This is a rhetorical question. Of course it could. I've ridden driverless trains in at least three countries - the technology is unquestionably available, proven, and safe.
Is it possible politically? That is the real question. Perhaps not, but let's not pretend it has anything to do with technology.
I cannot speak for BART, but in NYC the MTA has been trying to automate its trains for many years (since the early 90s for the latest effort) and has only barely been able to keep everything working on the one line chosen for the pilot program -- and that is one of the simpler routes in the system. While I am sure that automation is possible and that the technology is available, the MTA seems to be making all the wrong choices, and I would prefer to have human operators until some minimum technical competency can be established (we can start with this: trains that can reliably announce their position on the line, without needing a human being to set things up -- one would think this is a bare minimum for automated service).
So ... lots of people have a financial stake in automated trains not working, and for some reason MTA is moving in a direction that consistently doesn't work. Quite a coincidence there.
It is a coincidence only. The MTA has been engaged in various labor-reduction initiatives and has been steadily reducing the size of its workforce for years. Beyond automated trains, the MTA has been building "master towers" (with a long term goal of having a single control center for the whole system), repeatedly trying to remove the need for conductors (and then being told by the fire department that one man is not enough to evacuate a train quickly enough), removing token booths, etc. The real pattern with the MTA is hiring incompetent engineers, particularly software engineers -- their payroll system is in a miserable state, they have yet to computerize their system for recording when trains arrive in stations, bus stops still lack information about when the next bus will arrive or even where that bus is, and the attempt to modernize their communications system went bust in just one day, leaving everyone running back to their older office (across the city) just to handle the radio traffic. You might say that there are financial interests in holding back some of these projects, but for the most part the MTA's M.O. is to hire contractors who fail to deliver, then pay them more to continue to fail to deliver, and then abandon the project and hire the same contractors to fail elsewhere.
I'm just guessing but I think the main difference is between building a system from scratch vs working with an existing system. While the cost of strikes is high, so is the fixed cost embedded in the current system.
My train was halted this morning due to a man waving a gun around. Between that and other previous incidents involving other riders, I am quite grateful there was a person operating the train.
I wonder if TechCrunch articles could be automated. Have the TC editors ever bothered to ask, or are they too afraid of the interests of the contributors to explore the question?
If everyone could just email their PR pieces to a common techcrunch email address, someone could write a bit of code to check any links and then bung the text and pictures into an article template on the homepage.
Except there are lots of examples of successful train automation -- the article mentions several.
Plus, the author may not have initially known much about how hard it is to run a train, but they weren't expressing their own opinions -- they found experts and asked them how hard it would be.
It's lazy and disingenuous to pretend anyone involved in the article was expressing opinions about things they knew nothing about.
BART is already automated. The "drivers" just make announcements, check that the doors don't close on someone's leg, and press the emergency stop button if the computer goes badly awry.
This is the same kind of "automation" that is in place at most mass transit systems in the US (sans DC, which still uses human operators).
The requirement of having that human operator is typically born strictly of labor requirements first, and not necessarily the need of having someone's hand over the "Oh shit" button.
Sans New York also -- with one exception, all of the MTA's trains have human operators, and the majority have two-man crews. It has been possible for a single person to operate the MTA's subway trains for decades, but attempts to do so on "full length" trains (most lines; shuttles and the G are the main exceptions) have generally resulted in failures to meet safety requirements e.g. evacuating passengers quickly enough during a fire. It is overly simplistic to claim that this is strictly about labor requirements; while the TWU certainly works to keep its members employed, there are many other factors, at least in NYC. Also notable are the various attempts to increase automation, which have failed not because of the union, nor because of technology not being up to the task, but because the MTA does not know how to hire competent engineers for its projects (despite having billions of dollars available to pay them).
