2021-06-07
June 7, 2021 blue; text-decoration: blue; text-decoration: none;”>22nd edition of the 9th year of SmartDrivingCars eLetter
Self-Driving Cars Could Be Decades Away, No Matter What Elon Musk Said
C. Mims, June 5, “…” Read more Hmmmm… Not to be defensive, but I will be…
“In 2015, Elon Musk said self-driving cars that could drive “anywhere” would be here within two or three years.” … According to my definition, from day-one (>9 years ago), of my 3 (very) different types of SmartDrivingCars:
-
Safe-driving Cars (Automation of Collision Avoidance on cars that we drive all the time. Societal benefit is improved Safety),
-
Self-Driving Cars (Automation of Steering and Braking functions some of the time, in some places, but always requiring driver supervision. Societal benefit is Comfort & Convenience (and NOT any substantive Safety improvements), and
-
Driverless Cars able to go from some origins to some destinations at some times without a driver or attendant on board. Societal benefit is delivering affordable high-quality mobility for almost anyone (and some/many things), from those origin-destination-time combinations. (period! Again, safety is a floor, not a substantive value proposition.)
Elon delivers, every day, “self-driving Tesla” with his autoPilot and FSD features. They deliver very good “Comfort & Convenience” to Tesla owners as long as the driver continues to do their part… always supervise the Tesla’s automation. Cadillac also does it with its SuperCruise, Subaru with its EyeSight, Mercedes with its 997 package, and …
Automakers, Mad Men and modern day commercials seem to make it a habit to oversell and over promise. I admit, Elon may well be at the asymptotic limit of that distribution, but everyone knows that he’s way out there. We consider him entertainment, just as we consider all the money we loose on Fan Duel and in Vegas to be an entertainment expense. Caveat emptor
In 2016, Lyft CEO John Zimmer predicted they would “all but end” car ownership by 2025.
… Hopefully by then, that thought will be in at least some minds. Putting some blemish on what the Mad Men created as an absolute human desire would be a substantial achievement….
In 2018, Waymo CEO John Krafcik warned autonomous robocars would take longer than expected.
… Nothing wrong here…
In 2021, some experts aren’t sure when, if ever, individuals will be able to purchase steering-wheel-free cars that drive themselves off the lot….”
… From the beginning and continue today I argue that there is no market in the personal ownership of Driverless Cars. Why own it??? I can’t even drive it!!! Just to sit in my driveway??? I’m going to make it a business??? I’ll be the smallest businessman in the world, bearing on my shoulders the highest form of personal responsibility, the life & safety of my customer. NOT GONNA HAPPEN!!!
Also… please, not everyone promised anything. And I haven’t even mentioned Steve Schladover who has been stalwart in his efforts to advance this technology in a realistic context.
The Society of Automotive Engineers had, and continue to have, an opportunity to bring realism to this community by, at the very least, simply dropping any reference to anything called “Level 5”. If SAE wishes to be humble and brave, they can also apologize for even suggesting that Level 5’s “everywhere” could ever exist within the lifetimes of any current or soon to be member of SAE. By creating the category, SAE baited the Mad Men, Sunday Supplementers and Click-Bait folks into fantasizing something envisioned by a reputable, serious organization.
SAE, please edit your “Levels literature” by “whiting out” all reference to “Level 5” or adding after any Level 5 “NA”. While you’re at it, do it also for “Level 3” because that’s also a non-starter. Alain
SmartDrivingCars
Pod-[Cast Episode 217](https://soundcloud.com/smartdrivingcar/smart-driving-cars-episode-217), [Zoom-Cast Episode 217](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZAfs4qULMk)
w/Christorpher
Mims,
Columnist,
Wall Street
Journal
F. Fishkin, June 7 , “Are self-driving cars still decades ahead? Wall Street Jopurnal columnist and author Christopher Mims joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser & co-host Fred Fishkin for a look at the progress and roadblocks. Plus the latest on Tesla, Cruise, the dramatic rise in road deaths during Covid and more. “Alexa, play the Smart Driving Cars podcast!”. Ditto with Siri, and GooglePlay … Alain
The
SmartDrivingCars
eLetter,
Pod-Casts,
Zoom-Casts and
Zoom-inars are
made possible
in part by
support from
the Smart
Transportation
and Technology
ETF, symbol
MOTO. For
more
information: [www.motoetf.com](https://www.smartetfs.com/). Most funding is
supplied by
Princeton
University's
Department of
Operations
Research &
Financial
Engineering
and Princeton
Autonomous
Vehicle
Engineering
(PAVE)
research
laboratory as
part of its
research
dissemination
initiative
Why AI is Harder Than We Think
M. Mitchell,
"... Despite
attempts to
redefine "full
self-driving"
into existence
[7], none of
these
predictions
has come true.
It's worth
quoting AI
expert Drew
McDermott on
what can
happen when
over-optimism
about AI
systems—in
particular,
self-driving
cars—turns out
to be wrong:
Perhaps
expectations
are too high,
and... this
will
eventually
result in
disaster.
[S]uppose that
five years
from now
[funding]
collapses
miserably as
autonomous
vehicles fail
to roll. Every
startup
company fails.
