How Will You Get To Work in 2050?
By Joshua Emerson Smith
San Diego Union-Tribune
3 February 2017
Photo courtesy ABC
While San Diegans would desperately like to see shorter commute times and less highway congestion, voters in the county have disagreed on the best way to do that. Many want to prioritize highway expansions. Others favor putting more resources into buses, trains and trolleys. A future with self-driving vehicles and expanding ride-sharing companies, such as Lyft and Uber, has started to complicate the debate, but may also offer potential solutions.
Some experts warn that if the planning is not done properly, these emerging technologies and business models could exacerbate urban congestion rather than relieve it. With the future so uncertain, many transportation researchers have advised elected officials and planners to start designing flexible transportation systems that will be able to adapt to changing circumstances.
According to Associate Professor of City & Regional Planning Daniel Chatman, who specializes in travel patterns, automation and technology like driverless cars could worsen congestion issues: While autonomous vehicles can drive more tightly packed on highways, time saved by automation could be lost if congestion increases on surfaces streets. Additionally, driverless-vehicle technology could lead to a proliferation of empty cars circling city roads in lieu of expensive parking.
“The estimates that are really the high estimates could only apply in the best case scenario along a freeway and in no other context,” he explained. “There are all kinds of question marks of how they’re going to work in urban areas.”
Researchers have said the future of transportation could largely hinge on whether people own their own autonomous vehicles or rely on evolving ride-sharing companies like Lyft and Uber.
“If they’re cheap enough for people to actually own then absent any significant regulator intervention, we’re going to have major traffic,” Chatman added. “You think you have bad traffic now? It’s only going to get worse.”