Pure fantasy
Safe, cheap and reliable autonomous electric vehicles any time soon is pure fantasy. It's all just hype.
Regardless of how much the tech companies salivate at the thought of selling x hundred million pieces of software, hardware and a bewildering amount of sensors, the technology isn't even close to existing with which to build reliable and safe autonomous electric cars. The environment isn't remotely suitable, and even the cities would apparently need redesigning. Parts of the industry are finally being honest and confessing to this, but nobody seems to have informed the UK government who are too busy right now enjoying appearing to actually understand anything technological to notice!
The UK doesn't even have enough electricity to power such a plan, the government already pay large electricity users not to use any at peak times and run power station car parks full of diesel generators at peak demand while many coal-fired power stations continue to close years earlier than planned with no viable replacements even started to be planned or built. There aren't even enough roads to handle any more cars and the cost would be astronomical. Who is going to pay for all this? It's nothing short of crazy, especially in the time frame being suggested.
While it wouldn't be a bad plan to reduce the number of petrol and diesel cars on the roads for reasons of public health, wouldn't the money be far better spent on improving public transport systems that all could benefit from?
Here in the UK public transport options are currently abysmal, especially if you don't live in a big city and so don't have access to various subsidised discount fares. e.g. I had a journey to make last week of approx. 75 miles. I ended up getting a taxi for £80 each way (£40 each for the two passengers). If I came back same day the return was free (so less than half the price of a train, plus £12 per hour waiting time), or next day return which involved a second journey for the taxi driver with a round trip of 300 miles which cost £160 in total (or £80 per passenger). However, this was still cheaper than an anytime return ticket on the train once the very limited number of subsidised tickets were sold out, and that doesn't take long especially if you're travelling at fairly short notice. The equivalent train price was approx. £173, so with two passengers that travelled that would cost £85 each. How come an expensive taxi is often still the 'cheapest' way to travel?
If we're going to modernise and go all electric, a system of trams feeding a much hugely less expensive rail network seems like a far more sensible idea that would benefit far more people. Other nations seem to be able to manage it, so why can't we do this on a national or even a global scale?
Biting the hand that feeds IT