And there's a
big backlash
so that you
can't get
money for
anythinconnectedwith
AI. Everybody
hurriedly
changes the
names of their
research
projects to
something
else. This
condition [is]
called the "AI
Winter" [8].
What’s most notable is that McDermott’s warning is from 1984, when, like today, the field of AI was awash with confident optimism about the near future of machine intelligence….” Read more Hmmmm… This is an excellent read. However, the problem is in terminology again. Why call and automated driver, AI? It really doesn’t take much intelligence to follow a route from where you are to where you are going and not crash. Ants do it to get food and bring it back to the ant hill. Flees fly around my office without crashing into my walls. It is a lot like “rocket science”, but what it needs to do is let the practical rocket scientists address the problem at hand which is: bringing affordable mobility to folks who can really use it rather than making a get-rich-quick toy.
So far, the investment community has sloshed.. gained and lost … among itself with minimal societal investment from Local, State, Federal or Benevolent entities. It has all been among investors. Society should not be concerned that, to date, this sector has delivered essentially zero societal value. All of the net loss is sitting on balance sheets of the investment community. At some point, they’ll have a margin call and sweep the net losses under some rug (or reorganize under some bankruptcy law) . Then we can all start again, wiped clean of those sunk investments. Hopefully we’ll have a more modest and benevolent initiative focused on affordability and mobility to create a viable on-going business serving those whose lives can really be improved by this consumer product, rather than focused on getting rich flipping from one investor to another. Alain
Autonomous vehicle startup Aurora in final talks to merge with Reid Hoffman’s newest SPAC
” K. Korosec, June 4, “Autonomous vehicle startup Aurora is close to finalizing a deal to merge with Reinvent Technology Partners Y, the newest special purpose acquisition company launched by LinkedIn co-founder and investor Reid Hoffman, Zynga founder Mark Pincus and managing partner Michael Thompson, according to several sources familiar with the talks.
One of the
sticking
points is the
targeted
valuation,
which had been
as high as $20
billion. It is
now closer to
$12 billion
and the deal
is expected to
be announced
as early as
next week,
said multiple
sources who
have asked not
to be
identified
because
they're not
authorized to
discuss the
deal. Aurora
declined to
comment.
Reinvent also
declined to
comment......"
[Read more](https://techcrunch.com/2021/06/04/autonomous-vehicle-startup-aurora-in-final-talks-to-merge-with-reid-hoffmans-newest-spac/) Hmmmm...Very interesting.
Congratulations
Chris. You
deserve it.
All the best.
Alain
Man killed after car hits horse-drawn farming implement in Wayne County; drunk driving suspected
WKYC Staff,
June 5, "...
he was hit
from behind by
an Acura
RDX..." [Read more](https://www.wkyc.com/article/news/local/northeast-ohio/man-killed-car-hits-horse-drawn-farming-implement-wayne-county-drunk-driving/95-4821b73f-c435-4916-bf55-9d6b5a86212d) Hmmmm... First of all my sincere
condolences go
out to the
family and
loved ones of
Eli A. Miller
of Big
Prairie.
2. Why didn't
the Acura
RDX's
Automated
Emergency
Braking System
not stop the
Acura RDX from
hitting Eli A.
Miller of Big
Prairie?
Maybe if Acura
is found
liable in this
most tragic
situation
they'll
finally be
motivated to
get their AEB
Systems to
work reliably. 3.
To be clear..
we as a
society should
have zero
expectation
that any of
us, in any of
our lifetimes,
will be able
to affordably
buy and
personally own
a car that
will be able
to safely
drive us from
our watering
hole to our
home.
Period! So
don't drink
and ever even
think, or
fantasize,
that you'll be
able to safely
drive home or
have some AI
gizmo get you
home safely.
Alain
The pandemic was the bloodiest year for driving in over a decade
A. Hawkins, June 4, “Road deaths jumped 7.2 percent in 2020 from the year before, hitting a 13-year high, even though people weren’t driving as much, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). But while NHTSA’s numbers paint a grim picture, they offer only a glimpse at what’s shaping up to be a historically bloody year of driving.
Overall,
38,680 people
died in car
crashes in
2020, the
highest number
since 2007.
But it's worse
than it
sounds, since
the number of
miles driven
in the US
dropped by 13
percent. That
means every
mile someone
drove last
year was more
dangerous than
it was the
year before.
." [Read more](https://www.theverge.com/2021/6/4/22518496/2020-traffic-crash-death-nhtsa-pandemic-driving) Hmmmm... We knew this was coming
and it may
well be even
worse now.
From my small
vantage point,
people seem to
be driving
faster and
crazier. It
is bad out
there.
Technology
better hurry
up and help
keep us from
misbehaving so
badly while
driving.
Alain
SpaceX launches Dragon cargo ship to space station, nails booster landing
Space.com, June 3, “A brand new SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched the Commercial Resupply Services-22 mission (CRS-22) from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at Kennedy Space Center, Florida on June 3, 2021.” Read more Hmmmm… Watch from 6 minutes into the video to see “best ever” views of the landing. New booster must have better live com system. On June 5th, SpaceX had its 125th successful launch and 87th successful recovery of a launch stage. Impressive!. Nice progress since the 1st launch of Falcon 9 on June 4, 11 years ago to the day. That’s an average of 1 launch per month, since the start, with the rate now. With more than 17 launches so far this year, SpaceX is close to a launch per week now. And with no mention of any “AI”. Alain
Jeff Bezos is going to space on first crewed flight of rocket
J. Watties, June 7, “Jeff Bezos will be flying to space on the first crewed flight of the New Shepard, the rocket ship made by his space company, Blue Origin. The flight is scheduled for July 20th, just 15 days after he is set to resign as CEO of Amazon.
