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" The idea is that drivers will be able to choose how much control they want to cede to the car - there are two self-driving modes and two active modes - and that the car, in turn, will be able to adjust its driving based on data collected from connected devices. (The car is designed to integrate with Samsung's Artik IoT platform.) If you just logged a hard workout on your smartwatch, for example, the Instinct could automatically shift into an "autonomous soft" mode to let you relax."

"THERE ARE PLENTY of ways to get directions in the car, but most have one big shortcoming. Whether you're using a standalone GPS, in-car navi system, smartphone, the Apple Watch, or even a paper map, you have to look away from the road (you know, that thing you're supposed to be paying attention to when driving) in order to see where you're supposed to be going. So how to keep your eyes on the road and not get lost? One option is the heads-up display. Increasingly common on high-end cars, these devices project things like navigation directions and current speed onto the windshield, so the driver has important information right in their field of vision. It's a technology that's fast spreading beyond this incarnation, though: We've seen screens showing ghost cars for racers, and another that uses lasers to "paint" the edge of a road on the windshield in inclement weather. Then there are these wacky augmented reality concept goggles from Mini. One of the latest gadgets to enter the fray is something called the Navion, from Swiss firm WayRay."

"The very earliest automobiles used tillers to control their steering, but by the turn of the century the nascent car industry settled on using a wheel to control the steering, perhaps taking inspiration from boats. With the driver's hands busy steering (and changing gears via a lever), pedals soon found favor as the optimum method of controlling the brakes and engines. Along the years, concept cars have appeared with alternative ideas, often involving aircraft-inspired joysticks. Nearly two decades of Gran Turismo and its ilk have trained gamers to control cars using d-pads, buttons, and triggers. Then there's the even more outlandish stuff like prone driving positions, a la Batman and his Tumbler Batmobile. Have we learned anything during the last hundred-plus years of driving that makes more sense than Edwardian-era human-vehicle interaction?"

"That may have represented a pivotal moment in the long American romance with the automobile: In 2006, the nation had an average of .786 cars per person and 2.050 per household. Vehicle miles traveled peaked in 2004, with 9,314 miles per person and 24,349 miles per person. America had hit Peak Car. After 2006, car ownership and vehicle miles began declining. But the latest installment of this research, conducted by Michael Sivak, who heads the University of Michigan's Sustainable Worldwide Transportation research consortium-shows a hint of a rebound. In 2015, vehicle ownership rates ticked up 1.4 percent on average from 2012. Car ownership went from .744 per person in 2012 to .756 per person in 2015 and from 1.27 per household in 2013 to 1.95 per household in 2015. Distance-driven rates on average increased 2.1 percent, from 8,461 miles per person and 21,866 miles per household in 2012 to 8,648 miles per person and 22,311 miles per household."

"Traffic circles are ubiquitous in France, accepted as safer than traditional intersections. But they have also become an emblem of the country's ailments, from urban sprawl to inequality. France loves its roundabouts. They are ubiquitous throughout the country, including in Abbeville, a city of about 25,000. Credit...Aurelien Breeden/The New York Times By Aurelien Breeden Dec. 25, 2019 ABBEVILLE, France - Every day, about 65,000 vehicles cruise through the center of Abbeville, passing by its Gothic church, City Hall and rows of red brick houses, with many drivers on their way to the English Channel about a dozen miles away. But they never stop for a red light. None exist in this town of about 25,000 people. Instead, drivers bank, swerve and loop their way through traffic circle after traffic circle. Their ubiquity in Abbeville is an extreme example of France's unabashed embrace of the roundabout, found in abundance throughout the country and widely credited for making roads safer and less clogged. Even in Abbeville, on a recent morning, workers in fluorescent orange vests and hard hats were breaking ground on yet another traffic circle, as cars were backed up by the construction. Roundabouts played a central role in the Yellow Vests protests, when demonstrators occupied hundreds of the nation's roundabouts, blocking traffic as a way to demonstrate against a despised fuel tax increase in particular and a growing sense of inequality in general. But France's relationship with them has in some ways soured, their very pervasiveness making them a convenient scapegoat for many of France's ills, real or perceived. Pierre Vermeren, a French historian writing in Le Figaro last year, said roundabouts were a "symbol of ugly France" and the "emblem of French malaise." There are no official statistics, but estimates of the total number of traffic circles in France range from 20,000 to 50,000. In the United States - about 18 times bigger and five

"BMW has created an urban-electric motorcycle called the BMW Motorrad Concept Link that syncs to riders' online calendars to get riders to where they need to be."

