Taxi plates? Bad luck or greed?

Discussion in 'Other Asset Classes' started by TMNT, 24th Jul, 2018.

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  1. #house

    #house Active Member

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    The entire taxi plate system was a bubble. Taxi plates could be traded and sold. This led to 'investment' in plates which inflated them beyond their value. All bubbles burst. Ultimately I believe the government should never have allowed taxi plates to be traded. Instead drivers/operators should have been required to pay an annual non-transferable licencing fee

    The unlicensed taxi model was illegal, but absolutely begging to happen with the development of GPS and self-driving cars. Why not? Most people can drive a car.

    As the government has demonstrated a lack of foresight, I believe that some compensation is reasonable.
     
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  2. jprops

    jprops Well-Known Member

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    Well.. we won't need taxi drivers... or uber drivers. And we won't need very many cars anymore for that matter... So car production will plummet... along with the jobs that support them.

    But they'll likely be more fuel efficient and traffic will be a thing of the past.
     
  3. jprops

    jprops Well-Known Member

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    Oh and dont forget about all the truck drivers. Pizza delivery drivers. Can you think of any more?
     
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  4. LVR

    LVR Well-Known Member

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    how will driverless cars mean less cars?
    I cant see how that will happen. People will still need to get around, and public transport just doesn't cut it for many.
     
  5. jprops

    jprops Well-Known Member

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    My driverless car drives me to work early. Drives home, takes wife to work and kids to school. No need for 2 cars.

    I can imagine that uber itself will be driverless and it would be far cheaper than today's rates. Families may not need a car at all.
     
  6. LVR

    LVR Well-Known Member

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    an uber car still carries passengers whether it has a driver or not.
    The worlds populations are only increasing and in many if the developing Countries the new middle class want - and are getting - cars. You can make every one of them driverless but they will still have a passenger. I dont think driverless cars will improve anything. It is just another of those situations where we humans can do something just because we can - not because it is necessary or even that useful.
     
  7. jprops

    jprops Well-Known Member

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    I'm not sure what point you're making there.

    My point is not that people will use cars less. People will probably use cars more. But they won't necessarily own them. Each car will be utilized maximally rather than parked in a driveway or in the street.

    This article is good 73 Mind-Blowing Implications of a Driverless Future
     
  8. Stoffo

    Stoffo Well-Known Member

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    If Govco were smart (so never going to happen)
    They (being us) would own and supply all driveless cars.
    I get a ride to work (tap on and off Opal style, even having the option to select private ride or to share) someone else gets in and travels on to their destination and so on, literally a car on every corner working 22 hours a day on ratation (not 2 cars in every garage)
     
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  9. Blueskies

    Blueskies Well-Known Member

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    I can just picture such a system implemented by Government:

    -woefully short or massively too many fleet of cars
    -delivered a decade late at five times market price
    -run at a loss for tax payers
    - have some buggy IT system
    - poorly funded in non-marginal seats
    - periodically kills someone
    - registration that is unnecessarily tied up in red tape and for some unknown reason linked to mygov or Centrelink
    - simultaneously hated by both the left and the right

    It is a great idea for the future, but it must be the private sector that brings this vision to life, Governments job is to get out of the way!
     
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  10. Rolf Latham

    Rolf Latham Inciteful (sic) Staff Member Business Plus Member

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    we would all be in Mahindras and Cherys, but paying for Benz :)

    ta

    rolf
     
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  11. TMNT

    TMNT Well-Known Member

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    I personally Thoguht the obike idea was the most ludicrous idea for Australia.
    I did the numbers on the back of a napkin and no matter how I manipulated them, it didn't work...

    Apparently it works in Asian countries
     
  12. TMNT

    TMNT Well-Known Member

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    Why is uber illegal? Is it illegal because of no other reason than the government doesn't like it?

    Frankly, it seems the reasons why taxi drivers and plate owners are all complaining becasue the service and products offered are generally crap in multiple ways.
     