The 'Oh shit' button is not something we can reasonably expect the driver of a 'partially' automated train to be able to press: humans just aren't good at maintaining attention for these sorts of tasks with half-second reaction times once every fifty years of service. They can occasionally make useful decisions about edge-cases that represent small chances of failure (like wet-rail operation), that it is possibly for the automated operators to fail to account for.
The human driver instead serves as a sort of last-ditch assurance that the transit company values human life sufficient that a jury wouldn't destroy them in the event of an accident. He performs a sacrificial function by being the first one to die in the event of a crash, at which point it becomes a tragedy for the operator company, milliseconds before the people behind him die, at which point it becomes a tragedy for the passengers. There is no point, therefore, at which a disaster can be seen as a tragedy for the passengers but not the operating company, a position which is fraught with political-legal consequences in the US corporate and municipal environment, ever obsessed with liability. The driver's failure to respond adequately is implied to be at least partially the fault of the late driver, sufficient to draw fire until the panic dies down.
Absent liability issues, we would all be riding perfectly safe labor-less cars and trains, which were perfectly safe because we insisted on using them once they were mature enough to be safer than individual automobile drivers, and learned from each crash that happened afterwards, and improved our algorithms iteratively. Instead, every time we have a crash we blame the algorithm's existence rather than tweak it, switch to using a more human-intensive mode, let the automated infrastructure rot, add weight to our trains, and decry the tragic no-fault coincidence of driver inattention and algorithm failure that doomed the driver and the passengers.
The DC Metro was designed for full automation. Rather than implement the automation and improve on it over time, the predictable initial failures resulted in scaling back the automation partially and later fully and now it's not even a realistic capability, the infrastructure has degraded.
I don't know of many other heavy-rail systems where the control system has full authority over the control of the train. Most systems can stop the train if the operator exceeds the safety limits, but it's up to the operator to do routine things like stop at a station, open the doors, and accelerate away from the station.
Same for London's DLR (Docklands Light Railway). I remember whe the drivers went on strike, the trains simply ran without the babysitters. Nobody died or lost any limbs that day.
"BART was one of the first U.S. systems of any size to have substantial automated
operations. The trains are computer-controlled via BART's Operations Control Center
(OCC) and headquarters at Lake Merritt and generally arrive with regular punctuality."
They should be. Artificially keeping jobs alive that are better, safer and cheaper performed by machines is bad for everyone in the long run, even the train drivers.
BART is already almost automated: the train drives itself. The "drivers" only close the door, and stop the train if something unexpected happens. Some other light rail systems around the world run with no drivers on board at all.
The progress of automation will certainly result in complex social issues, and the entire concept of employment may have to be rethought.
But keeping a small number of people pointlessly in their old jobs is not the right solution. Why should a few people receive $66-92k per year in welfare just because they used to drive a train, while other unemployed people and the homeless do not? It would be more fair to share the tax funds between all unemployed, regardless of whether it was due to a new automated train system or not.
Same reason for anyone in that situation: The sooner they learn/do something else, the sooner they can acquire a new useful skillset, instead of dragging on their now useless one. It's not like this is an intermediate problem and if we just subsidize them long enough, there'll suddenly be a need for train drivers again.
Since 1985, Vancouver has had a 100% automated metro system ("SkyTrain") which has expanded to three lines (soon 4) and about 65 KM in track (soon to be closer to 80).
Almost any metro system could be converted to be automated but SkyTrain was built to be 100% computer-controlled from the get go. To switch from manual to electronic control would likely lead to enormous interruptions and it is unlikely that the unions in charge would accept it. It also isn't a matter of just updating the trains but it also means building sensors at all stations to detect intrusions and it also means changing signal controls. Needless to say it would be a bad idea and likely would just cost money.
In 2001, we suffered a prolonged transit strike that stopped all local bus and ferry service. However, the SkyTrain system continued to operate as normal albeit without any staff at any of the stations.
I would like to see all forms of transportation automated as long as it is proven safe. Trains have to be one of the easiest to automate since it runs on a track. If Google can automate a car which needs to avoid potholes, idiot drivers, construction, snow, rain, etc, I think we should be able to automate trains.
