billions in subsidies.

But on some level, in the end it comes down to what your society ends up spending totally on transportation and how efficient that is. The investors investing in these things need to make their money back. And the US is generally not very efficient, its just rich enough to care less. If you look at total 'consumption' that looks ok, but then you realize its just a expensive pickup truck that you end up sitting in traffic jams doesn't really improve your live that much.

If you look at how effectively poor people generally get around, the results are not that great. Car dependency cause tons of problems and cost on society and is worst for the poorest.

So I guess I just care less about who provides capital compared to what the outcomes are. The idea that public capital investment is bad and private investment is a universal good that can never be questioned is just not how I think about it.

> in order to wait for public transportation to be solved.

My argument is much wider then just 'public transport'. Its about how all land use and transportation infrastructure is organized.

> And per the OP article, it's more like 94% reduction already with the existing self-driving technology, and it keeps getting better.

Some of that can be questioned but its not my focus. Even if it was 100% reduction, its to narrow of an argument.

[no-name-here]

>> It's a good goal to have, and to continue working towards. At the same time, we shouldn't let that goal cause massive numbers of unnecessary deaths because we're avoiding the thing that can save lives along the way.

> My argument is that political capital and time should be invested in changing people mind about the fundamental approach to land use and transportation.

Do you think your approach is as likely to be successful? If so, how long do you think it will take until it's achieved? How many hundreds of thousands, millions, etc. of unnecessary deaths do you think will occur until you think your approach is likely to succeed?

And again, my comments say to continue working towards your goal too, but just not let that delay solutions that can save massive numbers of lives until (/if)? they are successful.

> The idea that public capital investment is bad and private investment is a universal good that can never be questioned is just not how I think about it.

Is there someone here making that argument, or is that more of a strawman?

Regardless, the point in my parent comment about private spending on something vs taxpayer spending on something is that people generally have less of an issue if a company spends X money to achieve Y goal, that they may or may not agree with, but less tolerance when being forced to spend X of "their own" money via taxes on it.

> I just care less about who provides capital compared to what the outcomes are.

I would recommend to not "care less" about who provides the money (private funding vs taxpayer funding), but to actually care a very large amount about it, as it is one of the most important factors that can determine whether something happens or not.

> the US is generally not very efficient

What measures are you using to quantify US efficiency vs other countries? I guess things like healthcare and public education could be examples? But I'm not sure if those 2 examples are enough to conclude "the US is generally not very efficient".

> Car dependency cause tons of problems and cost on society and is worst for the poorest.

Agreed.