This sounds great and all, but we need a solution right now, not 30 years from now.
If we built a massive, efficient, and effective mass transportation system right now, the big moving parts would probably be starting to break at right about the time that self-driving cars really took off in the best case. Because really, it is going to take some time to get that working.
Building more mass transit takes time. I can't tell you when automated vehicles will actually work. I think many people are overly optimistic about AVs. And naive about the risks they pose.
But I do think they will eventually work and will profoundly change everything.
What we should do is implement demand-based tolls for highway use and allow the marketplace to fill in the gap. We can get an efficient road system NOW. We don't need to invest more in command and control. We need a functioning marketplace. And that means dynamic pricing.
Seriously, such a system is in use in Singapore right now. And they have far less gridlock and more vehicle sharing. And they are switching to demand pricing for taxis too.
With the rise of electric vehicles, we are going to have to change how pay for roads. We should implement a system that also helps us manage demand and that keeps everybody moving.
The existing way of doing things is so bad, it's shocking that people continue to put up with it. It literally stops working twice a day in many places. That's completely unnecessary.
Self-driving cars in there own lanes on freeways would work right now. Convert carpool lanes on freeways to toll for self-driving cars. Maybe let people get a special license with a special training course and, if they can drive like a self-driving car (no fucking around, always have the right following distance, etc,) they can also go in the toll lane. As more and more self-driving cars come on-line (and every major car manufacture has the tech to do this already) convert more lanes to self-driving only. If you really want to get crazy, relax the passive safety features of these self-driving cars and they can be made very inexpensively.
Add cheap tunneling for future additions to the road network and cities can be super dense with individual, point-to-point, transportation systems.
If we built a massive, efficient, and effective mass transportation system right now, the big moving parts would probably be starting to break at right about the time that self-driving cars really took off in the best case. Because really, it is going to take some time to get that working.