"De la même manière que l'industrie automobile produit chaque année des concept cars sensés contenir en elles les ingrédients des voitures de demain, des individualités proposent régulièrement de nouveaux concepts de véhicules. La principale différence à ce jour est que si l'innovation dans l'automobile est aux mains des industriels, les moyens de locomotion doux ne nécessitent pas les même investissements et permettent à des acteurs plus petits de prototyper et proposer leurs solutions. "

"When you think about it, the concept of an elevated road is not even that far-fetched: we have been doing this for cars for decades. It is odd, even, that it took us this long to get one, considering its overwhelmingly positive reception. It is one of those rare occurrences in Copenhagen where seemingly everyone is happy. Cars have not had to budge an inch, the lower level has been returned to pedestrians, and cyclists love it. Besides easing the transition from highway to bike bridge, it is a pure joy to ride."

""The whole building is geared towards pedestrians, subway and streetcar riders, and cyclists-there is no space for cars," the company writes in German on a store website. The location is next to a tram stop and a three-minute walk from a subway station; like other parts of the city, it's easily accessible by bike. Anything that customers can't easily carry away will be delivered from a new logistics center farther away (and soon, as with other Ikea stores, those deliveries will happen via electric delivery vans). "Our concept is that parking spaces are not needed, because there are no products to buy that require a car," the website says. The company's stores in other large cities are beginning to take similar approaches; there's a store in Manhattan that serves solely as a showroom. Without the need for parking, the building has room for other uses. "It influenced our design radically," says architect Jakob Dunkl, the owner of Querkraft, the Vienna-based firm that worked on the project, comparing it to another Ikea store in Hamburg that's a similar size, but devotes the top floors to parking. "Instead of two parking floors, we have two hostel floors. And there's a huge roof terrace which is open to the public." The ground level will house retailers from an older building that was displaced by the new construction."

"For those who are either unwilling or unable to own a home, self-driving van houses could become a convenient and affordable solution.  Soon, our mobile driverless vehicles may allow us to work from our cars and have our laundry and a hot meal delivered at the same time. In Los Angeles alone, it is estimated that 15,000 people are already living in their cars and in most countries it is perfectly legal to live in your vehicle. The consequences of autonomous home living are far-reaching. It could radically reduce carbon footprints and living expenses by combining all transportation and housing needs in one space.  The new need for overnight parking creates new economic and social opportunities. New types of pop-up communities will emerge with charging stations, retail stores, laundry facilities, restaurants, and social spaces. The freedom of a van-home lifestyle suggests new modes of living which include more leisure time and less time tethered to a job. The impact on cities, economies, infrastructures, inter-city travel, and the way we live and organize ourselves are immeasurable and scarcely completely imagined. As Volvo says "Why fly when you can be driven?" Soon you may be able to avoid airport lines and delays. You will be able to arrive at your destination rested and refreshed after being driven overnight in your personal portable bedroom."

Le philosophe Patrick Lin, directeur du groupe des sciences de l'éthique à l'école polytechnique de Californie (que nous avions déjà évoqué ici) revient dans une tribune pour Wired sur les problèmes liés à la programmation des choix éthiques des voitures autonomes. Au nom du principe d'optimisation de l'accident, confrontées à un choix, les voitures devront être programmer pour s'écraser sur ce qui peut survivre à une collision. Si la voiture a le choix entre s'écraser contre un cycliste qui porte un casque et s'écraser contre un cycliste qui n'en porte pas, il sera logique qu'elle choisisse celui qui en porte un, car ses chances d'en réchapper seraient plus fortes. Mais ce choix porte sa part d'injustice, puisque la voiture pénalise le cycliste responsable sur l'autre. Ne sommes-nous pas là en train d'introduire une mauvaise politique, s'interroge le philosophe, qui privilégiera ceux qui ne portent pas de casque ou ceux qui ont de petites voitures fragiles sur les autres ? Une autre solution, estime le philosophe, est de ne pas faire de choix délibéré. Et si la voiture autonome prenait certaines décisions via un générateur aléatoire ? Ne serait-ce pas la façon de mieux imiter la conduite humaine, surtout dans ces moments imprévisibles et trop rapides pour qu'elle s'y applique ? Mais là encore, l'argument ne semble pas pleinement convainquant, puisque si nous voulons une voiture autonome c'est pour qu'elle prenne de meilleurs décisions que l'homme… L'erreur humaine, la distraction au volant sont déjà responsables de la grande majorité des accidents… Pour optimiser les accidents, les programmeurs devront être capables de calculer les coûts attendus entre les différentes options possibles. Et déterminer qui à le droit de vivre et de mourir est fondamentalement un problème d'éthique qui nécessite d'être débattu avec la société toute entière. Et pendant que Patrick Lin

"Cities around the world are evolving and, as a result, urban mobility has become an ecosystem of connected modes of transportation. Moving around in cities, we travel in different ways, including walking, biking, riding public transit, and using cars. With the rise of new technologies and the on-demand economy, providing us access to whatever we want, whenever we want, transportation is no longer just a question of options, but of convenience and ease of use. With transportation on the edge of disruption, Daimler, the company that invented the automobile in 1886 and owns Mercedes-Benz, founded moovel to reinvent the concept of urban mobility. At moovel, we aim to discover how new technologies will affect the way we move tomorrow and connect the ever-changing state of urban transportation. moovel offers new ways to connect the urban mobility ecosystem with our three complementary products: moovel app, moovel transit and RideTap."