I'm not from the bay area-- do the train operators seem to have any public support? I feel like it's hard to sympathize with striking workers who are already among the highest paid in the country for this line of work.
The most recent polls show 68-77% of the public are against yet another union strike. In terms of general public opinion, there are, of course, contingents of uber-liberal/uber-conservitive outliers on either end; but the majority of the public are simply fed up with what is perceived as an increasingly petty and entrenched stalemate with little transparency as to what is actually being negotiated.
BART employees and their unions say salaries are too low for the (high) cost of living in the area, and should be increased by 23% to correct that. However, BART (and increasingly, the public) argue that BART jobs require no technical skills or education (beyond a HS diploma) and are benefitted and secure jobs already paying far above the average wage for jobs of similar (low) skill levels; and in light of the context (economic and otherwise), only a 4% raise should be granted. The percentage raise rates have gone back and forth on both ends, but that's the general gist.
I'm not from the bay area either, but have you see the rent prices out there? Just seeing how much rent prices over the last 20 or so years have increased, mostly because of the tech industry, it's easier for me to sympathize with them.
Caltrain seems to operate on the principle "users are the enemy".
I wanted to travel between San Francisco and Santa Cruz, where my family is. Driving, that takes about 2.5 hours depending on traffic. In theory, the mass transit way of doing things is to take Caltrain from SF to San Jose and then a bus over highway 17.
Here are some of the problems I encountered.
- Caltrain leaves once an hour. This is forgivable, but incredibly inconvenient, and the express train (same distance, half the time) leaves much less often. It would matter less than it does, except...
- I once arrived at the station on time, saw people being let through the gate, bought a ticket, and was turned away from the gate by the guard. The people I had just seen were clearly visible on the platform, walking to the train. But hey, why not make me sit in the station for another hour.
- Multiple times I experienced indefinite delays as the train just sat on the track in the middle of nowhere, unmoving. No explanation was given.
- Caltrain arrives at (and leaves from) Diridon roughly once per hour. The highway 17 bus leaves from (and arrives at) Diridon roughly once per hour. They've been anti-synced: the bus leaves about ten minutes before the train arrives, and the train leaves about ten minutes before the bus arrives. The only explanation I can even imagine for this is that whoever set the schedule specifically hated the passengers.
The upshot is that you spend the better part of your day on what would have been a 2-2.5 hour drive. It's not even feasible to make the trip both ways in a single day.
The frequency of the trains will be increased once the trains are moved from diesel to electricity (will take 2 more yrs?), since the operating costs will decrease.
Whether the Caltrain schedule matches the highway 17 bus's schedule is not solely the fault of Caltrain -- it's either a 2 way street, or else they're both neglecting it, unless you have proof otherwise.
I have ridden MTA (NYC) and BART when they have stopped the trains in unpredictable locations for various reasons. For short stoppages, they don't say anything, but for stoppages more than 30 secs, they typically say something.
> Whether the Caltrain schedule matches the highway 17 bus's schedule is not solely the fault of Caltrain -- it's either a 2 way street, or else they're both neglecting it, unless you have proof otherwise.
You're talking about a bus route with two stops. The only thing it does is travel between Diridon station and downtown Santa Cruz. I'm assigning responsibility for the station's scheduling to the station, which is Caltrain.
Tangential point: I once got speaking to a taxi driver who used to be a tube driver. He said if you ever want to commit suicide, do it on the Victoria line. Although the traines have a driver in the cab, they are automated so the driver will be paying less attention and less likely to stop in time.
My understanding has been that the a significant role of a BART driver is crowd control as people get on and off. Some of that seems less automatable than the travel itself. I could easily be wrong about that, though, or automating the rest might be worth doing anyway.
Is it possible politically? That is the real question. Perhaps not, but let's not pretend it has anything to do with technology.