The trend since COVID hit is commercial real estate has been suffering. Companies are discovering that having white collar workers working remote works better in many cases and workers have more time because they aren't stuck in their cars for a couple of hours a day. There are some office jobs that require someone to be there in the office, but quite a few don't need someone there all the time.
In California it's causing a housing boom in places like Bakersfield, as Los Angeles based businesses realize workers don't need to commute, people are moving further out because they can get more house for their money. A 2 hour drive to work is livable when you only need to do it a few times a year.
In the future I think downtowns will become ghost towns as the suburbs become an even bigger thing. Office space in tall buildings will probably be converted to condos for single people and childless couples who want to be within walking distance of downtown activities, but people will leave the city when they have kids.
Less desirable buildings will be abandoned and eventually torn down. In cities where the entertainment is not near downtown might see their former business core go downhill like Detroit's factories did.
Inner cities today have a lot of ethnic poor people and they will probably stay in decayed inner cities, but I suspect robotaxis probably won't serve those areas very well. The poor always get screwed over.
The suburbs might still have high car ownership, but they will be more and more electric as time goes on. The subrubanites will electrify before the poor do. The place where ICE will remain in service will be the poorer areas where people can only afford older cars nobody else wants and are underserved by other forms of transport.
Electric cars are the wave of the future because they are both cheaper to run but also better than ICE in almost every way.
I've seen Tony Seba's work and that of other people predicting future trends. The behavior of corporate and government purchasing can be predicted because they follow cost much more than consumers. They will almost always go with the option that results in the lowest costs over the long haul.
Consumers aren't that way. Look at the fashion industry. People spend thousands on something that should cost less than $50 and many more people want those thousand dollar items. It's driving a big counterfeit market. If the most expensive purse on the market cost less than $100 and there were no strongly desired name brands, there would be no counterfeit market.
Same thing with cars. From a cost point of view a Mercedes is a stupid purchase and a Lambroghini is completely insane. But there is a market for them because people will spend more money for something nicer. Sometimes insane money. If consumers were all rational buyers, all Americans driving Mercedes S class today would be driving a Chevy or Ford that fits their basic needs and nothing more.
When the car was evolving, most American cities had decent public transit systems that most people used. But as people got the extra money to afford a car, they bought one. Part of it was because it was more prestigious to be able to afford a car, but it was also more practical. Driving from point A to B was quicker than going down to the bus or trolley stop and waiting for the transport to come, then transfer a few times and finally get to your destination.
Another thing happened as people got their own cars. They could customize them the way they wanted. In some ways that was a way to show off their interests, humor, style to others, but it also meant a car they owned could be made to fit their needs in ways something that wasn't theirs could never do.
Some people's cars become rolling skips with fast food packaging all over the backseat, while others become offices on wheels, and still others become ultra organized storage mobiles. One of my neighbors is kind of OCD and he has tricked out his Toyota 4Runner with cabinets in the back where he can store anything he might need. He installed an aftermarket roof rack with a ladder mounted to the back hatch as well as a full sized spare on the back hatch.
One thing people like about having their own place is they aren't traveling in someone else's germnasium. Their car may not be pristine or even all that sanitary, but it's their space with their crud and not someone else's.
I do think that people will own fewer cars, but I don't think that car ownership is going to go away to the degree that people like Tony Seba think it will.
There's a limit to the urban exodus, and that's the human stomach. Urban environments brought people and society physically closer, making many different things accessible. And one of the biggest "industry" in urban centers is restaurants/food. People who live in NYC, SF, and LA are always talking about trying out new restaurants/foods. Most people don't want to live too far away from convenient access to grocery stores and restaurants (less than 30 mins?).