"attachez une maison derrière votre bicyclette. C'est en Chine que les équipes de People's Architecture Office ont eu l'idée de ce « camping-bike ». Dans un pays où l'accession à la propriété demeure très difficile pour une grande partie de la classe ouvrière, le concept a été bien accueilli. Car la maison-escargot est tout ce qu'il y a de plus confortable : un évier, une cuisinière, une baignoire, un chauffe-eau et des meubles multifonctions... "

"British architect Norman Foster has unveiled a concept to build a network of elevated pathways above London's railways to create safe car-free cycling routes, following 14 cyclist deaths on the city's streets in 2013."

"Pour prolonger les réflexions engagées dans mon précédent post sur la déconnexion comme avenir de l'automobile, je voulais vous proposer ces images des derniers concept cars Mini axés sur le camping. Plus, là."

"Dans mon précédent post je me demandais si les sociétés de VTC comme Lyft ou Uber pourraient amener à une nouvelle réflexion sur l'objet automobile. Cette question était née d'une récente campagne de Lyft proposant des visions très décalées d'aménagements intérieurs de voitures - voir là. Aujourd'hui j'ai eu envie de prendre le contre-pied de ma question d'hier en me demandant si les VTC n'allaient pas empêcher une nouvelle réflexion sur l'objet taxi et notamment sur son habitacle ? Je m'explique : la véritable innovation des VTC n'est pas dans le véhicule - ce sont des voitures classiques et très traditionnelles - mais dans la mise en relation d'un "chauffeur non professionnel" avec un client. Aujourd'hui ce modèle fonctionne bien et à ringardiser les taxis classiques.  Sauf que à trop insister sur cette mise en contact, on a oublie un peu vite qu'un VTC comme un taxi cela transporte avant tout des gens et donc des corps qui ont besoin de place, de confort et éventuellement d'un certain nombre de services que n'offrent jamais les taxis comme les VTC. La seule exception notable à cette règle étant en terme d'espace les fameux taxis londoniens. C'est d'ailleurs face à ce constat que les voitures traditionnelles était souvent peu servicielles et mal adaptées à beaucoup de demandes, que la ville de New-York avait lancé en 2007 un concours d'idées sur le taxi du futur (concours d'où sont tirés les concept cars de ce post) - voir là."

"Sans surprise, l'intermodalité tourne parfois au cauchemar. Les exemples abondent. Le car démarre quatre minutes exactement avant l'arrivée du train en gare, et il faut attendre le suivant 26 minutes de plus. Le trottoir qui permet d'aller de la station de tramway à la gare du RER est, en permanence, encombré de voitures garées. Le parking est accessible depuis la rocade, mais il faut marcher dans la pénombre pendant 10 bonnes minutes pour rejoindre la gare, etc."

"Les nouveaux services de mobilité fondés sur l'économie du partage, Etat des lieux en France en 2014 Article par Jean-Pierre Orfeuil, Economiste et spécialiste des transports, professeur émérite à l'Institut d'urbanisme de Paris, Université Paris-Est Créteil, président du comité scientifique de la Chaire IVM, France SOMMAIRE - Introduction                                                                                                                          I Le développement de l'économie du partage                                               - Économie du partage, consommation collaborative, consommations émergentes : de la contrainte écologique aux opportunités ouvertes par une nouvelle économie - Le développement de l'économie du partage : des moteurs qui tournent à plein, des verrous qui sautent. - Des pratiques un peu mieux connues, des zones d'ombre qui subsistent, un champ encore à baliser II L'automobile en France : un poids considérable dans la mobilité, des problèmes spécifiques pour des populations dans des situations spécifiques.                                                                                                                           III Le partage de véhicules en France : état des lieux, évolutions récentes - Introduction - Les plus pragmatiques : l'autopartage informel entre particuliers - Les militants historiques, en ville : l'autopartage institué - La location sociale de véhicules : une forte diffusion sur le territoire, mais des systèmes qui restent de faible taille dans chaque département - L'autopartage en trace directe : l'exemple d'Autolib à Paris - Les autres systèmes en trace directe : Car2go, Ha :mo, Wattmobile - L'esprit business des digital natives : la location de véhicules entre particuliers or