Blue Origin
said Bezos'
younger
brother, Mark
Bezos, will
also join the
flight. "Ever
since I was
five years
old, I've
dreamed of
traveling to
space," Bezos,
57, said in a
Monday morning
Instagram
post. "On July
20th, I will
take that
journey with
my brother.
The greatest
adventure,
with my best
friend."..."
[Read more](https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/07/tech/jeff-bezos-space-blue-origin-new-shepard-flight-scn/index.html) Hmmmm... I want to go too!!
Please! 😁
Alan
Cruise can now give passengers rides in driverlee cars in California
" K. Korosec,
June 4,
"Cruise, the
autonomous
vehicle
subsidiary of
GM that also
has backing
from SoftBank
Vision Fund,
Microsoft and
Honda, has
secured a
permit that
will allow the
company to
shuttle
passengers in
its test
vehicles
without a
human safety
operator
behind the
wheel.
The permit,
issued by the
California
Public
Utilities
Commission as
part of its
driverless
pilot program,
is one of
several
regulatory
requirements
autonomous
vehicle
companies must
meet before
they can
deploy
commercially.
This permit is
important —
and Cruise is
the first to
land this
particular one
— but it does
not allow the
company to
charge
passengers for
any rides in
test
AVs......." [Read more](https://techcrunch.com/2021/06/04/cruise-can-now-give-passengers-rides-in-driverless-cars-in-california/) Hmmmm... Good that they can, but
when will they
be comfortable
enough to
actually do it
without a
driver or
attendant in
the car?
Alain
Merlin Labs wants to fill the sky with pilotless planes carrying cargo and passengers
A. Hawkins, JMay 26, “Rutonomous flight startup Merlin Labs is coming out of stealth mode to announce that it’s raised $25 million in funding from Google Ventures and First Round Capital. The company has also struck a deal with aviation services contractor Dynamic Aviation to begin putting its pilotless plane technology into commercial operation.
The two
announcements
are the first
steps toward
Merlin Labs'
larger goal of
filling the
sky with
pilotless
planes
carrying cargo
and
passengers. As
part of its
deal with
Dynamic, the
startup will
supply its
autonomous
flight
technology to
55 of the
contractor's
King Air
aircraft.
Merlin is
already
conducting
test flights
with the first
King Air plane
outside its
dedicated
flight
facility at
the Mojave Air
and Space
Port. Merlin
Labs is
co-located in
Boston; Los
Angeles;
Denver; and
Auckland, New
Zealand.. ."
[Read more](https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/26/22453042/merlin-labs-autonomous-flight-startup-stealth-funding) Hmmmm... Seems like a real
opportunity ..
to/from the
many small
airports...
Only problem
is aerodynamic
drag... goes
up with
velocity
cubed!
Energy costs
are a
non-trivial
floor on
affordability.
Alain
Autonomous Vehicles
C. Wilson, Jn 14, “… Autonomous Vehicles 101
An autonomous
vehicle drives
itself by
using a
combination of
onboard
technologies
to measure the
distance of
the car from
various
objects,
including
pedestrians,
bicyclists and
other cars.
GPS,
supplemented
with highly
detailed
up-to-date
digital maps,
locates
vehicles and
indicates
which has the
right of way.
Communications
among AVs, as
well as
between AVs
and roadway
infrastructure,
determine the
location and
intention of
other
vehicles, the
condition of
the roadway,
and the status
of traffic
signals.
Cooperative
automated
driving, in
which multiple
(or even all)
vehicles are
effectively
plugged into a
local network,
has the
potential to
smooth traffic
flow, improve
travel time
and its
reliability,
and virtually
eliminate
accidents
along with
loss of life
and damage to property...." [Read more](https://www.milkenreview.org/articles/autonomous-vehicles?IssueID=39) Hmmmm... Recommended reading.
Alain
More On….
See
(confidential)
[from (5/15/21](cid:part71.140024F6.C0E866AB@princeton.edu)[)](cid:part71.140024F6.C0E866AB@princeton.edu). Then Re-see:
Pop Up Metro USA Intro 09 2020
H. Posner’77, Sept 13, 2020. “Creating Value for Light Density Urban Rail Lines” . See slides, See video Hmmmm… Simply Brilliant. Alain
0, 0);">[Annual Princeton](https://orfe.princeton.edu/conferences/sdc/session/20210128)SmartDrivingCar
Summit [It is over!!!](https://orfe.princeton.edu/conferences/sdc/session/20210325)
Now time to
actually do
something in
the Trentons
of this
world.
Making Driverless Happen – The Road Forward (Updated)
K. Pyle, April
18, ""It's
time to hit
the start
button," is [Fred Fishkin's](https://www.techstination.com/) succinct way of
summarizing
the next steps
in the Smart
Driving Car
journey.
