Should cities be building new transit infrastructure when driverless cars may be just around the corner? That’s the question asked by a New York Times article last Friday. The answers provided by a range of experts were far more balanced than a previous Times article about transit, which took for granted that transit was good and anyone skeptical of it was bad.
Last Friday’s report was far more broad minded. “Don’t build a light rail system now,” it quoted a venture capitalist as saying. “Please, please, please, please don’t” until we see how driverless cars “plays out.”
The article also quoted driverless car supporter Brad Templeton, who has promoted “robocars” for years, arguing that driverless cars can move people far more efficiently than forms of transit. Templeton claims that transit supporters are people who “just believe there is something pure and good about riding together, that it must be the right answer.” Continue reading
