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21 sats \ 4 replies \ @wolfsbane OP 1 Jun \ parent \ on: 🚂5 Years Without a Raise Now the Trains Stop Construction_and_Engineering
RoboTransit sounds great flexible, productive, and future forward but rail still wins on scale, equity, and resilience. Maybe the answer isn’t replacing it, but upgrading both.
Buses are designed to maximize systemic efficiency (passengers per driver).
Commuter rail is designed to maximize systemic efficiency (passengers per conductor).
The point I am making ... the convenience for the commuting passenger does not figure at all into that equation.
RoboTransit [nice, I'm going to steal that], having no driver or conductor, can be sized to match market demand. And as a frequent public transit passenger, I would like to see waits per-connection of five minutes or less, and door-to-door service. Simply having affordable RoboTaxi + RoboShuttles (vans) would likely be more than acceptable.
There's limited demand, and naturally passengers will gravitate towards the fastest solution (all else being equal), end-to-end. That takes those passengers off of rail, making rail more costly, per passenger, and RoboTransit less expensive, per passenger.
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You're spot on rail maximizes efficiency per operator, not per rider But riders chase speed and convenience so as they leave, rail gets costlier per passenger meanwhile, flexible systems like RoboTransit scale better, adapt faster, and aren't hostage to labor disputes.This isn’t just a transit problem it’s legacy infrastructure cracking under modern expectations.
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Waymo stops this train:
(actually, Waymo, being door-to-door, and door-to-station probably increases commuter rail ridership today. But combined with RoboShuttles ... it's game over for the transport mode designed for your Grandfather -- long before he was your age even.)
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Waymo enhances commuter rail today by solving first last mile gaps. But as RoboShuttles scale, they could replace traditional transit entirely especially systems built for a bygone era.
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