Comment by meagher

Comment by meagher a day ago

26 replies

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This is great long term for having cars that follow traffic laws since human drivers in NYC are awful (kill/injure pedestrians, bikers, and other street users all the time).

Not so great for getting cars out of NYC and pedestrianizing more of the city/moving towards more “low traffic neighborhoods” as I imagine Waymo and other similar companies are going to fight against these efforts.

Edit: Lots of people talking about human drivers taking advantage of self-driving cars being more cautious/timid. Good news is that once you have enough self-driving cars on the road, it probably slows down/calms other traffic (see related research on speed governors).

seanmcdirmid a day ago

I'm not sure why you think waymo would fight against that. People getting rid of their own cars for daily use will increase how often a service like waymo is used for occasional usage. In the long run it would be a win for waymo. Not many people are taking taxis on a daily basis in New York for normal driving, they buy a car if they need to do that because even with the parking bill they will still come out ahead. And once they have their own car they feel like they need to get some use out of it.

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  • meagher a day ago

    > not sure why you think waymo would fight against that

    If you were to pedestrianize 10% of Manhattan (or for example all of Broadway, which is being considered), then that’s less area for Waymo to operate and make money. To be clear, this is likely more of a long term issue.

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    • marcosdumay a day ago

      They will probably gain way more by the removal of parking lots that comes with it than by losing rides to pedestrian traffic or bikes.

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      • JumpCrisscross 20 hours ago

        > will probably gain way more by the removal of parking lots

        Or remove street-side parking.

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      • meagher a day ago

        NYC doesn’t have a lot of surface parking lots.

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        • seanmcdirmid 18 hours ago

          It had a lot of on street parking, at least mid town did, when I lived there in 2000 (which admittedly was 25 years ago). It was good enough that my gf at the time was driving from a Columbia dorm to IBM hawthorn.

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  • almostdeadguy a day ago

    Waymo would not fight against "people getting rid of their cars", many people in NY who use the incredible public transit system would like to see more car-free streets, which they absolutely would fight against.

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Workaccount2 a day ago

Believe it or not, NYC is actually the safest city in the country for pedestrians and bicyclists.[1]

[1]https://www.wagnerreese.com/most-dangerous-cities-cyclists-p...

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  • meagher a day ago

    I’d believe it, but the fact that any pedestrians/bikers are killed/injured by cars in NYC is unacceptable.

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    • Dylan16807 a day ago

      Do you mean that in the sense of "anyone getting killed is unacceptable" or the sense of "we need complete separation between cars and pedestrians/bikers, somehow"?

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      • bryanlarsen a day ago

        The rule of thumb for almost completely eliminating pedestrian fatalities is complete separation or a 20mph speed limit. A 20mph speed limit is far more feasible for the 5 boroughs than most other American cities.

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      • woodruffw a day ago

        I think there's a third more charitable reading: that current injury and fatality rates are still too high, even if they compare favorably to the rest of the US's rates. It's unrealistic to have no traffic injuries ever; this doesn't imply that NYC can't do better.

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    • guywithahat a day ago

      I mean if we required a license to own a bike in NYC we could see a significant reduction in injuries/deaths, same for pedestrians. Cars are already heavily regulated and likely aren't the underlying issue.

      There are many ways to interpret data, but one often comes to the conclusion that pedestrians and bikers are the root cause of most accidents.

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      • paulgb a day ago

        Cars are only “heavily regulated” in the sense that you pass a test once when you are a teenager and then never have to pass a test again, just pay a nominal fee to renew your license.

        I am curious what data you are looking at that gives you the impression pedestrians and bikers are the root cause of most accidents. As a frequent pedestrian / biker here, I see a car doing something unhinged about every mile I walk. On Wednesday I almost got hit by a car flying the wrong way down a one-way street and then running a red.

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        • guywithahat 4 hours ago

          Well if this is the standard we’re going for

          > the fact that any pedestrians/bikers are killed/injured by cars in NYC is unacceptable.

          Then the next step is regulating bikes and pedestrians. I think most studies which are willing to assign blame to bikes find they’re usually at fault or visibility is an issue, both of which come down to the bike. To approach no deaths, we need licenses, lights, increased safety protection, and training. If we’re fine with NYC just being one of the safest cities for bikers and pedestrians, then maybe we don’t have to worry about that

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xnx a day ago

> pedestrianizing more of the city

Replacing dangerous, dirty, noisy cars with safe, clean, and quiet ones seems like a huge pedestrianizing step.

What's a "low traffic neighborhood"? Does that allow busses or deliveries?

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  • meagher a day ago

    It’s a step in the right direction, but they still pollute (heavy electric vehicles have a lot more tire dust) and take up a lot space (could close roads and build housing or just have more space for the millions of city residents that don’t have/use cars).

    LTN still allow buses, emergency vehicles, deliveries, etc. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_Traffic_Neighbourhood

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    • xnx a day ago

      > heavy electric vehicles have a lot more tire dust

      It would be interesting to know the fleet-level statistics for this. Driven by humans, EV might wear tires faster because of fast starts and the extra weight during stops. It's possible that the Waymo Driver accelerates and decelerates more smoothly, resulting in less tire wear than a human-driven ICE vehicle.

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      • meagher a day ago

        That would be great! Even if EV pollution is zero, cars still take up a lot of space in a city where space is very limited.

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    • NewJazz a day ago

      EVs usually produce much less brake dust, not more, than combustion vehicles.

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fnord77 a day ago

> Not so great for getting cars out of NYC

This will never happen. Not in our lifetimes. And as I get older and less able to walk, I don't want it to happen.

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billfor a day ago

You know what kills or harms people in NYC are the motorized bikes driving the wrong way and putting people in the hospital, with no charges against the operator because they are usually an illegal alien. Not sure Waymo is going to fix that.

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