| THURSDAY, AUGUST 4, 2016 | THE STRAITS TIMES |

A25
SOCIETY DIVIDED STORMS A WAY OF LIFE FOR HONG KONG A26
S.E.A. VIEW ASEAN ECONOMIES NEED POWER OF ONE A27 THE STRAITS TIMES

Alan Chan Heng Loon
SPH Chief Executive Officer
Patrick Daniel, Anthony Tan
Deputy Chief Executive Officers
Elsie Chua Executive
Vice-President (Marketing)
Low Huan Ping Executive
Vice-President (Technology)
Chua Wee Phong Executive
Vice-President (Circulation)
Ignatius Low Managing Editor
(English/Malay/Tamil Media Group)
Warren Fernandez Eugene Leow Digital Editor
Editor-in-Chief Audrey Quek Foreign Editor
(English/Malay/Tamil Media Group) Lee Su Shyan Business Editor
and The Straits Times Editor Marc Lim Sports Editor
Chua Mui Hoong Opinion Editor
Sumiko Tan
Executive Editor Lydia Lim Associate Opinion Editor
Peter Williams Art Editor
Paul Jacob, Helen Chia,
Rahul Pathak, Ravi Velloor, Stephanie Yeow Photo Editor
Ivan Fernandez Liaw Wy-Cin Forum Editor
Associate Editors Fiona Chan Managing Editor
Lim Chuan Huat Night Editor

The Straits Times says

Treating streets as public spaces

O
rthodox thinking frowns upon any street closure,
diversion or narrowing as inconveniences that
motorists should be spared. A citys arteries need
to be kept free-flowing, but when roads form
about 12 per cent of total land use and motor vehi-
cles rule, one must also ask how an equitable bal-
ance can be struck. Cars glide dominantly every-
where, even in and out of buildings, while pedes-
trians have to scamper out of the way, suck in pol-
lutants and struggle with uneven surfaces, kerbs
and poorly connected pathways.
What is emerging in many cities is a progres-
sion away from the narrow view of streets as con-
duits for cars and towards a notion of streets as
places, as noted by the New York-based Project
for Public Spaces. The ambitious ask for streets to
be transformed into grand boulevards or to serve
as the town square which existed in many com-
munities before it was converted into yet another
carpark. While urban mobility remains important
here, the Urban Redevelopment Authority recog-
nises the potential of selected streets to become
temporary public spaces that can be utilised
meaningfully by communities. A liveable city,
which is the guiding vision of the Sustainable Sin-
gapore Blueprint, is rightly one that puts people
first, especially when carving out and shaping
spaces in dense areas.
This is a necessary step to help rekindle the vi-
brancy of local life in places that people might
gravitate towards. Alas, many such spaces that
were once part of the cultural and social con-
sciousness of people no longer exist. Some hap-
pened to be inconveniently sited (like the old Na-
tional Library building in Stamford Road) or need-
ed to be sanitised (like the old Bugis Street).
One might transform places with redevelop-
ment zeal and plant infrastructure there with rev-
enue-earning potential. That would not be far re-
moved from the mercantilist approach of the
islands former colonial rulers. Or one could
acknowledge that throbbing public spaces are an
essential part of the high-quality living environ-
ment envisaged within todays masterplans.
Hardware might come together perfectly in
some spots while others might look colourful out-
wardly, yet these would be barren without peo-
ple. Hence the need to spur more street activities
that can attract widespread participation. Exam-
ples are outdoor dining in Haji Lane and Club
Street, and the Singapore Wellness Associations
PlaystreetsSG events. Without community in-
volvement, even a gilded district could appear life-
less most of the time.
Green public spaces have grown over the years,
and, thankfully, theres also greater awareness of
the need for well-designed spaces for people to
gather for a host of reasons best determined by
the community rather than by officials. Public
spaces thus energised can perk up the citys spirit.

population is driverless or until all

drivers learn to give way to buses
(neither is likely any time soon), we
will still need a bus driver to stick
his hand out the window to request
for right of way. Like lift operators,
the bus driver will also serve to put
commuters at ease, even if he does
not need to drive.
While commuters did not seem to
have any qualms getting on board
the North-East line when it opened
13 years ago, a train is a different
kettle of fish. Because even in a
manned metro, commuters almost
never see the train driver.
Still, having a driver on board may
prove useful in a situation such as
the one that spooked Bukit Panjang
LRT commuters last month when a
train failed to stop at three stations.
The anxiety could have been
averted if there had been a driver on
board, and if the system allowed him
to apply the brakes manually.
What about driverless cars? Well,
until we reach the driver-off level of
autonomy, drivers will still be able
to resume control of the car (like in
an aeroplane). Most carmakers are
working on this assumption. So the
steering wheel and pedals will be
around for some time.
But not Google. Google believes
all that is needed in its driverless
car is an emergency stop button.
But US regulators are forcing the
information giant to include
HomeFront steering wheel and brake pedal in
its pod-like robotic cars. That is

