In Volkswagen's vision for the future of automobiles, not only cars drive themselves, but are not owned by their drivers; rather, they belong to a fleet from which they can be summoned anytime one is needed.
Could this be the solution to the current conundrum of urban transport? A large fleet of one- or two-seat electric cars for everyday usage, complemented by a restricted number of five-seat SUV's for longer-distance (or larger-packed) travels, could well be enough to meet the transportation needs of a whole city, much more economically than today's private-ownership model could ever accomplish – and without giving up user comfort, the main objection to nowadays public transport systems.
However, apart from technological requirements, it does remain open to question how the current – and indeed quite large – fleet of privately-owned, manual-piloted automobiles would be phased out, and whether the public would even approve of this new model, let alone agree to pay for whatever it would take to implement it.