Fiskin, along
with the LA
Times' [Russ Mitchell](https://twitter.com/russ1mitchell?lang=en)
co-produced
the final
session of the
[2021 Smart Driving Car Summit, Making It Happen – Part 2](https://orfe.princeton.edu/conferences/sdc/session/20210415).
This 16th and
final session
in this
multi-month
online
conference not
only provided
a s[ummary of the thought-provoking speakers](https://viodi.com/2021/04/18/making-driverless-happen-the-road-forward/),
but also
provided food
for thought on
a way forward
to bring
mobility to
"the Trentons
of the World."
Setting the
stage for this
final session,
Michael Sena
provided
highlights of
the Smart
Driving Car
journey that
started in
late December
2020. Safety,
high-quality,
and affordable
mobility,
particularly
for those who
do not have
many options,
was a common
theme to the
2021 Smart
Driving Car
Summit. As
Princeton
Professor
Kornhauser,
the conference
organizer put
it,....." [Read more](https://viodi.com/2021/04/18/making-driverless-happen-the-road-forward/) Hmmmm.... We had another
excellent
Session.
Thank you for
the summary,
Ken! Alain
Ken Pyle’s Session Summaries of 4th Princeton SmartDrivingCar Summit:
14th Session What Will Power Safely-driven Cars
13th Session Improving the Moving of Goods
12th Session 3/18/21 Human-centered Design of Safe and Affordable Driverless Mobility
11th Session 3/11/21 Incentivizing Through Regulation
10th Session 3/04/21 Incentivizing Through Insurance
9th Session 2/25/21 Can Level 3 be Delivered?
8th Session 2/18/21 Who Will Build, Sell and Maintain Driverless Cars?
[Michael Sena's Slides](https://www.dropbox.com/s/yfzscinfy41vrka/Sena_Session8%20SDC_Summit.pdf?dl=0),
[Glenn Mercer Slides](https://www.dropbox.com/s/8x4sd97vrifa9r9/Mercer_Session8%20SDC_Summit.pdf?dl=0)
7th Session 2/11/21 Finally Doing It
6th Session 2/ 4/21 Safe Enough in the Operational Design Domain
5th Session 1/28/21 At the Tipping Point
4th Session 1/21/21 Why Customers are Buying Them
3rd Session 1/14/21 The SmartDrivingCars We Can Buy Today
2nd Session1/ 7/21 A Look into the Future1st Session:12/17/20Setting the Stage
Kornhauser & He, April 2021“Making it Happen: A Proposal for Providing Affordable, High-quality, On-demand Mobility for All in the “Trentons” of this World”
Orf467F20_FinalReport “Analyzing Ride-Share Potential and Empty Repositioning Requirements of a Nationwide aTaxi System” Kornhauser & He, March 2021 “AV 101 + Trenton Affordable HQ Mobility Initiative”
C’mon Man!(These folks didn’t get/read the memo)
Sunday Supplement
Half-Baked
Click-Bait
Calendar of Upcoming
Events
The 2021 TRB Annual
Automated Road Transportation Symposium
Virtual on July 12-15, 2021
5th Annual Princeton SmartDrivingCar Summit
Fall 2021 Live in Person To be Announced
Georgia,
serif;">
On the More Technical Side
http://orfe.princeton.edu/~alaink/SmartDrivingCars/Papers/
K. Lockean’s AV Research Group at U of Texas
and
[The SYMPOSIUM ON THE FUTURE NETWORKED CAR 2021 VIRTUAL EVENT](https://www.itu.int/en/fnc/2021/Pages/default.aspx)
R. Shields, 22 - 25 March, “Recordings from the conference:
Session 1 plus opening: (Regulatory): https://youtu.be/UcDC8gXiUFk
Session 2: ([Cybersecurity](https://youtu.be/ppp2hxlvebY)): [https://youtu.be/ppp2hxlvebY](https://youtu.be/ppp2hxlvebY)
Session 3: [(Automated Driving Systems](https://youtu.be/uL2dRHuX2Cc)): [https://youtu.be/uL2dRHuX2Cc](https://youtu.be/uL2dRHuX2Cc)
Session 4: [(Communications for ADS](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFQcL6yfBso)) : [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFQcL6yfBso](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFQcL6yfBso)
Read more Hmmmm… Russ, thank you for sharing! Alain
###
These editions re sponsored by the SmartETFs Smart Transportation and Technology ETF, symbol MOTO. For more information head to www.motoetf.com
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 216, Zoom-Cast Episode 216 w/Michael Sena, editor The Dispatcher
F. Fishkin, May 28 , “The Future of Mobility is Slowly Coming Into Focus. That’s on top in the June edition of The Dispatcher. From Sweden, publisher Michael Sena joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin for that plus better batteries, May Mobility, Tesla and more.
