Those Atlantic articles seem like bogus trend pieces. The main evidence they cite is that the percentage of car sales to youth has declined—not surprising given the aging of the population in recent decades. As for the “suburbs empty[ing] out,” that isn’t actually happening. Suburban populations are still rising, just relatively slowly compared to the growth of cities.
And driverless cars are a boon especially to suburban areas, since they make commuting less annoying (and potentially, much faster).
Those Atlantic articles seem like bogus trend pieces. The main evidence they cite is that the percentage of car sales to youth has declined—not surprising given the aging of the population in recent decades. As for the “suburbs empty[ing] out,” that isn’t actually happening. Suburban populations are still rising, just relatively slowly compared to the growth of cities.
And driverless cars are a boon especially to suburban areas, since they make commuting less annoying (and potentially, much faster).
Certainly. I think there’s multiple overlapping trends feeding the final results, but the cited stats could be purely cyclical or cherrypicked.
And the total population is still growing, which means a shift.
This can only happen after autonomous cars are accepted and widespread for ordinary driving, hence it doesn’t matter to my argument about acceptance.