I was having a discussion with a friend of mine who had flown in for the day from LA and was heading back to the airport via the Golden Gate Bridge (GG).  The GG, as of recent, is now 100% electronic tolling; one can prepay via FasTrak, Pay-by-Plate, or wait until a bill is sent to the registered owner via the picture that is taken of the license plate as the car proceeds through the toll.  What is the visitor/tourist supposed to do who has no previous knowledge of this?  In my friend’s case, the rental company will get the $6 bill and then forward it onto her, with of course, its own handling fee, which brings the total to a $10 minimum cost (hmmm, hope she doesn’t have to pay it before she gets to expense it…) to one trip over the GG, and if not paid in a timely manner, the rental car will then charge $20.  And, then my friend asked me, what about all the (poor) toll takers’ jobs that have been taken away by all this automation?

This topic of ‘robots taking people’s jobs away’ has been debated, deliberated, and in my opinion, disserving to the public.  Case in point – the GG toll takers who lost their jobs.  If the Highway Dept. were run like a business, then none of the toll-takers would have to lose their jobs.  Rather than doing the mundane of taking money and providing change/receipts in adverse weather conditions, exposing oneself to the many toxics sitting in the air on the bridge, and risking their lives every day (I don’t even want to research this one) – how ‘bout if they were retrained for one of the many following ‘downstreaming’ positions such as the analysis required (if it’s not already automated from the initial image taken) to input the license plate details in order to generate an invoice, or the handling, opening, and receiving payments from the millions of returned envelopes, or the maintenance of the cameras located at each lane, or the increase of humans needed to field the thousands of incoming daily calls.

I was having a discussion with a friend of mine who had flown in for the day from LA and was heading back to the airport via the Golden Gate Bridge (GG).  The GG, as of recent, is now 100% electronic tolling; one can prepay via FasTrak, Pay-by-Plate, or wait until a bill is sent to the registered owner via the picture that is taken of the license plate as the car proceeds through the toll.  What is the visitor/tourist supposed to do who has no previous knowledge of this?  In my friend’s case, the rental company will get the $6 bill and then forward it onto her, with of course, its own handling fee, which brings the total to a $10 minimum cost (hmmm, hope she doesn’t have to pay it before she gets to expense it…) to one trip over the GG, and if not paid in a timely manner, the rental car will then charge $20.  And, then my friend asked me, what about all the (poor) toll takers’ jobs that have been taken away by all this automation?

This topic of ‘robots taking people’s jobs away’ has been debated, deliberated, and in my opinion, disserving to the public.  Case in point – the GG toll takers who lost their jobs.  If the Highway Dept. were run like a business, then none of the toll-takers would have to lose their jobs.  Rather than doing the mundane of taking money and providing change/receipts in adverse weather conditions, exposing oneself to the many toxics sitting in the air on the bridge, and risking their lives every day (I don’t even want to research this one) – how ‘bout if they were retrained for one of the many following ‘downstreaming’ positions such as the analysis required (if it’s not already automated from the initial image taken) to input the license plate details in order to generate an invoice, or the handling, opening, and receiving payments from the millions of returned envelopes, or the maintenance of the cameras located at each lane, or the increase of humans needed to field the thousands of incoming daily calls.  The toll-takers, the knowledge and experience of the tolls, can easily be used for the preceding tasks.

And what about a possible boost to the local economy?  Traffic is now moving at an increased speed of 10 miles per hour, and no longer stopped at the GG.  That means less time spent in traffic, and thus for some people, more money.  For others, it is money savings, as there is less gas and wear and tear on their automobiles on the daily commute.  Both allow for more disposable income to go back into the local economy.  And, more jobs are created by this shift in automation – there will be the need for the GG to invest in more sophisticated software and computers to deal with the massive amount of auto-billing.  The manufacturer of the cameras and electronic transponders will have to increase their quantities and provide more parts to replace all those that are now working 24/7.

Now that there will be an increase in revenue for the GG because it can handle more cars per day than the previous stop-and-go, perhaps this will help to pay for the GG’s bridge maintenance, providing new work to others.

Sometimes the question is: do the ‘old’ workers want any of the new jobs?  Perhaps not – perhaps it’s time for retirement and automation was the impetus, but please don’t blame technology on ‘taking a job away’.  Instead, how ‘bout focusing on how SF rental car companies are ripping you off!

P.S.  (For those who miss their human toll takers, what about having each camera with a name tag of a human toll taker, including dressing it up on holidays?)  (Get used to it!!)