On: How Driverless Cars Could Reshape Cities

[mahyarm]

Today's electric cars would be used for many of these things even they have 80 mile batteries, since the taxi company can manage charging levels very easily. They will end up using it just on a cost basis alone since the cars are cheaper on a marginal basis than gas. Most people don't need a gas car for most of their driving. A tesla model S would do even for most people in large cities today. It's only when you would want to go on long distance road trips that you would need a gas car.

Just this weekend, me and my roomate went on a road trip to san diego and we rented a car because he didn't want to put the ~1200 miles on his car.

[zanny → mahyarm]

Also, since it isn't "your" car, it is perfectly reasonable that on a longer taxi trip the cars just drive to a taxi depot when low on battery and have you switch cars or have the cars switch batteries (as demonstrated by Tesla).

I don't think any of the autopilot cars will be gas guzzlers. By the time they are allowed for consumer use as taxis, the Tesla 300 mile range battery will be half as expensive.