LocostUSA.com :: View topic - The end of enthusiast cars?

Personally I hate the thought of having a self driving car. However in Florida (voted worst drivers in USA) the roads are getting more and more dangerous. There are lots of old people who tend to slow you down but I can live with that. I hope to be old some day.

Age may not necessarily bring wisdom, but it DOES bring experience!

In my experience I am probably right about this as it is following the familiar pattern.

And, don't worry, they're a way off yet even if all the techie folks are jumping up and down with excitement.

In that case it might just come down to putting officers with desk jobs into cars, "moving offices", and have their car just drive around town collecting money.

Cars that will be "Dispatched" to run errands WITH NO OCCUPANT, "Hailed" to pick up passengers so running empty in one direction, etc.

Maybe the iPhone generation has no problem with that, but I find driving to be just about the last Semi-Free activity we are allowed to participate in without having to make special arrangements.

Remember when "lead" was mandated to be removed from our gas, and the conequences to MANY cars. This will be MUCH worse!

There are three basic reasons why this theory should be believed. First, as Drum points out, the numbers correlate almost perfectly. "If you add a lag time of 23 years," he writes. "Lead emissions from automobiles explain 90 percent of the variation in violent crime in America. Toddlers who ingested high levels of lead in the '40s and '50s really were more likely to become violent criminals in the '60s, '70s, and '80s."

Second, this correlation holds true with no exceptions. Every country studied has shown this same strong correlation between leaded gasoline and violent crime rates. Within the United States, you can see the data at the state level. Where lead concentrations declined quickly, crime declined quickly. Where it declined slowly, crime declined slowly. The data even holds true at the neighborhood level - high lead concentrations correlate so well that you can overlay maps of crime rates over maps of lead concentrations and get an almost perfect fit.

Author:	carguy123 [ September 2, 2017, 11:16 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
wrightcomputing wrote: Personally I hate the thought of having a self driving car. However in Florida (voted worst drivers in USA) the roads are getting more and more dangerous. There are lots of old people who tend to slow you down but I can live with that. I hope to be old some day. It's not the OLD that causes that, it's the SNOW BIRDS of all ages that cause that. People who have never had to drive their whole lives come down and suddenly have to drive. They don't know how to judge speeds, distances and turning a corner is beyond them. I'm from Floriday and that's what stopped me from moving back. My blood pressure couldn't take it when you got behind them.

Author:	rx7locost [ September 2, 2017, 11:32 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
Every time I get behind a driver who is driving way to slow, I tell myself that they are more scared on the road than I am behind them. I really don't want them driving faster than they feel comfortable with. We are both better off. I was wondering how these cars would deal with parking in a large parking lot or into and along a longer private drive. Maps currently know most addresses but not how to actually get into the driveway or navigate on private property. How would the car know how to get there or where on that property is appropriate to park? There are no maps of . at least I don't think so. Don't tell me they will learn. We are talking about usefulness of driverless vehicles for people who cannot drive. There are many hurdles to overcome, some of the legal. Exactly who will be liable for accidents or obeying the traffic laws. The manufacturer? The map companies? There will always be cars running red lights where vision was blocked by a semi who gets the tickets?

Author:	wrightcomputing [ September 3, 2017, 12:08 am ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
The future is not as far away as some think. Tesla has a summon feature which is working in a car park, not on a mapped road. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2bZ1CWqvbA

Author:	Driven5 [ September 3, 2017, 1:17 am ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?

Author:	RichardSIA [ September 3, 2017, 1:25 am ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
Age may not necessarily bring wisdom, but it DOES bring experience! In my experience I am probably right about this as it is following the familiar pattern. I remember when folk scoffed at the notion of not being able to buy leaded gas at the pump, and many other unfortunate Gov. mandates.

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Author:	Lonnie-S [ September 3, 2017, 9:46 am ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
I have zero interest in a car that drives itself. And, don't worry, they're a way off yet even if all the techie folks are jumping up and down with excitement. Those of you from the 1950s will remember all the headlines and front page drawings (Popular Mechanics, for example) about flying cars and them being "just around the corner." Have you seen one on the road or in the sky in your town lately? No, you haven't. Look at electric cars, for example. They've been in the marketplace for a decade and still account for a small percentage of the vehicles. Why? Because they cost too much for what they are and what they do. I predict autonomous vehicles will be the same way. I'll be too old to drive by the time they are the vehicle of choice on the American highway. In the mean time, let's work on a special lane for those of us who want to drive ourselves on the highway. Let's redefine HOV lane to be Human-driven Only Vehicles(s). Cheers,

Author:	JackMcCornack [ September 3, 2017, 11:35 am ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
RichardSIA wrote: Age may not necessarily bring wisdom, but it DOES bring experience! As my father mentioned when I was young and foolish and doing dumb stuff, Wisdom brings age. Weighing risk vs. reward pays off, it allows one the best chance for a long yet interesting life. It's why I don't ride motorcycles any more, but continue to drive Locosts--the risk is similar (let's be honest, now) but I get more pleasure from the latter. Now back on topic: The time will come when these cars we build are no longer appropriate for daily driving, but it's going to be a long from now and I'll be long gone by then. Though in my lifetime (knock wood) I'd wager there will be cities prohibiting SSBB vehicles and possibly prohibiting driver-driven vehicles.

Author:	zetec7 [ September 3, 2017, 12:55 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
I predict that the first cities to ban driver-operated vehicles will be in California...

