You keep selling to people living in countryside, where you don't go anywhere without a car and where fleets of cars would have to be very large to be able to cover the territory in a meaningful way. There will be less and less people living there but it could affect the kind of cars that are manufactured. By the way, a self driving car would be very useful to elderly people living in their house far away from the nearest town.
In any case, less cars.
People in cities demanded EVs, yet didn't show up to keep buying them.
People in cities apparently know best what car companies should build, yet they don't buy the cars.
Car companies build for suburbanites.
Suburbanites buy cars.
Very few cities in the us are actively anti car, and the ones that are, are dense enough that vehicle emissions are a local problem for them.
We’re not demanding evs for ourselves, we’re demanding gas cars stop gassing our homes. You want to drive a v8 dually? Great, go nuts! Keep it out of SF!
They're ripping up lanes of traffic in my city and replacing them with bike lanes that nobody uses.
The busy intersection next to my home used to take all of 15 seconds to turn at, now I get stuck for five to six minutes at a time because they now forbid right turns on red and stuck left turners in front of right turners.
Meanwhile, nobody is using the bike lanes.
The bike lanes are gender and age inequitable, favor low-commercial activity, and hamper productive economic activities. Not only that, but they're unusable in inclement and hot weather, which my city experiences frequently.
I drive a car because I'm buying things, traveling with family, and spending hundreds of dollars. People on bikes are not doing these things and are not contributing to the tax base as much as car drivers. A typical bike rider's coffee and book reading activities do not match a trip to Target and a local restaurant with family in terms of economic impact.
Now multiply that times every car rider who is being delayed and disrupted. All of this spending is now being delayed or even prevented.
We're going to feel really silly when we need more lanes for all the autonomous vehicles that will come online in the next 15 years. Autonomous vehicles - transportation, logistics, last mile delivery, ordering robotics services, etc. - are going to be a billion times more important than bikes.
Just go to a park or get a gym membership if you want to exercise. Or, better yet, take your bike with you on your car and drive to the countryside trails.
That’s different for small-town low-traffic areas.
On bike lanes, it takes up such a tiny amount of space relative to cars. The real problem is that they are not put in with much thought, not made very safe and are ultimately not very attractive.
But in cities with a higher level of decent bike lanes (Seattle), you’ll absolutely get many people using them. But it also depends on the culture. Reality is that Seattle is geographically constrained, and I’m sorry, there is no room for more car lanes essentially anywhere in the city without destroying property.
So finding smarter, more efficient, cost-effective ways to use that space (like bikes and public transit, which are vastly more space efficient) is a fantastic idea.
If you go all-in on car infra (eg everywhere in the USA, including places like Seattle), you still get congested roads. Cars just use space so poorly that a small increase in number of cars when the streets are full will have massive compounding effect on how long it takes anyone to get anywhere.
Besides, your city is already fully designed around the MOST EXPENSIVE form of local transit, by far. You know what might help stimulate the economy? Make it easy for someone to take a bike to a restaurant. No gas or car payment (or parking, in the city), and now you might have more money to treat yourself
The two towns close to my home (10k and 5k people each) have 3 and 2 traffic lights. It's a different world with different problems and different solutions than the ones of the cities with 1M people one hour away. It could be a different country with different legislation.
To your point on bike owners not contributing to the economy. They probably have a similar income, and are paying similar taxes. They are still buying groceries. But where they choose to spend their money is different. It's all still economic activity though.
But it's been a few years, and in the meantime good e-bikes are affordable for most here now, so these days there's quite a lot of bike riders all over.
Of course when the snow and ice sets in there are fewer, though a fair few carry on with studded tires and good clothing.
It took some years but there's no denying there are significantly more people riding bikes to and from work, to and from kindergarten or similar.
Build it and they will come...
[1]: https://ruter.no/planlegg-reise/aldersvennlig-transport
If you live in car dependent suburbia, sure. And it sounds like you do.
And again, little of what you said is based on fact, only grievance.
SF in particular can be a pain in the butt. There are scearios where public transit works, and many where it doesn't. Biking there from anywhere else is not viable. I need to drive into it in cases when transit doesn't work, and the city is hostile to me trying to spend money. Great for some of its own residents, not for all of them, definitely not for visitors.
>The bike lanes are gender and age inequitable,
How? Everyone can ride a bicycle, even kids and seniors, meanwhile cars are locked behind expensive driving lessons, licenses and exams. Not to mention car ownership is inherently expensive due to fuel, maintenance and insurance requirements. E-bikes give anyone a motor assist and can carry you uphill without any problems while still being good for your health.
>and hamper productive economic activities.
Most productive economic activities just require people to show up to work. Buying something is not a productive activity by definition and nobody is suggesting that deliveries should be done on bicycles.
>I drive a car because I'm buying things, traveling with family, and spending hundreds of dollars. People on bikes are not doing these things and are not contributing to the tax base as much as car drivers.
