If you're going to block off lanes and install sensors why not just lay track and use streetcars? Rail is way more efficient. This has been a solved problem for the better part of two centuries.
The answer is that people want cars. They want to drive. They want to be taken directly from point A to point B without needing to walk to transit stops and switch buses/trains and face unpredictable schedules and delays.
Autonomous road infrastructure is a sensible, incremental improvement. And in fact city buses will tend to benefit from it the most.
EDIT: and yes, it's a completely reasonable question to ask why invest in special new kinds of roads when more people would be better served by public transit.
Or maybe just issue license plates with a different color to avs. Like taxis/public transport having yellow license plates in some jurisdictions.
> The answer is that people want cars.
Actually in many cities in the world, only a minor % of people own a car. And even those that do own a car don't use if for that many trips.
> They want to drive.
Driving in cities is almost universally hated and is proven to cause lots of stress.
> and face unpredictable schedules and delays.
Because in cars its impossible to have unpredictable delays, roads are always completely open and there is never any concention?
In most cities in the world, public transport has less unpredictable delays compared to driving.
> Autonomous road infrastructure is a sensible, incremental improvement. And in fact city buses will tend to benefit from it the most.
A sensible incredmental improvment are regular bus lanes with regular trolley buses.
Even if the claim (you need Europe density) wasn't trivially false, several parts of the US DO meet that level of density and could easily support good public infrastructure.
Or do you not know that in the early 1900s nearly every city had copious public transportation that was relied on by literally everyone in the city?
Seattle has a tiny amount of street car rail, but regularly pays out large damages to people injured by the rails.
For heavy rail, they don't often run in the road, parallel with the road, in the lane of travel. And when they do, it's usually in an industrial area that people aren't walking and cycling through.