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 215, Zoom-Cast Episode 215 w/Cade Metz, Correspondent, NY Times & Ken Pyle, editor, Viodi.com
F. Fishkin, May 27 , “The Costly Pursuit of Self Driving Cars Continues On and On and On. That’s the headline of a NY Times story this week. The reporter, Cade Metz, also the author of a new book on artificial intelligence, joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser, co-host Fred Fishkin and guest Ken Pyle of Viodi View..”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 214, Zoom-Cast Episode 214
F. Fishkin, May 23 , “An interview with the chief engineer behind Ford’s F150 Lightning EV truck…Waymo shares rider stories and the AFL-CIO tells Congress autonomous vehicles should be required to have human operators. Join Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin for those stories and more.”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 213, Zoom-Cast Episode 213 w/Robbie Diamond; Founder, Securing America’s Future Energy
F. Fishkin, May 14 , “The autonomous mobility competition with China. What will it take to succeed? Securing America’s Future Energy founder Robbie Diamond dives in with Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser & co-host Fred Fishkin. Plus the latest on #AutoX, #Tesla, #GM, #TuSimple and more. Remember to subscribe! And check out this SAFE panel discussion too. “..
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 213, Zoom-Cast Episode 213 w/Robbie Diamond; Founder, Securing America’s Future Energy
F. Fishkin, May 14 , “The autonomous mobility competition with China. What will it take to succeed? Securing America’s Future Energy founder Robbie Diamond dives in with Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser & co-host Fred Fishkin. Plus the latest on #AutoX, #Tesla, #GM, #TuSimple and more. Remember to subscribe! And check out this SAFE panel discussion too.. https://youtu.be/Z6NBRrtTDnI “
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 212, Zoom-Cast Episode 212 w/Ken Pyle
F. Fishkin, May 8 , “Where does Waymo go from here? Is GM really going to market personal autonomous vehicles? Viodi View managing editor Ken Pyle joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser & co-host Fred Fishkin for a look at those issues plus Volkswagen, Tesla, Argo and more.
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 211, Zoom-Cast Episode 211 w/ Michael Sena, Editor of The Dispatcher
F. Fishkin, May 1 , “There’s plenty of combustion around the issue of banning internal combustion engines (ICE). Consultant and The Dispatcher publisher Michael Sena joins us for a look at what makes sense…and what doesn’t. Plus #Tesla, #Toyota, #Volkswagen, #Baidu and progress in Florida. …”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 210, Zoom-Cast Episode 210 w/Ken Pyle & Louis Aaron’23
F. Fishkin, April 26 , “Passengers at the Las Vegas Convention Center are about to get their first taste of the new underground mobility service from #Elon Musk’s The Boring Company. Princeton student Louis Aaron has been working there and he joins Viodi View Managing Editor Ken Pyle, Princeton’s Alain ..”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 209, Zoom-Cast Episode 209 w/Clifford Winston, Brookings Inst.
F. Fishkin, April , “The Texas #Tesla crash that killed two continues to make headlines. The impact on the electric and automated vehicle industries? From the Brookings Institution, senior fellow Clifford Winston joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin for a look at what the real focus should be on..”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 208, Zoom-Cast Episode 208 w/Prof. Stephen Still, U. of Buffalo
F. Fishkin, April 18, “What does it take to bring about mobility for all in the real world? With help from the federal DOT and a team at the University of Buffalo…some big steps are being taken there. Professor Stephen Still joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin for that…plus, Tesla, Uber, Cruise and more on Smart Driving Cars.”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 207, Zoom-Cast Episode 207 w/Selika Josiah Talbott
F. Fishkin, April 10 , “When a driverless vehicle crashes…what should passengers, other vehicle owners, law enforcement and first responders do? American University Professor Selika Josiah Talbott says the time for planning is now. She joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin for that plus Tesla, Apple and more in the latest Smart Driving Cars.”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 206, Zoom-Cast Episode 206 w/Stan Young, National Renewable Energy Laboratory
F. Fishkin, April 2, “When it comes to future mobility, what will fuel the vehicles? How can the shortcomings of electric vehicles be overcome? Stanley Young, Mobility Systems team lead for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser & co-host Fred Fishkin…”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 205, Zoom-Cast Episode 205 w/Michael Sena; Editor The Dispatcher. President, MLSena Consulting
F. Fishkin, March 26, “Every driverless car should take the same tests that we take..and have the same responsibilities. So says Michael L. Sena in the latest edition of The Dispatcher. He joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin for that plus the latest from Tesla and more…on Episode 205 of Smart Driving Cars…”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 204, Zoom-Cast Episode 204 w/Andrew Rose, President, OnStar Insurance Services
F. Fishkin, March 15, “.With GM aiming to upend the car insurance industry, the President of the automaker’s new OnStar Insurance Services, Andrew Rose joins Princeton’s Alain Kornhauser and co-host Fred Fishkin. What advantages will OnStar insurance bring to the table…and a look at the future of auto insurance..”
SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 203, Zoom-Cast Episode 203 AV 101: A. Kornhauser
###
F. Fishkin,
March 13,
".GM's move to
transform auto
insurance
through OnStar
Insurance:
Is it a win,
win for
all? Is
adaptive
cruise control
prompting some
drivers to
speed? And
what does
Tesla really
mean by "full
self
driving"?
Just some of
the questions
tackled in
the latest
edition of
Smart Driving
Cars with
Princeton's
Alain
Kornhauser
& co-host
Fred Fishkin."
[SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 202](https://soundcloud.com/smartdrivingcar/smart-driving-cars-episode-202),
[Zoom-Cast Episode 202](https://youtu.be/Hj3GmnTqfdk) President
& CEO,
RoadDB
###
###
F. Fishkin,
March 3, "When
will we be
able to
purchase cars
that can
largely drive
themselves?