Ok now this is turning into a parody. Do you know what's even more expensive than driving a car? Building and maintaining a road for cars. European bike lanes cost almost nothing in maintenance. Sprawl in North America is actively bankrupting cities because drivers don't bring in enough tax revenue to maintain the roads they drive on. Driving to a property tax optimized big box store at the outskirts of the city doesn't bring in as much property tax as you think it does.
Obviously not since it is so widely adopted.
Right on red is an extremely useful optimization so you don't sit waiting for nothing when it is clearly safe to turn.
That's only natural, because two kinds of people want EVs in cities (with some overlap). The first kind wants less noise, less pollution and fewer gas stations inside the city - they want other people to buy EVs, but don't want a car themselves. The second wants to own an EV because it's green and efficient.
For suburbanites with off-street parking, overnight charging and few road-trips or long distance commutes, an EV is these days simply more convenient to operate, and has cheaper total cost of ownership.
For many people, the case for an EV is simply pragmatic - better convenience and cost.
And for $100, where are the majority of consumers often located
The car manufacturers could have staved this off - they keep developing new models with little to no marginal improvement. Once we got seatbelts, airbags and similar in cars, there's literally no reason for a new model to drop, but here we are with new models dropping every 5 years, using parts that don't fit the old model!
Maybe if they were dropping only new types of cars (say, EVs), I could see a need, but there's no reason a 2010 Toyota has to be replaced by a 2024 - you have the jigs, the factory, the supply chain for parts already. Just keep making it and charge less.
The evidence that this is what the market demands is that Toyota is selling tons of new vehicles, despite the 2010 Toyotas still being available (used) for a lot less money.
That's not my point. My point is that the billions poured into designing the three new generations of Toyota since 2010 did not have to be spent by Toyota.
But they did spend it, to design new cars, with little to no actual improvements, and so they have had to price their new cars appropriately, to recoup the cost.
What would a brand new Toyota cost today if billions of dollars were not spent in designing a whole new car, with all new incompatible parts, and all-new jigs? Would we still be looking at $40k for a brand new car?
We cannot tell that for sure, because that 2010 model is not being sold new anymore.
I'm working off the assumption that the billions in dollars spent on developing the new generations are reflected in the price of the new generations.
Maybe I'm wrong, and the $40k on a new Toyota comprises only $1k to recoup the development cost, but I'm pretty certain that a market exists for a 2010 model Toyota sold new in 2026 for a lot less than the current-gen.
China has done this with their Haval brand. The new model is manufacturer and sold concurrently with the model it is replacing, and the price difference is significant.
"The things cars had in them when I was first driving are all they should ever need; everything else is frivolous, planned obsolescence, or fashion" is a very tempting position to hold, but it doesn't actually hold up to reality.
First, those are almost all in the 2010 Toyota that I used as an example. Other than those things (which are in the 2010 model), what did the post-2010 models bring?
Second, none of those require an entire new model to be designed that shares no parts with the previous model.
> "The things cars had in them when I was first driving are all they should ever need; everything else is frivolous, planned obsolescence, or fashion" is a very tempting position to hold, but it doesn't actually hold up to reality.
Please go back and re-read my post - I was not comparing cars from 1990 (when I first started driving). You are doing that comparison, and it's a strawman.
Okay. So... flying cars? Don't think so. Robotaxis make sense where taxis make sense and you can get by without a car already. The demographic decline is real.
The idea that they would be common enough to seriously disrupt "personal transport", even restricting to the "premium" market as it's known today is crazy. Imagine a fancy party where every 10 seconds everyone on the red carpet is being blown away by the backwash of someone landing - also disrupting everyone else trying to land there at the same time.
Not to mention the noise. Residential neighborhoods will ban these immediately (and some won't have a choice because they have, you know, trees.)
Are these teenagers buying new cars in the room with us now?
Transportation is going through many massive changes right now. I haven't driven to the office in a decade. Huge segments of the workforce are migrating to exoburbs because they don't need to drive to work anymore. My son hasn't mentioned wanting to drive. My neighbor's kid flat out says she doesn't want to learn (both will be able to soon) and many of their friends don't want to learn either. There is a generation growing up far less invested in the car than the generation before them. Some of the points in this article may not be perfect, predicting the future is a fools bet, but it sure feels like the trend they are bringing up is real.
Eventually, the truth will emerge, possibly with the collapse of the auto subprime loans and the car financing industry.
But what to do?
Don’t build factory capacity and manifest decline? Not likely.
They’re betting success will find a way and those factories will be needed. It’s all they can really do.
The idea that that a huge number of people will give up their private cars for robot-taxis in the next 20 years is laughable. They don't even exist in the vast majority of the country, and it's not even clear that they can function everywhere with our current technology. In just the past year we've seen how the technology we have today is still struggling with how to properly deal with basic things like red traffic lights and school buses.
