What’s next in trucking?

I agree, until they discover the meat in the seat is still cheaper than self driving trucks. If they can produce at 15 thousand dollar truck that self drives? It's over. They will stay with the cheapest option, and lowest input till then. A 300k self driving truck cost to much, and most drivers are to cheap.

We won't see fleets of self driving trucks in are life time. But they are coming eventually.

 

May God have mercy on our soles,,

 

I don’t think he will for some reason. We’re doomed.

 

I follow technological, advancements, and AI specifically… trust me dispatch and office staff are going to go before we go as truck drivers completely. Experts estimate in the next decade at least 60% of all current jobs being done by humans will be done by artificial intelligence and robots. And it will only increase from there. But yet somehow they say we’re all gonna be living some kind of easy luxury lifestyle I haven’t figured out how that part is going to work yet but that’s what they say.

I believe the current version of AI technology is probably capable of running a dispatch center quite easily. It just needs to be fine tuned. And perhaps advanced a little more to where it can deal with the more complex driver issues etc. but it’s coming.

Self driving trucks will be implemented in increments. Long straight shots out on the highway will be first with drivers finishing the loads off from there. Before it becomes completely driverless, there will have to be a lot of infrastructure, rebuilt and redesigned. Specifically shippers and receivers. I’d say it’s safe to say we got about another 10 to 12 years left.

 

At $300k, a driverless truck pays for itself in under 2 years.

Let's assume a "normal truck" costs $150k and drivers average $80k a year, which makes total employment cost $100k (health benefits, 401k match, etc). Even if the both trucks run the same loads, get the same fuel economy, same maintenance costs, etc - after 2 years the driverless truck costs $50k less.

That's before taking into account that the driverless truck doesn't have to follow the HOS, doesn't burn up time at truck stops to pee/eat/nap. Imagine an account of 15 trucks running from Milwaukee to Carlisle and back. Each truck does two loads a week. A driverless truck can make a leg in 1 day instead of a day and a half. Now you don't need 15 trucks, you can get everything covered with 12, possibly as few as 8 if the truck can be flipped around as soon as it arrives. Taking into account the extra yard trucks/drivers, if the driverless truck only costs $300k, it will pay for itself within a year.

 

Yeah, I’ve been hearing “There will be self driving trucks in five years” for over 15 years. I agree with the post that said we won’t see them in our life time.

 

Did u guys forget about 2022-2023? There was fuel over $7 a gallon

 

June 20 2022 in southern cali. That ain't a typo either