Author:	horizenjob [ September 3, 2017, 1:22 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
Quote: In my experience I am probably right about this as it is following the familiar pattern. Hmmm... Quote: And, don't worry, they're a way off yet even if all the techie folks are jumping up and down with excitement. I think they're closer than one would think. The reasons we don't have flying cars involve physics. Most of the attempts at flying cars are ignoring that. Cars can already drive themselves, the problem is doing it intelligently and/or safely. About 30,000 people die in car accidents every year here in USA, so that gives some idea of the budget for learning how to do this. The tipping point might be if people give self driving cars, with all their sensors, the ability to issue traffic citations to human driven vehicles. I think the issue with this is the submission of "heresay" evidence in court. In that case it might just come down to putting officers with desk jobs into cars, "moving offices", and have their car just drive around town collecting money.

Author:	BHRmotorsport [ September 3, 2017, 2:20 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
horizenjob wrote: In that case it might just come down to putting officers with desk jobs into cars, "moving offices", and have their car just drive around town collecting money. We've already got a version of that in operation here in Winnipeg where we have portable red light/speed cameras mounted in vehicles (all sorts of different types of vehicles for disguise) that move around the city all of the time...a real pain in the ass. Luckily the cameras are manned so the operators tend to keep them running which, in Winnipeg, produces an exhaust cloud for months of the year. If you see exhaust from a parked car you know to suspect a camera vehicle and slow down. Still, our speed cameras aren't as bad as the average speed camera system on British motorways.

Author:	nick47 [ September 5, 2017, 5:32 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
Lonnie is right, it's a long ways off, but I agree the air car analogy isn't the same thing. We did hear about self-driving cars in the 50's, again, coming soon to a dealer near you. That technology was based on sensors buried in the roads. I heard they actually built a test road somewhere down south a few years back. As far as cars learning, that's actually a real advantage of self-drivers, because when one car learns something, they'll all know it. At least in theory. Kind of like the Borg. Everything Tesla does at this point is a stunt, under very controlled conditions. I think everyone's heard by now about the guy who put his Tesla on autopilot and the car drove straight into a big rig.

Author:	BHRmotorsport [ September 5, 2017, 11:15 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
Another issue to consider is GPS accuracy. GPS must play a hugely important role in AV navigation yet GPS accuracy can vary greatly day to day and even location to location because of multi path error (GPS signals reflecting off of buildings causing small errors in signal timing). Being off a meter or two is not a huge problem for an aircraft but it could be catastrophic for a vehicle on the street. Plus, as I understand it, limiting GPS accuracy, or the option of turning the GPS system off altogether, is a strategic defensive option for the USA....would thousands of AV's on the road negate this possibility or would the AV's have an auto shut down if these lose GPS accuracy?

Author:	RichardSIA [ September 5, 2017, 11:41 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
When I used GPS a couple of days ago in the Sacramento area it was off no less than fifty to two-hundred yards. It kept saying I was ready for my next turn way too early. In a congested area that can be a turn onto the wrong street, including wrong-way on a one-way! There is an area between Carson City and Reno on the "New" bypass (Now a few years old) where the GPS ALWAYS goes wonky. Like a lot of the other Big. Gov./Green utopian dreams this WILL be deployed before it is ready. In the end the only real winners will be lawyers and those who manipulate the results into special allowances for themselves.

Author:	BBlue [ September 6, 2017, 9:06 am ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
Self driving cars are heavily dependent on visual sensors. I think they will appear on big rigs pretty soon and the day of the long haul driver will be over. City driving, not so much. A word or two about northern drivers in Florida. Remember a few things. 1. They are old, with older eyes that do not accommodate rapidly. 2. They are unfamiliar with the area and traffic flow. 3. Todays road signage is terrible. The highly visible overhead in cities are gone. 4. They have been replaced with tiny signs placed curbside. So we have a driver that does not know where he is, or how to go to where he wants to be. Has no idea which lane to be in until he gets to within a hundred feet of the intersection. If he has been able to get only a glance at the sign, he may not have had time to actually focus on the sign, so he just barges through the intersection, regardless of lanes. If he is following a box van, he may never see the sign. So you shake your fist and say nasty things about his heritage. Guess how I know all this. Bill

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Author:	Laminar [ September 6, 2017, 12:19 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: The end of enthusiast cars?
RichardSIA wrote: Cars that will be "Dispatched" to run errands WITH NO OCCUPANT, "Hailed" to pick up passengers so running empty in one direction, etc. Cars today sit unused 95% of the time. http://fortune.com/2016/03/13/cars-park ... t-of-time/ You think that having a single car with...say...80% utilization is worse than the manufacture, upkeep, storage, and depreciation of 16 cars with 5% utilization? Quote: Maybe the iPhone generation has no problem with that, but I find driving to be just about the last Semi-Free activity we are allowed to participate in without having to make special arrangements. What other semi-free activities have been banned? Quote: Remember when "lead" was mandated to be removed from our gas, and the conequences to MANY cars. This will be MUCH worse! Do you even know the extent of the effects of leaded gasoline? https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/ ... 49bcb112c4 Quote: There are three basic reasons why this theory should be believed. First, as Drum points out, the numbers correlate almost perfectly. "If you add a lag time of 23 years," he writes. "Lead emissions from automobiles explain 90 percent of the variation in violent crime in America. Toddlers who ingested high levels of lead in the '40s and '50s really were more likely to become violent criminals in the '60s, '70s, and '80s." Second, this correlation holds true with no exceptions. Every country studied has shown this same strong correlation between leaded gasoline and violent crime rates. Within the United States, you can see the data at the state level. Where lead concentrations declined quickly, crime declined quickly. Where it declined slowly, crime declined slowly. The data even holds true at the neighborhood level - high lead concentrations correlate so well that you can overlay maps of crime rates over maps of lead concentrations and get an almost perfect fit. You probably don't want to defend the use of leaded gasoline.