Man, I love ya, but your lack of intellectual precision in your arguments is just exhausting to have to rebut every single time, and these diversions do nothing to move our conversation forward.

Deep down, you know you love it. ;)

You REALLY think we won't be making most of our utility trips in automated vehicles in under 20 years?

Nowhere in our entire conversation have I contested that we won't. In fact, we've been talking as if it's a given. We're just arguing over whether it's gonna be small personalized vehicles or mass transit and the merits of both.

How can you, with any intellectual honesty, conflate those two completely different resource streams into one measure of value?!

The manufacturer pays for the metal, plastic, wiring, FMCSA testing, and designs the vehicle to meet the regulations appropriate to the vehicle in question. They sell the vehicle, and recoup their expenditures, plus profit.

The buyer pays for fuel, oil, maintenance, expendables, all the other operating expenses, and the depreciation in value of the vehicle itself as it gets used.

And yet, you devise a completely fictional "resource scale" that takes ALL of the expenditures by the company AND the owner - while still ignoring the environmental cost of the vehicle and its use - and try to measure the vehicle's value against this "resource scale". That doesn't exist. That drives neither the manufacturer or the owner, and never enters into their thinking or balance sheets.

I was trying to oversimplify using MPG as an example. What I'm trying to say is that if we look at mass transit vehicles like buses, in all seriousness, to the best of my understanding per person less metal, rubber, etc. will be needed to produce and maintain the vehicles.

My day job is in the telematics industry, dealing specifically with how to maintain and track the value of fleets of vehicles. I know the industry inside and out. And no, there is never a point where a large vehicle is less expensive than a small one. It may SEEM like it pencils out, but it doesn't.

I mean, at this point, since you stated it twice, I'll take your word for it.

Is there a stigma against buses? Maybe there still is. But that's only because promotion of that viewpoint is funded by those who would lose from transportation infrastructure improvements.

There's totally a stigma against buses. In your own words . . .

And I don't know about you, but I'm not walking 5 blocks with bags of groceries, to ride in an overheated vehicle with non-opening windows, to sit next to insane/smelly/wonderful/tired/happy/unhappy people.

The dirty, crazy, impoverished bus riding customer is like a fucking trope at this point and it's kind of crazy to me that that's a thing since I see tons of business people and college kids at bus stops all the time.

Public transit works.

Totally does. That's why I keep bringing it up. Mass transit. In the city. Where we're gonna see automation. You already agree with me. Once again, in your own words . . .

Will AVs be prominent in rural areas? No.

Which means, you and I are both talking about cities. Cities. Cities. Where there are already bus routes. That can be expanded by adding more buses, more bus stops, designated bus lanes, altering traffic lights to accommodate for traffic, and so on and so forth. This is a regular fucking debate for our county because we need to expand our bus lines and I've read the arguments about how it's very doable and won't cost much but people are against it. Here's where it gets crazy, not because of cost, but heaven forbid bus lines go to the suburbs, cause poor people.

So yeah. What WILL happen, and is already happening, and has happened thousands of times before with any new technology, is that the rich will get it first. Then it will expand to accommodate more and more people.

Which, we're in agreement, in a way, because I'd argue that cities are probably more willing and able to pay for automated vehicles than individuals. The computers and technology and testing is gonna make them hella fucking expensive at first, which is why Tesla's first three vehicles were all in the premium car price range. A city is probably more likely to spend $600,000 on an automated bus than an individual is willing to spend $150,000 for an automated car (both prices pulled out of my ass but I know regular buses are about $450,000 already). There's a buying efficiency there.