They haven't even come close to replacing the private cars in the few areas where they do operate. Most people like to be able to go wherever they want whenever they want without begging someone else to come and get them then waiting around for the ride to show up. They like to keep stuff in their cars. They like not having to worry about availability or surge pricing/price gouging or that a lost phone or dead battery or broken app will leave them stranded. If anything will keep Americans from buying new cars it will be because they can't afford them. You can bet it won't be the sudden popularity of "Vertical Takeoff and Landing aircraft"!
One reason I'm starting to see turn people away from new cars are the anti-features. My next new car will already be an old car because I don't want a camera recording my face the entire time I drive, or microphones recording my conversations, or basic controls buried in touchscreen menus, or features that cause my car to brake unexpectedly or jerk the wheel suddenly from under my hands, or make me pay a monthly subscription fee for anything. I don't want a car that gets software updates over the air. I don't want it internet connected at all. I want my car to work for me and do what I tell it to do.
Total acknowledgment US vehicles are inferior, but no desire or drive to compete, only stifle.
It’s sad, and the outcome is entirely predictable.
It's even predictable and inevitable based on that fundamental tenet of capitalism: the market.
It's weird kinda knowing what the outcome is going to be, but not knowing exactly how we're going to get there and how long it's going to take. Feels like it's all in slow motion.
But you're right in terms of, if they don't get bailed out it could bring pain to certain demographics that any side of politics doesn't want to get blamed for. It's hard to see either side making the difficult decision to inflict mid-term pain for, maybe, very long term gain. Not a concept voters will accept.
Need a consolidation auto-makers in the US to maybe rationalise things a bit?
The very first line begins: Take a look around the American automotive landscape
Which seems is a prevailing mindset of the US administration (which infects those at lower, but still leadership, levels due to the short term legal and financial 'influence' of the administration): Denial of the changing world. Classic uber-conservatism, which works until it, explosively or revolutionarily, breaks. The ripples of which affect the innocent most of all.
(I'm more progressive than conservative, for roughly my own definition of what those loaded terms mean, but I'm also aware of the social problems caused by uber-progressiveness, which bumps up against humanity's basic resistance to change, or too much change too quickly).
The world kinda feels stuck between the 'uber' of both sides, with very little conversation covering the majority middle.
First, personal flying vehicles are definitely not going to be a common mode of transportation. If and when this happens, it will be for ultra rich, select few people, effectively replacing a private helicopter. We don't have the infrastructure, regulation or technology to have millions of people buzzing around in their astro-ford like the fifth element - this is still very much science fiction.
Second, scooters and bikes need infrastructure, which in 99.99% of the US, is not made for this. In fact, current infrastructure is very much hostile to bicycles and scooters, so in order for this to work, there's going to have to be a massive investment in new infrastructure all over the US. Is this very likely? I wouldn't say so.
The US locked itself into using cars through massive, expensive infrastructure and culture and I don't see this changing easily.
The population growth slowing might be true, but it's still growing, and there's still a profit to be made there.
The new factories are going to replace manufacturing in foreign countries. I'm not sure the effects on supply will be drastic. It's just a matter of building cars domestically, avoiding tariffs and securing domestic pipelines.
Finally, asking these corporations to "look 20 years ahead" instead of maximizing short term profits, is a common tradeoff that they are all aware of. Currently, short term gains is what's being preferred in almost every industry. I doubt any board members will vote to leave money on the table for long term benefits. More money now always wins.
I wonder what it would be like for most cars to be replaced with flying cars (i.e. helicopters). I think the noise alone would be a huge issue. Helicopters can be heard from extremely far away and are quite noisy. If you multiply that by like 1 million in a metropolis, I think that would approach unbearable, specially at nighttime, etc.. Also I don't think noise can be reduced too much, including electric propulsion. Propeller engineering would give you some reduction but still I think too much for near universal usage.
But I think the main thing is just cost. Electric aircraft like that would really be just too expensive for everyone to have em. Not everyone can afford a good old (electric) automobile today.
There's also battery technology needing a significant improvement.
Regulation and infrastructure is comparatively solvable I think.
But everybody seemed to believe Amazon was building an insurmountable, monopoly-like position. That never happened. Then AWS came out of nowhere and that's when their profits finally took off, and investors won their bet, but in an unpredicted way.
The problem with the car industry is that, excepting Tesla for 5-10 years, nobody believes there are outsized profits to be made, and other than Musk (once upon a time), nobody with the personality to convince them otherwise. Though Amazon didn't need a personality; everyone just sort of assumed Bezos was an evil business genius biding time.
If by flying cars you mean flying robotaxies, then all you need are landing pads. They can be easily accomodated on top of buildings. And regulation for what? We already know how to fky helicopters by autopilot, no need for innovation stiffling with more regulation.
