Autonomous vehicles are one of several mega-disruptive technologies “everyone knows” will have a significant impact on real estate going forward. And “everyone knows” if investors do not factor the future impacts of autonomous vehicles into their underwriting, they are doomed to failure.

Indeed, for the past several years, the real estate press has been peppered with articles discussing the implications of the coming era of autonomous vehicles or, more colloquially, “driverless cars.” It is an attractive vision. It would be wonderful to have all of the benefits that are likely to flow from driverless cars, and I am sure the real estate industry will be able to successfully adapt to accommodate them.

But what if the inevitable triumph of autonomous vehicles does not happen? Or the inevitable takes much longer to manifest than people are currently expecting? Is this Luddite heresy? Or simply prudent skepticism?

After all, nuclear power was once thought