It may not be
long...but
don't expect
to vacate the
driver's
seat. That's
the view of
entrepreneur,
tech pioneer
and RoadDB CEO
Russ
Shields. He
takes an in
depth look at
where we are
and where
we're headed
with
Princeton's
Alain
Kornhauser
& co-host
Fred Fishkin." [SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 201](https://soundcloud.com/smartdrivingcar/smart-driving-cars-episode-201),
[Zoom-Cast Episode 201](https://youtu.be/n5oEfvBrWa8)
w/Michael
Sena,
Publisher of The
Dispatcher
###
###
F. Fishkin,
Feb. 26,
"Smarter cars
need smarter
assembly...and
location
matters. The
Dispatcher
publisher
Michael Sena
joins
Princeton's
Alain
Kornhauser and
co-host Fred
Fishkin for a
look at that,
politics,
climate and
carmakers...plus
Tesla,
Velodyne,
Foxconn and
more.." [SmartDrivingCars Pod-Cast Episode 200](https://soundcloud.com/smartdrivingcar/smart-driving-cars-episode-200),
[Zoom-Cast Episode 200](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVHQuwNT4eY&feature=youtu.be)
w/Edwin Olsen,
CEO, May
Mobility
###
###
F. Fishkin,
Feb. 22, "How
May Mobility
is building
confidence in
autonomous
transportation
and creating a
road map for
growth through
the pandemic
and beyond.
CEO and
co-founder
Edwin Olson
joins
Princeton's
Alain
Kornhauser and
co-host Fred
Fishkin for
that and
more."
Link to previous SDC PodCasts & ZoomCasts
Recent Highlights of:
May 29, 2021
[The Future of Mobility is Slowly Coming into Focus](https://www.dropbox.com/s/bpeklrq3sgutu1l/The-Dispatcher_June-2021.pdf?dl=0) M.
Sena, June
2021,
"...Mobility-as-a-service
would provide
the business
model to tie
everything
together,
perhaps as an
extension of
your
phone/broadband
subscription.
Private car
ownership
would soon be
a relic of a
bygone age.
This is an interesting narrative, but is not a correct one. Even before COVID-19 changed how people have been living outside of China since Friday, the 13th of March 2020, the picture of everything happening in high density cities was a rumor that companies like WEWORK spread to build their houses of cards. …
One effect of changes that have occurred in where people live and work in and around big cities is a phenomenon that was already well underway before the pandemic but has sped up: the demise of inner city buses. I wrote about this in the December 2018 issue of THE DISPATCHER, Is It Time to Throw the Bus Under the Bus?. I wrote:
We need to
start thinking
outside the
bus. If a city
is serious
about
providing a
useful bus
service, it
needs to run
them
everywhere and
often,
including at
night. It
must,
therefore, get
rid of cars
driving and
parking on its
streets. ..
One effect of changes that have occurred in where people live and work in and around big cities is a phenomenon that was already well underway before the pandemic but has sped up: the demise of inner city buses. I wrote about this in the December 2018 issue of THE DISPATCHER, Is It Time to Throw the Bus Under the Bus?. I wrote:
We need to
start thinking
outside the
bus. If a city
is serious
about
providing a
useful bus
service, it
needs to run
them
everywhere and
often,
including at
night. It
must,
therefore, get
rid of cars
driving and
parking on its
streets. ...
What cities
are doing
today all over
the world is
neither
providing an
adequate
service to
their citizens
nor using the
money
allocated for
transport in a
cost-effective
way...
Bite the bullet and get private cars off the big city streets
The reasons
that people
who live in
cities began
to buy cars
was that they
needed them to
get to their
jobs, the ones
that began
moving out of
the cities in
the '60s to
'campuses'
where there
were no
transit links.
Then they
needed them to
drop off their
children to
day care
centers since
both parents
worked. Then
they needed
them to drop
off their
older
children...
As I said, it is not buses that will meet the need. Neither is it roads filled with taxis. There are taxis offering rides in Trenton and Scranton, but they are not replacing buses because they are too expensive and are often unavailable when demand for them is highest. The Uber/Lyft model can be better at meeting demand, but they are still too costly…”
Read more Hmmmm… Enjoy the whole issue. It is enormously well written! Also listen/watch the SDC Pod/Zoom Cast 216- below with Michael. Alain
[The Costly Pursuit of Self-Driving Cars Continues On. And On. And On.](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/24/technology/self-driving-cars-wait.html) C. Metz,
May 24, "...
So what went
wrong? Some
researchers
would say
nothing —
that's how
science works.
You can't
entirely
predict what
will happen in
an experiment.
...
It's not an
experiment if
you can
predict the
outcome. Why
bother doing
it???
More importantly, Mother Nature is involved and you don’t know what she is going to throw at you. Which is why simulations are not the complete answer… They’ll only regurgitate what you told them to do (which is somewhat useful because they implicate together the things that you thought you knew, giving you new insights.). The challenge is, She’s not involved in the simulation but She is every time you do it… But that’s life and that’s what makes it exiting and worth living…. The self-driving car project just happened to be one of the most hyped technology experiments of this century, occurring on streets all over the country and run by some of its highest-profile companies….