In proper downtown areas I suspect even if you'd cover every rooftop in these it wouldn't be enough capacity
Small cheap cars have been disappearing from the ranges of most manufacturers.
They eventually might have no choice, especially with Chinese manufacturers starting to make inroads, but for now they do believe they are better off with higher margins and fewer customers. As long as the USA remains the car bread and butter with a political climate that keeps out the competition they can hold out for a while. The risk of not offering a small, cheap car now is not buyers going to another brand, but buyers giving up on the idea of car ownership entirely and finding an alternative. Once they've become accustomed to other modes of transportation, they aren't apt to come back to owning a car. That is going to be a harsh realization when manufacturers are forced to compete on volume again. But, hey, current executives will have moved on by that point and the next guy can take the blame.
Maybe if the venture capitalists private equity, and their billionaire handlers didn’t fuck around with every industry that working people depend on. Then maybe the flow of goods would continue.
Maybe if C-level idiots invested profits into the companies rather than in short term gains (ie, stock buybacks). Then maybe we wouldn’t be in this situation where a collective <1% of people own a majority of the capital.
If we had a government that actually cared about the welfare of its citizens, we wouldn’t have to depend on companies that enshittify their products and betray their founding principles. Imagine an ecosystem where you didn’t have to force yourself to go to a shitty job you hate because you depend on it for healthcare (fuck private health insurance), an income, and other needs.
America is the richest country in the world yet a majority of citizens are pushed to the brink of poverty despite working 40+ hrs.
Better get to it.
Because a single autonomous vehicle operating in a shared
fleet can replace multiple privately owned cars, the
widespread adoption of this technology can’t help but
reduce new-car sales volumes.
If we can travel and send stuff around from point A to point B cheaply and instantly by dropping ourselves or an item into an ocean of cars roaming our streets autonomously, there is a lot more demand for rides.
Also comfortably traveling longer distances might alter where we live. If we can walk out the door, sit down in a comfortable robotaxi right away and exit in the city center 10 minutes later, we might not have to live right in the city center anymore. Another driver for more demand.
Essentially everyone has a car. The car is mostly idle. If car availability starts to approach instant then people don't need personal vehicles that are idle 95% of the time. Car quantity overall goes down unless you can 20x current utilization, which is a lot of trips and fuel.
Not to mention that if anything resembling current quantity of extant cars becomes the current quantity of cars using roadways at a given moment, most cities will gridlock.
If the thesis is "cars will approach 50% or greater utilization" then car numbers must drop barring a massive increase in road capacity for which the land does not exist.
Pretty much every self-driving car will be electric; battery charge has a very different set of considerations than fuel tanks do.
Cabs are replaced something like 3x more often than privately owned cars. And when they run 24/7 because of self-driving, that factor will even increase.
You can build stacked roads a few levels up. Capacity doubles or triples without any significant land use.
Visit Amsterdam, then visit LA. Tell me which place is more pleasant to be in.
You mean like last time? More cars being the answer to problems created by creating too many cars and reasons to use them is like more people buying guns to counter the gun problem, and I can't think of better "tragedy of the commons" applicable situations.
As I start to get older and I spend less and less of my time in the deep suburbs, I'm starting to be more aware now of the phenomenon for people to get less social and less trusting the further away from a core area (or, arguably also the ground in the case of skyscrapers, but much less so) they live. I don't think it would be a net win to hypothetically encourage further dispersement from one another.
I wish HN commenters would stop bringing up Jevon's Paradox:
1. We see it mentioned all the time now, i.e. When AI makes producing software essentially free, there'll be more jobs. As HN has maybe 75% of the frontpage filled with AI stories, it means we see it almost every single day!
2. It essentially describes outliers. Driving food costs down to a fraction of the peak price (basically down by 90% over the last 200 years) did not result in correspondingly higher food consumption.
3. It only applies when the market is not yet saturated. Making cars more fuel efficient (by going EV) in the last 5 years did not result in correspondingly more miles being driven.
Any time you feel compelled to bring up Jevon's Paradox, ask yourself "Are we talking about energy here?" and if the answer is "No" then it probably doesn't apply.
Keep in mind that even if Jevon's Paradox applies, it does not mean that the society actually benefits. If you drive the value of all human labour to almost zero, you can't use Jevon's Paradox as an argument that the increased efficiency means that we're all living a life of leisure.
We don't need fleets of autonomous vehicles, each carrying two tons of metal for transporting a person or two and clogging up cities. We just need a train network that doesn't suck.
If you're reaction to Daniel Penny's killing of Jordan Neely on the New York City Subway isn't "Daniel Penny was a hero, Jordan Neely should have been incarcerated rather than allowed to freely exist on the train, and everyone involved in Penny's prosecution should be thrown out of positions of power", then you can't actually make the train network not suck.