Largest retirement community in the U.S. gets a fleet of self-driving taxis

I still believe the city is the best place to retire, with so many things to do and so many people of all kinds of ages, interests and values.” But after going through the last few weeks of deep freezes, too much ice to ride my bike or even go for a run, I can see the attraction of a nice warm place in Florida. And for the promoters of self-driving cars, I can see the attraction of a big, private gated community as a test bed

MNN’s Jim Motavalli saw this one coming, writing Seniors, not hipsters, will get self-driving cars first. And he nailed where they would get them:

Closed communities, with only a few roads, slow traffic and common destinations — the clubhouse, the supermarket, the library…Here’s the scenario: Happy Acres Retirement Village owns (or leases) a fleet of 10 self-driving mini-cars. As a homeowner, I can summon one with my phone and pay 50 cents a mile, get driven on my errands, and then send the car back to the motor pool, where it will park itself…We’ll see this at least in pilot form before 2020, guaranteed.

And much sooner than 2020,The Villages, the largest retirement community in the world, is getting self-driving taxis from Voyage. 

When fully operational, all 125,000 residents will have the ability to summon a self-driving car to their doorstep using the Voyage mobile app, then travel anywhere within the bounds of the community fully autonomously.

When it comes to making the leap to fully automated cars, trust in the technology is directly linked to the age of the consumer. More than half of Gen Y (56%) and Gen Z (55%) vehicle owners say they trust self-driving technology, compared with 41% of Gen X, 23% of Baby Boomers and 18% of Pre-Boomers. Further, only 27% of Gen X, 18% of Gen Y and 11% of Gen Z consumers say they “definitely would not” trust the technology, while 39% of Baby Boomers and 40% of Pre-Boomers say the same.

But it might be different in the Villages, where according to Alex French, writing on Buzzfeed, the people are pretty adventurous. Jane Gould, author of “Aging in Suburbia,” thinks they will catch on, and her research contradicts J.D. Power:

Polls show that even today, there is a surprising level of interest in the self-driving car among older people. Autonomous cars will find a ready market with Baby Boomers as they grow older or frail. In contrast to other types of innovation, it is the disenfranchised — in this case, those who cannot or should not drive — who could be innovation pioneers.