Thoughtful thread on the future of shared, autonomous and electric mobility

For those not familiar with Twitter, click on this link to read the full thread.

On a related note, Tim Schwanen pointed out to this interesting piece about the State led emerging role of China in electric mobility industry.

A lighthearted title about a very real dispute over urban geometry — & a larger dispute between technologists & urbanists, generally, about the future of shared, autonomous, electric mobility. (Alt. title: Why e-bikes, & not AVs, are the real transportation disruption.) 1/ pic.twitter.com/MdSJbKcI1L

— Autonomous Law (@SafeSelfDrive) 6 February 2018

A glimpse into the future of autonomous vehicles

Cesar Hidalgo (Twitter) has shared this mesmerizing video by People's Daily, China. It shows hundreds of autonomous robots sorting parcels in a warehouse of a Chinese delivery company.

It makes you think about many things related the technology density of the Chinese economy and the coming changes in the labor market of China and beyond. The obvious thought that occurred to me, though, is how these warehouses can be thought as a super simplified beta-version of integrated systems of autonomous vehicles we might see in cities in 100 years form now... maybe 50.

Assorted Links

1. Uber suspends testing of self-driving cars after crash last frieday. Uber's SUV had the right of way and bears no blame
   
   
2. Dr. Mae C. Jemison was the 1st African American woman to travel in space, in 1992.
   
   
3. Harvey Miller's entry on Time geography andspace–time prism for the new International Encyclopedia of Geography. Harvey is also on Twitter
   
   
4.  paper: Network theory may explain the vulnerability of medieval human settlements to the Black Death pandemic
   
   
5. Chronological map of Edinburgh showing expansion of the City from earliest days via Phil Taylor
   
   
6. 15% of the entire housing stock of Florence historic centre is on AirBnB. David Wachsmuth also has a coming paper analyzing Airbnb’s impact on housing and gentrification in New York
   
   
7. Where workers will be needed in the Asia, and where they could come from
   
   
8. In 1900, W.E.B. Du Bois created these beautiful data visualizations for the Paris Exposition Universelle to show the economic and social progress of African Americans since emancipation (via Michal Migurski)

credit: W.E.B. Du Bois

The Social Dilemma of Driverless Cars

Iyad Rahwan presents in a TEDx his recently published paper on the the social dilemma of driverless cars (arXiv version here). HT Cesar Hidalgo.

You should try out the Moral Machine. 

Related link

• Autonomous vehicles

Assorted Links

1. Night lights and regional income inequality in Africa
   
   
2. Will autonomous vehicles really be safer than conventional cars? Here is why answering this question is not so simple via Tyler Cowen
   
   
3. Real-time visualization of Ebola evolution and geographic spread
   
   
4. Higher Gender Wage Gap is associated with higher Domestic Violence rates
   
   
5. The Global Metro Monitor 2014
   
   
6. Some Beautiful Abandoned Places In Europe
   
   
7. How Americans Get to Work, neat interactive dataviz by Nathan Yau
   
   
8. Nice tool for comparing the size of countries, ht Pablo Astudillo
   
   
9. A terrific visual and interactive explanation of Gridlock vs. Bottlenecks, by Lewis Lehe

Autonomous Vehicles

by Paul Noth for The New Yorker

Assorted Links

1. Cities bask in spotlight at Paris climate talks
   
   
2. Why drivers in China intentionally kill the pedestrians they hit ht Leo Monasterio
   
   
3. How complete is OpenStreetMap data coverage?
   
   
4. How the United States generates its electricity
   
   
5. A real-time map of cyber attacks via Flowing Data
   
   
6. Autonomous Vehicles Need Experimental Ethics: Are We Ready for Utilitarian Cars? via Cesar Hidalgo
   
   
7. A crowdsourced and open database for  wheelchair-accessible places
   
   
8. Seven days of carsharing in Milan (project website) 

Assorted links

1. Mapping LA's 20 Year Mobility Plan
   
   
2. Should Your Driverless Car Kill You to Save Two Other People?
   
   
3. 13 women who transformed the world of economics via MR
   
   
4. Color use in paintings, by year
   
   
5. Seagull Skytrails
   
   
6. Same BMI, different bodies (the problem with averages)
   
   
7. Ratio of Workers to Retirees Will Plummet Worldwide
   
   
8. Grid-based statistics in 3D using Three.js and D3.js.

The Transport Tech Revolution? Hold your horses!

There is an increasing buzz about the tech revolution that would happen in the transport sector in the next decades. Here is a glimpse of what I'm talking about.

In a more down to earth perspective, Tim Schwanen (TSU/Oxford) writes short piece with a few good reasons to expect the future of transport to look remarkably familiar. Here is his article.

Assorted Links

1. Beijing Quadrupled in Size in a Decade, NASA Finds
   
   
2. Delhi metro could soon run completely on solar power
   
   
3. 25+ Of The Most Majestic Libraries In The World
   
   
4. What the coast cities of US and China might look like if predictions of rise sea levels are confirmed
   
   
5. Great pictures of "International Borders Around The World"
   
   
6. Good Dani Rodrik powerpoints on labor migration (pdf) via MR
   
   
7. Self-driving Toilets might be the next 'invention' of Google
   
   
8. Google has built a virtual simulation of California to test its self-driving cars (via Francesco M. Cerroni)