News, Views and Analysis from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Association of Bay Area Governments
A recent Cal Matters piece highlighted the future of self-driving cars in the state, and while the technology is promising, there are still hurdles. Read More
A recent New York Times opinion piece says technology can be the enemy of safety and it urges the return of the stick shift in automobiles. Read More
A new transportation group that will look at technology-driven, new modes of transportation and how they fit into the urban landscape has launched. Read More
Update: Video recordings of these meetings are now available.
Three of MTC’s standing committees will meet starting at 10 a.m. on Friday, June 8, at the Bay Area Metro Center. Highlights include a preview of a new report on autonomous vehicles, proposed action on two pieces of housing-related state legislation, updates on this week’s state primary election, and federal legislation and funding updates. Read on for links to everything, and tune in live to the meetings on Friday from our Live Webcasts page. Read More
MTC and ABAG have released their first-ever joint annual report to Congress for 2018, urging lawmakers in Washington D.C. to honor long-standing bipartisan commitments to transportation, housing and disaster relief. The report, Accelerating Progress: Strong Partnerships Move the Bay Area Forward:
For more detail on these and other issue areas and initiatives, download the report. Read More
Whenever self-driving vehicles come up, the question of long-term employment impacts is never far behind: What happens to the millions of people who drive for a living? Although this jumps over a lot of feasibility issues in terms of how likely truly autonomous and connected vehicles are, it’s a crucial consideration. The effects on industries and people’s livelihoods will have all kinds of implications, whether economic, political, regulatory, social or technical – and these will all have feedback effects in determining whether, when and how the driverless utopia happens.
Over at The Atlantic there’s an interesting take looking at the trucking industry, suggesting that self-driving trucks could actually be good for truckers, as opposed to resulting in technological unemployment on a massive scale:
Read More“We’ve been disappointed over the last year to see a lot of stories about how self-driving trucks are going to be this huge problem for truck drivers,” says Alden Woodrow, the product lead for self-driving trucks at Uber. “That’s not at all what we think the outcome is going to be.”
For one, Uber does not believe that self-driving trucks will be doing “dock to dock” runs for a very long time.
Love our daily news headlines but craving some deeper knowledge? Settle in for some in-depth reading on the important issues affecting our region. This month we highlight some publications that contextualize and illuminate the regional housing crisis, including this thorough literature review from CASA and a handy summary of the significant housing bills passed in California in 2017.
Other topics included in this month’s reading list include Regional Measure 3, local Bay Area transportation projects, transit ridership, automated vehicles, and climate change. Read More
The subject of driverless (or autonomous) vehicles and the future of transportations brings about all manner of prognostication. Some commentators think the revolution is nigh: No corner of the transportation sector will be left untouched and impacts will be felt across the entire economy – and soon. Others dismiss this all as so much hype: The technical, political and social barriers are too high and real change is decades (and decades) away.
Count this piece from Bob Lutz – former vice chairman and head of product development at General Motors – as a provocation from Team Revolution. Read More