This week’s issue of The Economist raised an interesting question in a book review: Why do we focus on technological innovation to solve problems we could already solve with technology we already have?
The question raised in the Economist was: Autonomous vehicles are supposed to make roads safer. But if our goal is to make roads safer, why not focus more on public transportation instead of new technology for cars?
Arguments for Self-Driving Cars?
When I read this article, my first thought was: This is a very good question.
It got me thinking about the forces at play.
On the one hand, we have entrepreneurs and corporations as the drivers of technological change. Some business leaders think that they can solve society’s problems with more technology and, of course, make a profit. Because self-driving cars are at the cutting edge of technology, fame awaits the person who can make them a reality.
This won’t work without public support. Legislation needs to be drafted to allow this new technology to be tested in real-world conditions and later released to the public.
In order to gain this public support, car manufacturers are emphasizing the benefits to society:
Autonomous vehicles will be safer because they never get tired and never make mistakes that humans would make.
And they say that when cars drive on their own, more people will share a car, reducing overall traffic.
Should we Believe That?
If politicians buy into this argument, they can get the impression that by supporting self-driving vehicles, they will solve many of the problems of our transportation systems. Roads will be safer and less congested.
It is very convenient for politicians to adopt these arguments. All they have to do is change a few laws. They don’t have to build any new infrastructure, which today is increasingly opposed by NIMBYists. And a politician who drafts legislation for self-driving vehicles looks forward-thinking and progressive.
Another factor is money: When you build new public transportation infrastructure, it costs money that the public doesn’t usually have. Autonomous vehicles, on the other hand, are financed by their drivers, so the cost is borne by the owners.
So it is a win-win situation. Or is it?
Is this a Good Way?
But this is short-sighted: Whether autonomous vehicles make roads safer remains to be seen – at least at the current state of the technology, there are spectacular crashes and other problems with self-driving cars.
That we will be able to reduce traffic with autonomous vehicles is a proposition that I very much doubt. I wrote about this in 2017, but this point is still widely believed today.
So if we believe the car manufacturers’ arguments, we might actually end up with more car traffic. And the external costs of driving, such as pollution, noise, and accidents, are borne by the public. Even those who don’t own cars.
Hoping that autonomous cars will solve all these problems for us could just as easily backfire!
What Could Be the Alternative?
If we really want to achieve what autonomous vehicles are supposed to deliver, we need to think about other means. We need to encourage people to use more public transportation. This is both safer and more environmentally friendly than car travel will ever be, whether internal combustion or electric, self-driving or human-driven.
Of course, there are good reasons for self-driving technologies: There is a shortage of qualified drivers for both public transportation and trucks. Demographic changes, especially in the West, will make it necessary to think about replacing jobs that can no longer be done by humans.
Self-driving vehicles will also enable new types of services where the cost of the driver is no longer relevant.
And yes, of course, it may be more convenient for drivers to let the machine take the wheel on a long commute.
We Should Rethink
Autonomous vehicles may have many benefits, but they may not be the ones being discussed today. We should not embrace self-driving cars as an answer before we ask the right question.
And the question is not how we can make our roads safer or reduce traffic, because we already have the means to do that without self-driving cars.
The question is, are we willing to make the changes we need to make today, even if they are inconvenient for politicians? Or are we going to carry on as we have for the last few decades and just have more of the same?