Self-driving tech is not yet nimble enough to reliably handle the variety of situations human drivers encounter each day. It can usually handle suburban Phoenix, but it can’t duplicate the human chutzpah needed for merging into the Lincoln Tunnel in New York or dashing for an offramp on Highway 101 in Los Angele … True! But getting it to work in the Nevada desert and then Pheonix is an enormous accomplishment. Frank didn’t just roll out of the womb and make it in New York. He also went through “..the blues…” where he could actually sing and be appreciated in the “..small towns…” before he made it in NYC. It took GM about ‘12 seconds’ to realize that the required human chutzpah was way to much to get started and they were outathere.
“If you look at almost every industry that is trying to solve really, really difficult technical challenges, the folks that tend to be involved are a little bit crazy and little bit optimistic,” he said. “You need to have that optimism to get up every day and bang your head against the wall to try to solve a problem that has never been solved, and it’s not guaranteed that it ever will be solved.” … Absolutely true. By definition! (I also like to say that you need to be fundamentally stupid; else, you would have known how hard it was going to be and you would have just played golf or video games in your parent’s basement…)
“These cars will be able to operate on a limited set of streets under a limited set of weather conditions at certain speeds,” said Jody Kelman, an executive at Lyft. “We will very safely be able to deploy these cars, but they won’t be able to go that many places.” … Yup!! There is absolutely nothing bad about that. Go someplace else. It doesn’t need to be much tougher that “Chandler”. It doesn’t really need to be any “bigger” than “Chandler”.
Waymo needs what Chandler doesn’t have.. Customers … Definition: folks whose quality-of-life can be substantially improved by what Waymo’s Technology can readily deliver today. )
That's the
market side of
this
initiative
that Silicon
Valley seems
to have
forgotten.
Cool
Technology
doesn't
happen, just
because it is
Technology.
Technology
happens
because it is
Cool. Cool is
the value
proposition,
not
Technology:
else we'd have
[Segways](https://techcrunch.com/2020/06/23/say-so-long-to-the-original-segway/)
and people
wearing [GoogleGlass](https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/052115/how-why-google-glass-failed.asp)
all over the
place.
Assisted Driving (what I call Self-drivingCars, or, sorry, SAE Level 1 and Level 2, or Tesla AutoPilot) are Cool (That technology delivers Comfort and Convenience to those that can afford and wish to buy cars). The buyer/customer just relies, for the most part, that engineers are making sure that the Technology works. Customers demand that the Technology adds to what they already enjoy (Cool). Their attention span is really short. The “lipstick” wears off quickly.
For Driverless… not so much Cool in Chandler. Maybe as a fling, or a tale, but actually, the negatives, largely outweigh the positives, think GoogleGlass. Few move or stay in Chandler unless you have a car (~70% Households have 2 or more cars). ‘everyone’ has their own car. So while the Waymo technology might work in Chandler, it doesn’t have enough Waymophiles (customers for whom Waymo substantially improves what they already have for themselves) to make it a Go.
However, take “Trenton”. 70 % of the households have one or zero cars. Many more Trentonians have the opportunity to appreciate the incremental value that Waymo will bring to their lives. They will more easily become Waymophiles if Waymo delivers in Trenton what Waymo has well demonstrated the “Cool” that it can deliver in Chandler. Even if Waymo shuts down until the few roads that it uses are plowed the few times it snows in Trenton. Trenton is Waymos’s (Ford/Argo & GM/Cruise as well) “New York”.
In short… While Chandler is an ideal place for Waymo to start getting its Technology working, Trenton is a great place for them to deliver societal value, which is supposed to be the fundamental mission of these Google “X.Projects” … …”
...X's primary
output
is
breakthrough
technologies
that have the
potential to transform
people's lives
and become
large, sustainable
businesses."
It is time that Waymo begins to take what they’ve accomplished and actually begin to deliver primary output. “Read more Hmmmm… Excellent. Comments in line above. Also Listen/Watch PodCast above. Alain
May 22, 2021
Why I Ride with Waymo: Mike Waymo One, May 13, “… I started taking it to work, and after crunching the numbers for gas, maintenance, insurance, upkeep, and owning a depreciating investment, it was pretty much a no-brainer that we really didn’t need two cars. I sold off my car and made Waymo my choice for commuting to and from work and for trips my wife and I need to take when the other is using our car…” Read more Hmmmm…This is really great that he “crunched the numbers” and found it to be “pretty much a no-brainer”, which is what every real Waymo customer in Chandler has to do to become a Waymo customer. One “doesn’t move to Chandler unless one has “two cars”. See slide 5: 70% of the households have 2 or more cars in Chandler, so most of the folks have had to do the math to become a customer. If Waymo offered the same service in Trenton, where 70% of the households have at most one car and 30% don’t have any, then it doesn’t take much number crunching to appreciate Waymo when walking is the next best way to go.
The Chandler Operational Design Domain (ODD) may be a great place to get the technology working. It may well be the “easiest” ODD in the world. A Trenton ODD may well not be all that much more difficult technologically. What Trenton does have are customers for whom what Waymo can deliver is truly a no-brainer. Alain
May 15, 2021
Autonomous Vehicles: A Framework for Deployment and Safety R. Diamond, May 13, “Join SAFE for an event focused on the importance of autonomous vehicles to our national and economic security and outlining pathways for the safe deployment of autonomous vehicles.
