Lyft co-founder projects private car ownership will all but end in major US cities by 2025
19 September 2016
Lyft co-founder John Zimmer projects that private car ownership will all but end in major US cities by 2025; as the enabler for that, he projects that autonomous vehicle fleets will quickly become widespread and will account for the majority of Lyft rides within 5 years. In a piece published in Medium, Zimmer proposed that the coming transportation revolution—which will shape the future of our communities—will be defined by three key shifts:
Autonomous vehicle fleets will quickly become widespread and will account for the majority of Lyft rides within 5 years.
By 2025, private car ownership will all-but end in major U.S. cities.
As a result, cities’ physical environment will change more than we’ve ever experienced in our lifetimes.
A full shift to “Transportation as a Service” is finally possible, because for the first time in human history, we have the tools to create a perfectly efficient transportation network. We saw this potential in 2012 when Lyft became the first company to establish peer-to-peer, on-demand ridesharing, which is now what the world knows simply as ridesharing. What began as a way to unlock unused cars, create economic opportunities and reduce the cost of transportation, has today become the way millions of Americans get around.
Ridesharing is just the first phase of the movement to end car ownership and reclaim our cities. As I mentioned before, the shift to autonomous cars will expand dramatically over the next ten years, transforming transportation into the ultimate subscription service. This service will be more flexible than owning a car, giving you access to all the transportation you need. Don’t drive very often? Use a pay-as-you-go plan for a few cents every mile you ride. Take a road trip every weekend? Buy the unlimited mileage plan. Going out every Saturday? Get the premium package with upgraded vehicles. The point is, you won’t be stuck with one car and limited options. Through a fleet of autonomous cars, you’ll have better transportation choices than ever before with a plan that works for you.
—John Zimmer
Small electric ADVs would flood city cores and create huge traffic jams.
One way around the problem would be with 6 to 10 passengers ADV e-mini-bus with flexible routes to pick up more passengers going to the same area/place.
ADVs is a good solution if the number of units on the streets-roads-highways can be drastically reduced.
Secondly, cities could get rid of highly (over) paid bus drivers and questionnable cab drivers. Finding jobs for those people could be a major problem?
Posted by: HarveyD | 19 September 2016 at 08:12 AM
I agree, you need full sized buses and trams that can hold 80+ people rather than a swarm of smaller vehicles.
You can also have smaller vehicles, but you'll beed the big ones for rush hour.
You could have smaller ones for less busy routes because they would be cheaper to do if you had no driver.
Posted by: mahonj | 19 September 2016 at 12:06 PM