From Peter Cheney’s Globe and Mail piece about the rapid rise of the robocar, a passage about some of the conversion’s consequences, intended or not:

“Eliminating human drivers will have far-reaching social and economic implications. Entire industries (like truck and cab driving) may be wiped out. AVs will also dramatically reduce (and possibly eliminate) crashes – as safety experts can tell you, almost all accidents are caused by human error. This will shift the landscape for industries like body repair and auto insurance.

‘There won’t be very many claims,’ says [Canadian Automated Vehicles Centre Of Excellence Director Barry] Kirk. ‘But there won’t be much revenue, either. There’s not much risk to underwrite.’

There will also be a direct impact on the medical system. Treating car crash victims is a major industry. A decline in crashes would sharply reduce the supply of human donor organs available for transplant – the largest supply comes from drivers aged 18 to 30.

Autonomous cars will have a positive impact on congestion – they can operate at optimum speed and spacing, maximizing traffic flow. They can also be used with networked control systems that optimize traffic flow by commanding cars to take optimum routes, and letting each car know what other vehicles are doing. This type of networked traffic system has already been developed for aviation – the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NexGen) is starting to be phased in across the United States.

Google has studied the impact of human drivers on road congestion by using what’s known as Agent-Based Simulation – computers model traffic on a road system, and determine how flow is affected when a percentage of drivers engage in behaviours like tailgating, speeding and rapid lane switching. As the research has shown, these drivers have a significant impact on traffic flow.”