Will Robocars Kick Humans Off City Streets? - The Atlantic

Whenever people go from one place to another, they don't think much about the roads and sidewalks that pass beneath them. But this infrastructure, known as the public right-of-way, doesn't work by magic. It is managed and regulated by specific laws. People don't own the roads they travel on, but streets and sidewalks provide an easement--a right of use or passage separate from that of ownership. For example: a single-family homeowner usually owns the sidewalk that flanks a property, particularly if that sidewalk falls behind a tree-planting strip that separates it from the street. By local standard or writ, the homeowner grants an easement to the general public to use the sidewalk, utility companies to use the curb where utility lines run, and so forth.