Cars are killing machines — we all know that! — but do driverless cars need to be? No, says the city’s leading transportation activist.
Paul Steely White, the aptly named head of Transportation Alternatives, announced that his group is demanding that the coming fleet of automated vehicles be programmed to protect pedestrians at all costs.
“We were inspired because Mercedes-Benz introduced a driverless car and said it was designed to protect the driver at all costs,” White said on Brooklyn Paper Radio on Tuesday. “We think that’s the wrong way to look at it, especially in New York City.”
Under questioning from co-host Vince DiMiceli, White admitted he wants driverless cars to protect pedestrians to the point of even driving into other cars before jumping onto the sidewalk.
“Cars have airbags to protect the driver,” he said. “Pedestrians don’t have that.”
Co-host Gersh Kuntzman of the New York Daily News admitted that he always carries an airbag on him — in the form of that extra 20 pounds he’s carrying around his midsection.
That kind of self-effacing jocularity opened the door for our other guest, comedian Jenn Welch, to joke about her own neuroses and, of course, Donald Trump. Welch is co-hosting the upcoming comedy show, “What a Joke,” in Williamsburg on Jan. 20–21, after the inauguration of President Donald Trump (yes, I just wrote that).
Welch declined to talk about her dating life, which allowed Kuntzman to do what he does best: talk about his dating life.
“I see the face of God in an orgasm,” Kuntzman said.
It was all part of another great Brooklyn Paper Radio show — in its new timeslot live every Tuesday at 10 am. It’s also podcast — for your convenience — at Brook