Bumps along a driverless road

Challenges lie not with technology but with
public willingness to accept autonomous cars
cars are quite capable of getting
along fairly well without a driver in
many situations. In time, they will
be able to do so in every situation.
Rather, the challenges lie with
public willingness to embrace this
new and alien concept. It is one
thing to pronounce something as
Christopher Tan safe (and superior), and quite
another to convince the general
Senior Transport population that it is.
Correspondent Would you board a pilotless plane
if Boeing made one, even if experts
said there are fewer variables in the
The challenges facing autonomous sky than on the road? Now, imagine
vehicles lie not with the readiness booking a cab, and one appears
of technology. As demonstrated in without a driver. Would your
ample trials in Europe and the US, granny, for that matter your mum,
get on board even if it was not the
Seventh Month? Would you?
Early lifts had human operators
on board who controlled them with
a lever. With technology, lift
operators became redundant. But
not overnight. Many building
owners still employed them for
years to help or put older users at
ease.
This is likely to be the case for
autonomous cars. The US National
Highway Traffic Safety
Administration divides
autonomous driving into four
stages: hands-off (car can keep its
distance from another and stay in
lane); eyes-off (car can react to
some emergency situations);
mind-off (driver can relax during
entire trip); driver-off (vehicle can
operate completely without a
driver on board).
Although autonomous cars have
been on trial for nearly 10 years now,
no one has conducted a driver-off
journey on public roads yet.
Accidents involving cars in
so-called autopilot mode
including one which killed a Tesla
owner in May could be a sign that
there are still bugs to be ironed out.
Yes, companies like BMW and
Mercedes-Benz are aiming to
launch fully autonomous models as
early as 2021. But how many will
they sell?
Beyond fear of the unknown,
public acceptance is also likely to
be hindered by cost. These
new-tech cars are likely to be far
costlier. In Singapore, the cost
difference will be magnified by the
taxation scheme.
Singapore is ever eager to adopt
new technologies if they result in
better efficiency, though. The
North-East MRT line, for instance,
was the worlds first high-load
driverless metro when it opened in
2003. Whether it is actually more
efficient is still questionable, since
driverless trains often take longer
to come to a halt at stations and
their doors take longer to open.
This eventuality might manifest
itself on the driverless road too.
Example: Many of our bus routes
require drivers to make multi-lane
changes within very short
distances. Because a driverless bus
will have safety as its overriding
program, it will always err on the
side of caution, and end up being
stuck at a bus stop.
Until the entire vehicle
good news imagine someone
hitting the e-stop button at a
railway crossing, or if the e-stop
does not work as intended for one
reason or another.
One other big hurdle that might
impede the success of autonomous
cars is the willingness of consumers
to share.
Professor Carlo Ratti, director of
the Senseable City Lab at the
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, famously
hypothesised that if all vehicles
were autonomous, Singapore could
see to all its mobility needs with just
one-third of its vehicle fleet. Its a
scenario the Government is all
excited about.
But that is feasible only with one
huge assumption: that people
would be ready to car-share and
ride-share. Prof Ratti says that
journey times would not be
significantly lengthened. Even if
the public buys this hypothesis,
how many people will be open to
sharing something that has for the
past 130 years been private?
christan@sph.com.sg

Why Chinas government wont stop Uber-Didi deal competition by prohibiting

Adam Minter
The biggest winner in Ubers
decision to sell its Chinese business
to Didi Chuxing, its fierce local
rival, appears to be Didi Chuxing.
Didi not only eliminated its top
competitor but gained a veritable
monopoly over the worlds biggest
market for ride-sharing services.
The only remaining question is
whether the Chinese government is
willing to grant it such dominance.
And Didi has little to fear on that
count. The ride-sharing industry
has presented Chinas government
with a host of challenges including
serious political and social strife
and the plight of consumers hurt by
reduced competition simply isnt
high on its list of concerns.
In Chinas biggest cities, choked
by traffic and taxi monopolies, the
arrival of ride-sharing has been
transformative. Take Beijing:
Between 1994 and 2011, the citys
population increased from 11
million to 20 million, yet licensed
taxis increased by only 10 per cent,
to 66,000. Perhaps unsurprisingly,
Beijings cabbies have acquired a
reputation as some of the worst in
the world. Taxi-hailing and ride-
sharing apps offered a cheap and
clever solution to this problem, and
quality of life improved as a result.
But that improvement came at a
cost. Recorded taxi strikes in China
surged from 62 in 2011 to 263 last
year. In Shenzhen, where licensed
cabbies claim that ride-sharing has
cut their monthly pay by half, a
strike in January effectively
immobilised the city. Thousands of
drivers in at least a dozen other
cities walked out the same month.
Making matters worse, the labour
strife is compounded by class
divisions: Most ride-sharing drivers
own their cars, while taxi drivers
must rent theirs.
All this has placed the authorities
in a delicate position. As in other
countries, taxi companies in China
are usually protected monopolies,
and often owned by a local
government or local officials. In
most cases, they make money by
charging rental fees to drivers. Didi
and Uber were undercutting this
comfortable arrangement by
subsidising fares thus luring both
drivers and customers in a fierce
war for market share.
Some local governments cracked
down on the newcomers,
occasionally sparking riots. Others
threw their support behind apps
that hired drivers licensed by the
old monopolies. But for the central
government, the preferred
approach was simpler: Eliminate
competition. Doing so would limit
the subsidy wars, mollify angry taxi
drivers and critically increase
the governments leverage over the
remaining player(s).
Last year, regulators allowed Didi
to merge with its largest domestic
rival, Kuaidi, despite concerns
about how the deal would affect
consumers. Last week, they issued
rules that effectively outlawed
ride-sharing companies from
setting prices below cost to push
out competitors or dominate the
market. That means local
governments can now negotiate
pricing and other concerns with
Didi without having to worry about
anyone undercutting the deal.
Thats clearly a win for Didi. Its
probably a win for Uber, whose
investors will retain a 20 per cent
stake in its former rival. And (for
now) it seems like a win for Beijing,
which badly wants the benefits of
ride-sharing without the
disruptions that go along with it.
The only losers will be consumers,
who will likely be facing higher
fares, less choice and worse service.
Chinas passengers, in other words,
are once again being taken for a ride.
BLOOMBERG VIEW