It has begun. Nutonomy has started to pick up passengers in its fleet of electric, self-driving taxis, and Uber just did the same in Pittsburgh. Meanwhile, Navya is operating autonomous buses in multiple European cities, including Lyon in France. Self-driving transportation is taking its first baby steps.
Technology might not be perfectly ready for a true rollout - there are still test drivers seating at the wheel of Nutonomy vehicles, a Uber autonomous car took a one-way in the wrong direction, and Navya apparently hit a wall - but this marks the beginning of an interesting period of experimentation and learning.
Just like Uber took so many big cities by storm, we can expect self-driving taxis and buses to be deployed massively in the next decade, one city at a time. And just like when Uber sets foot in a new city, local governments will have to respond to this new mode of transportation. This piece tries to analyze what strategies could be adopted when this happens.
(please note that I am talking about Uber as an example of on-demand ride sharing, but any other could be substituted - Tesla will likely grow as a big Uber competitor for instance)
When Uber comes to a new city, local governments usually try to put some rules in place to contain its capabilities, to the point that it had to leave some of them (Austin or Berlin for instance). This comes from the deep social and economic change Uber brings: on how people move, on the workers’ protection and freedom, on the taxi and public transportation industries. Whether this change is good or bad is not the point of this article, but local governments can simply not ignore it and have to take actions to respond to it.
The changes that robotaxis will bring to cities are poised to be even bigger than ride-sharing. Governments at local, state and federal levels should be prepared to deal with it before it comes.
A few assumptions:
- 1 - On demand transportation will take over a big market share of public transportation (metro, tram, bus) once self-driving cars are technologically ready.
I believe that the cost of operating a network of self-driving, electric vehicles will decrease to the point of being cheaper and more convenient than taking any other medium for a lot of uses. Consequently, most trips will be exclusively made by robotaxis or a mix of robotaxi and rail. This will drastically reduce the income of public transportation operators, which will have no choice but shutting down some lines or stopping their geographical extensions.
- 2 - Corporations work towards their own financial success
- 3 - Governments work towards the collective well-being of its people.
In that framework, the government is here to set constraints and laws to align the financial incentives of corporations and the collective well-being, so that businesses deliver services that profit society as a whole.
Thinking this way is especially relevant for the transportation industry, because some geographic areas would not be served by public lines of buses or metro if it wasn’t for government helps - it just does not make any economic sense. This is also why public transportation is less developed in the US, compared to more socialist countries like France.
Under those assumptions, local governments have two choices: either they partner with - or give incentives to - companies like Uber in order to reach desirable service levels in underserved areas, or they operate their own network of robotaxis. Any other solution would lead to their public transportation industry losing considerable amounts of money, while potentially benefiting only a fraction of the population.
I have no doubt that things can happen smoothly if they are prepared enough in advance. As an example, I am thinking of how well Paris rolled out Velib’ (self-service shared bikes) and Autolib’ (same thing, with electric cars). With good partnerships and well funded policy support, those two projects brought new modes of transportation to the public transit system, in addition to the metro, buses and light rail. This allowed a smooth entry of other players in the space like Zipcar and Mobizen. But the public transportation industry will suffer big losses if such careful planning is not done for robotaxis.
The problem is that self-driving taxi operators might come aggressively and be unwilling to seek partnerships, if the states or local governments fail to anticipate the rollout. This is what happened with Uber in Paris - where big taxi strikes and violent demonstrations happened - and might happen again when the technology is ready for robotaxis.
The shift towards autonomous transportation will benefit user experience, reduce congestion, free space in cities, reduce car ownership and pollution. But if not regulated - or owned - by public institutions, it may also underserve less dense areas, suburbs and poorer locations, while favoring dense, active neighborhoods, and ruin the public transportation industry - affecting its current service levels and affordability.
Cities will have to play nice with Uber-like services, allow them a spot in their public transportation strategy and partner towards affordability and service for all.
In addition to that, infrastructure changes may have to be made to make cities attractive to mobility providers. For instance, charging or battery swapping stations in the cities peripheral areas ; regulated neighborhoods where human driving is restricted to allow better autonomous navigation (just like Navya in Lyon) ; smarter traffic controls, V2I (vehicle to infrastructure) sensors where flows need to be optimized… Making these infrastructure available, or allowing private companies to make those investments, will be crucial to allowing smart mobility to develop. This would also be a good occasion to grab a piece of the cake, by renting public infrastructure or space for operating networks of autonomous cars.
All of that planning must happen soon, if cities want to be among the first beneficiaries of this revolution.
I simply hope that fear of change will not get in the way of win-win partnerships between local governments and autonomous taxi providers in the next - exciting - years.