  13. PKFFW

    PKFFW Well-Known Member

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    Even with the state of driverless car technology as it is right now, if it were implemented Australia wide the number of car accidents and the resulting number of deaths or severe injuries would plummet to quite literally near zero.

    Human error is the cause or a major contributing factor in close to 100% of vehicle accidents. I'd say eliminating that would be a very useful thing. The costs saved in medical treatment, rehabilitation, emergency services response, investigations, legal costs, insurance costs, etc, etc, etc would be huge. Not to mention the human suffering, both physical and emotional eliminated for not only the victims themselves but also their families and friends.

    As has been mentioned elsewhere, driverless cars could also be utilised to near 100% capacity. So even if driveless cars did not result in less km's actually traveled the fact that less cars would need to be produced to fulfill the same needs would be beneficial in itself.
     
  14. aussieB

    aussieB Well-Known Member

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    Now yous see how visionary the NT gov is ?
    There is no Uber here yet. We could see how stupid it is and how it would undercut our precious taxi industry.

    But the voice of the bloody people ! I tell ya! Sick and tired of taxis has made the gov think twice. Uber is going to start here now. I heard some guy at the coffee shop pronounce uber as you-ber. Thought I'd sell that as an advertisement headline to the company..
    Do You-Ber ? :p
     
  15. R.C.

    R.C. Well-Known Member

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    Presume you have little experience driving in more rural areas and have never collided with a suicidal kangaroo? As a driver who has hit a few roos over the years, can assure you that human error is not a factor, except for those that swerve to avoid them and end up rolling their vehicle. This is one area where driverless technology has hit a roadblock ATM, literally.

    Similar issue in suburbs and cities, albeit from human error caused by others. Think of DH cyclists going through red lights or weaving through moving traffic; pedestrians who have their eyes in their phones, poor vision / awareness, or drunk. Algorithms have a long way to go yet before they can predict the unpredictable. I agree though that death and injury will be dramatically reduced when many incompetent drivers are replaced by machines, and statistically it will be much safer as an occupant of the driverless car than outside.
     
  16. jprops

    jprops Well-Known Member

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    Simple.. driverless bicycles.
     
  17. KinG3o0o

    KinG3o0o Well-Known Member

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    no reason they cant co-exist.. and uber is not the only car-hailing services, there is lyft,grab etc etc. more competition = better for end users.

    tbh, only one who find car hailing services like uber illegal are people involved in the taxi industry. If uber is illegal then air bnb should be ban from the hospitality industry too. taxi drivers and companies are no saints.

    driverless car are potentially one of the most privacy invading & manupulative products of the internet of things..

    a company/government that knows where you go everytime u get on the driverless car.and everything controlled by a software.. so basically IF the government wants.. they can controll every single vehicle on to road to go to where ever they want when they want. because autonomous cars are driven by sensors/ai/software, there is no way around this tracking..

    Tesla is tracking people 24-7, even if u didnt purchase autonomous driving software.. its always recording...and uber obviously know what you are doing everytime u uses its app.



    also if u know anything about big corporation.. once they dominate a market.. its anything but CHEAP.
     
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  18. PKFFW

    PKFFW Well-Known Member

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    Presume incorrectly on both counts.

    I live in regional NSW and have for most of my life. My job sees me manage fire stations from the Upper Hunter area all the way to Broken Hill. I'm on the road most of the time. Done many hundreds of thousands of kms on country roads both day and night. I've hit 1 kangaroo in all that time.
    I agree with your general premise regarding it being difficult to predict the unpredictable. Though I disagree that most of these situations are actually all that unpredictable. The issue is that most drivers don't bother to consider the unpredictability of other drivers, cyclists and pedestrians. Instead the majority of drivers think that if they are doing the speed limit all else matters naught.

    Mind you, I'm not claiming that driverless car algorithms are perfect at present. Only that they are orders of magnitude better than almost all human algorithms.
     
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