Found this fascinating article:
Driverless Cars Could Spell the End of Domestic Flights
What’s fascinating about the article is not only the impact such vehicles would have for domestic flights, but another thing I hadn’t considered: The effect on Hotels and reststops/restaurants along a commonly used route.
The crux of the argument is this: In the future, when we have self-driving/driverless cars, the vehicles may no longer resemble what we commonly think of when we think of cars.
Imagine there is a fleet of “rentable” long distance vehicles (you wouldn’t need to own one of them). You decide one weekend that you’d like to go to, say, a beach some five or more hours drive away.
You pull out your smartphone and call in the vehicle once you have all your and your family’s gear ready. The vehicle arrives and you put away your suitcases, etc. and get into the driverless car.
What you have inside the car is like a small room. The car’s seats fold down to make beds and you have a screen (or several!) available for entertainment. Should the trip be a very long one, you can order your car at night and sleep in while the driverless car takes you to your destination.
You wake up/arrive at your destination refreshed and ready for fun instead of tired of driving all that way. If you’ve “rented” the car for several days, it will sit waiting for you. If not, you may use a Hotel and after you’ve had your vacation, call in another car to take you back home.
Which brings us back to the article above. Why use an airline for relatively short flights when you can use a driverless vehicle? If, say, you want to take a trip from New York to Atlanta or Atlanta to Miami and are loathe to spent most of the day driving, you might take a flight.
In the driverless future, however, you finish up your work, head home, grab your bags, and call in a driverless car to take you to your destination. The interior of the car will be comfortable and filled with entertainment or work options. You are essentially in a bedroom or an office on wheels and don’t have to worry about the trip at all.
No ticket/boarding passes, no checking in luggage, no driving seven plus hours…
On the minus side: Yet more job disruptions. The Hotels that may lie in the middle of longer trips and service people who need a rest stop will of course be impacted, as will restaurants. Given our move toward electric cars (which I believe will also happen), there will come a time when gas stations will no longer exist, replaced (perhaps) with charging stations.
As for airlines, they’ll have to contract their services. Airlines will continue to exist but they will deal with longer trips. And think about it: What will be considered a “short” trip?
If the theoretical uses of driverless cars are taken to their limit, we might have driverless cars running in specific highway type lanes at better than 100 miles per hour. Now say you wanted to go from Miami to New York or 1089 miles. If you had a self-driving vehicle that managed 100 miles (or more!) an hour, you’re looking at a trip of 10 hours.
Let’s return to that vacation scenario I mentioned: You get home, pack your bags, have a meal, and summon a driverless car. Let’s say you’re in the car by 8 pm. That means if we have a car capable of speeds of at least 100 miles per hour, theoretically you could be in New York ten hours later, or by 6 am the next day.
Again, you were not driving. You might well have spent a few hours catching up on movies or listening to music then sleeping in the driverless car’s bed.
When you wake up, you’re in New York and at your destination, fresh and ready to have some fun or get to work or what-have-you.
As I’ve said many times before, the future of the self-driving car is a fascinating one. Let’s see how it all works out…