The event will
feature
remarks from
Dr. Steve
Cliff, Acting
Administrator
of NHTSA, a
discussion
between
industry
leaders, and
the release of
a report, "A
Regulatory
Framework for
AV Safety," by
O. Kevin
Vincent,
Associate
General
Counsel,
Regulatory at
Lucid...." [Read more](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efcOl4QT4vg) Hmmmm... A must watch,
complemented
by the [Vincent report](https://www.dropbox.com/s/v7d50nlj2k3o2ud/Kevin-Vincent-Regulatory-Framework.pdf?dl=0) and
our latest [PodCast](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biRYIW1ULCo) below.
Alain
May 8, 2021 [Why has't Waymo expanded its driverless service? Here's my theory](https://arstechnica.com/cars/2021/05/why-hasnt-waymo-expanded-its-driverless-service-heres-my-theory/)
###
T. Lee, May 7,
"Suburban
ride-hailing
is a lousy
business to be
in.
Last October, Waymo did something remarkable: the company launched a fully driverless commercial taxi service called Waymo One. Customers in a 50-square-mile corner of suburban Phoenix can now use their smartphones to hail a Chrysler Pacifica minivan with no one in the driver’s seat.
And then...
nothing. Seven
months later,
Waymo has
neither
expanded the
footprint of
the Phoenix
service nor
has it
announced a
timeline for
launching in a
second city.
It's as if
Steve Jobs had
unveiled the
iPhone,
shipped a few
thousand
phones to an
Apple Store in
Phoenix, and
then didn't
ship any more
for months—and
wouldn't
explain why.
Last Friday,
two Waymo
employees [participated in an "ask me anything" thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/SelfDrivingCars/comments/n031vq/you_voted_and_were_excited_to_chat_about_waymo/) on
the
SelfDrivingCars
subreddit, a
watering hole
for
self-driving
industry
insiders.
Questions
about
expansion
plans
dominated the
conversation.
"How are you
going to
scale?" one
redditor
asked. "What
are the
impediments to
service
expansion at
this time?"
The Waymonauts
responded with
maddening
generalities.
"We feel the
same urgency
to scale
quickly that
others do, but
a ton of work
goes into
doing it
safely," wrote
Waymo's Sam
Kansara." [Read more](https://arstechnica.com/cars/2021/05/why-hasnt-waymo-expanded-its-driverless-service-heres-my-theory/) Hmmmm... Not at all surprising.
Can you
imagine trying
to be better
than one's own
Land Rover or
Porsche in car
country. That
is a heavy
lift. Making
it heavier is
the focus on
today's most
entitled
yuppies.
That's as bad
as the
original focus
of driverless
cars on
1%ers. Waymos
are pure and
simple
mobility
machines to
get you
from/to places
horizontally,
just as
elevators do
vertically ...
just get you
up to the "8th
floor". Why
are elevators
so successful
at what they
do?... Second
best is the
stairwell!
They win all
the time,
hands down.
In Chandler, the “stairwell” is your car parked in your garage. You don’t even have to go outside in all that heat. Waymo’s got to be really good to beat that! Waymo might end up getting close to that good, but in the beginning chances “slim-to-none”. Not that the car in the garage doesn’t have an enormous amount of “excess baggage”. Everyone seems to have conveniently forgotten about it. When even with all of its LiDars, radars and deepLearning, whereas the car with the Mad Men fantasies is way more than half full and your go-to mobility is your car. Your car allowed you to consider the Chandlers of this world as a place whee you want to live. That’s a challenging market place for Waymo. It’s worse than Bing v Google
A better place for Waymo ( or Ford/Argo or GM/cruise) the place to start is to focus on a market where they can easily deliver better service. The obvious market is to provide Waymo mobility to concentrations of households that have zero or only one car. Folks that have been left behind by the automobile and don’t have access to one. Those that have been relegated to take the staircase thereby not even having the opportunity to reach “the eighth floor”; which, once they can using Waymo, would substantially improve their lives. They might in fact appreciate Waymo right out of the box.
Manhattan is one such place, but it has a great subway and safely driving its roads is enormously challenging, so that’s arguably the last place for Waymo to go. However, the census identifies many communities and “inner suburbs” that have substantial densities of zero and one-car household. For example: Trenton New Jersey. Waymo would be the obvious mobility choice. Numerous Trenton residents would readily perceive Waymo as the “Google” in their trip mode-choice.
Another note… trying to sell Waymo technology on its ability to improve safety is a fool’s gambit. Since Waymos don’t misbehave, it is “easy” to make them safer, but that argument is hard to get across Misbehaviors are core to the fantasies of driving and are thus excused and forgotten about. Alain
Alain L. Kornhauser, PhD
Professor & Director of Undergraduate Studies, Operations Research & Financial Engineering
Director,
Transportation
Program
Faculty Chair,
Princeton
Autonomous
Vehicle
Engineering
229 Sherrerd Hall
Princeton
University
Princeton, NJ
609-258-4657
(o)
609-980-1427
(c)
This list is maintained by Alain Kornhauser and hosted by the Princeton University LISTSERV.