I’m 78 and my driving is fine. I don’t like driving at night, and given that I’m not employed I can arrange my life to do most of that in the daytime. (Occasional nights out with friends, or a play or whatever, but everything else, daytime.)
My father drove until he was 87; again the amount decreased and the nighttime hours went to near zero, but we kids weren’t on him because of his driving (yet). Yes, we saw diminution, but he wasn’t dangerous, although we could see that in another couple years we might have to have “the talk.”
Didn’t come to that, he quit voluntarily after a very minor accident in a parking lot (two cars parked opposite each other both backed out at the same time.) He gave it up and went with the retirement home bus after that.
But again (and I feel like I have to say this every time) TaaS will be a convenience for some slice of the population. I expect it will even be big enough to affect car sales by some observable but minor percentage. I don’t think it’s credible that it is going to end the way people use or think of automobiles for a long, long time, as some are predicting.
But is it? I don’t know you, so can’t know. 1poormom thought her driving was fine. I hadn’t driven with her for a long time, so I didn’t know. When she ended up in the hospital with a hairline crack in her pelvis, they quickly did a neuro consult. I knew she was word-searching, and making notes about everything, but I didn’t realize she had a major problem until then. The neurologist said she should ever drive again, and -in Phoenix- if you can’t drive you can’t live alone. She (and I) didn’t expect that. I expected more of a fight, but it was surprisingly easy to get her to move to an elder facility and let me sell her car. (Which revealed an accident history I was unaware of.)
Point being…perhaps have someone else assess your driving. It may be totally fine, or not. Self-judgment probably isn’t reliable. Maybe arrange to take a driving test through the state, or even a driving school, just to be sure.
I understand, but I’m pretty sure I’m capable of deciding. I had my last accident in 1976. (I’ve been rear-ended twice since then, but both times while stopped at a light, so…I kinda think those don’t count.)
And I drove with Dad several times while he was in his 80’s. He was a tad slower, but then he compensated for it by being more careful, and there was never a time when I was worried about it. Still, we children had conversations about it and figured he had another couple/few years before “the talk” but he took himself out before it even became necessary.
I think I’ll be dead and buried. But I still care because I told my daughter that she won’t have to drive when she’s an old woman.
I think the transition will be pretty messy with human-driven and autonomous vehicles sharing the road. Expect to see lots of drivers yelling at autonomous vehicles who don’t care.
Autonomous vehicles, especially if operated in taxi service, will drive the speed limit because they would be seriously liable in an accident where they were traveling faster.
I would say that about 90% of the time traffic flows faster than that when humans are in control. So yes, expect lots and lots of fist shaking at cars “going too slow”, which as you point out, won’t care.
