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Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City
- the-rc 1y agoI saw one of these on Chambers Street just yesterday afternoon, but it must have been in manual mode, of course.
- nine_k 1y agoDowntown Manhattan is the hardest-to-navigate area of NYC. I thought they would start somewhere in Midtown, where the grid is regular, streets wide, and demand for taxis still pretty high.
- bryanlarsen 1y agoWe already know that Waymo can handle regular American cities quite well. I woul expect them to spend most of their expensive human-supervised training and testing budget in the most unique locations, like downtown Manhattan.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- ryoshu 1y agoMidtown on a busy Saturday or Sunday afternoon with a driverless vehicle would be... amusing. No one-including busses-give af about traffic rules.
- Sohcahtoa82 1y agoI would expect an "automatic, but human ready to intervene" mode for development and testing.
- kccqzy 1y agoI saw them in downtown Jersey city right across the Holland tunnel. I guess that's where they are parked when the human operator is off duty.
- xyst 1y agoThe Waymo’s I see in Austin just circle the same path to pump the number of miles their fleet is training on. Unless they are on an actual ride. Is Chambers St busy during the afternoons?
- the-rc 1y agoNo, especially after congestion pricing, it doesn't get very busy. I assume the car was mapping the area and collecting background truth in general. Downtown and the financial district have interesting peculiarities, like the highly irregular grid and the patches of open air construction that have been in the middle of Greenwich St for many years, exposing tens of pipes and cables carrying who knows what.
- TulliusCicero 1y agoIt's fascinating seeing all the comments elsewhere anytime Waymo starts testing in another city along the lines of, "ah, but how will they handle X, Y, and Z here?? Checkmate, robots!" despite having already launched service in several other cities. Granted, NYC is the biggest city in the US, so maybe that sort of reaction is more reasonable there than when people in Dallas or Boston do it.
- nine_k 1y agoNYC is also one of the most regularly built out cities, in stark contrast to Boston, for instance. OTOH roads here may be 3 or even 4 levels high at the same point (e.g. where Manhattan bridge meets Brooklyn), and GPS is sometimes way off in canyons between skyscrapers.
- xnx 1y ago> OTOH roads here may be 3 or even 4 levels high at the same point And here I thought Chicago was complex with lower lower Wacker (just 3 levels). > GPS is sometimes way off in canyons between skyscrapers This is probably very challenging for human drivers using navigation, but probably no nearly as much of a problem for a Waymo car with onboard 3D maps of the entire operating area.
- cma 1y agoHD mapping gives much better than GPS I would imagine.
- hardwaregeek 1y agoYeah I’m skeptical that robots will ever be perfect drivers but the bar isn’t perfect it’s better than human and that’s certainly possible.
- TulliusCicero 1y agoYup, the data so far seems to indicate that Waymo is substantially safe than average drivers. Obviously it's not inclusive yet since the tech is still new (and while the study I'm thinking of was done by a third party, it's still Waymo that handed over the data and paid them to analyze it).
- hardwaregeek 1y agoI’m curious if autonomous cars will become targets for aggressive drivers. Like a driver isn’t going to be as scared cutting off a Waymo or tailgating one because the AI isn’t gonna get road rage or honk like hell. In some places I could see the Waymo’s getting severely bullied if that’s the case.
- k__ 1y agoIf they don't get any feedback, they might not get anything from it anymore.
- dazc 1y agoYou are on to something here. I have started driving a small car in the UK (Ford Fiesta) and have discovered it's a magnet for the road rage people (around 50% of drivers here). Firstly, I never back down and will come to a complete stop if slowing down doesn't work. Secondly, I have noticed these drivers feed off any reaction and that avoiding eye contact works very effectively, even if they pull beside you to have a childish rant.
- xnx 1y ago"Don't engage" are words to live by on the roads
- armarr 1y agoOr maybe the agressive drivers get a kick out of inciting a reaction, which they won't get from a robot
- dmicah 1y agoBut why would you tailgate a driverless car? I think usually people tailgate to intimidate the person ahead of them to drive faster.
- dazc 1y agoBecause that works every time?
- wonderwonder 1y agoVery cool. I wonder what scale it has to hit for this to become a profitable line item for Google and what their revenue targets are for it.
- the-rc 1y agoI think the problem in NYC will be getting medallions, assuming that's what self driving cars will need. There are already so many (too many?) taxis and car sharing drivers, after TLC's massive increases of the last few years. You can play a game, based on something I read about last year: stand at a corner and count all cars/trucks/for-hire. The first two combined are barely outnumbered by the last group. And the few times I checked, half of taxis and car sharing vehicles were empty. (Of course that's different at peak times or when it rains.) Will Waymo be allowed to add as many vehicles as they want, like a new class of cars, or will they need to buy out medallions from drivers? The former might undo all the progress in traffic relief that was brought by congestion pricing.
- mgfist 1y agoMan I love Waymo everytime I'm in SF. Truly feel like I'm living in the future when I sit in one
- StableAlkyne 1y agoBiggest thing I'm excited for is knowing what the cost will be ahead of time Which Uber used to provide... Until they were infected with tipping. Hell, I will gladly pay more than I would've spent on a tip (20%) just to avoid the hassle.
- whamlastxmas 1y agoMy worst personal quality is that while I tip extremely well for everything (like $15 for a $40 haircut) I absolutely refuse to leave tips almost always for Ubers. I will if it was genuinely good service, a clean car that doesn’t have a gallon of fragrance in it that I’m massively allergic to, and the driver either leaves me alone or has a nice convo with me when it’s clear I’m trying to engage in one, and drives safely. However the combination of these things is really uncommon, and I’m usually very unhappy with at least one aspect of the ride. On the flip side I very rarely take Ubers so my shitty obstinance here doesn’t have a big impact I was also really salty when they decided to make tips a huge part of it. I hate tipping culture despite tipping very well. And if you read the subreddit for drivers they are constantly complaining about how people tip, and complaining that even 20% is not anywhere near enough
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago> Until they were infected with tipping I and most of my friends stopped tipping Ubers in New York after ride-share drivers won hourly wage minimums.
- beeflet 1y agoJust don't tip then
- StableAlkyne 1y agoRemove the social obligation to subsidize poor wages and I would. Also remove the passenger rating system, because drivers ding you if you don't. But I suspect they will not do these things, hence why I would rather use a service that doesn't have this.
- Night_Thastus 1y agoI'm cautiously optimistic about this self-driving thing. Waymo at least seems to have figured out a lot of it. Would it be way better to make walkable neighborhoods, mixed-use developments, and reliable and frequent public transit? Yes. Yes it would. But, in lieu of that, self-driving has a lot of advantages in the long run, even if the technology isn't 100% perfect right now.
- xnx 1y agoIn most respects, Waymo is the modern version of reliable and frequent public transit, with a lot of additional benefits.
- mritterhoff 1y agoNot in terms of throughput though. Buses and trains still have em beat.
- xnx 1y agoThis is true for intersection throughput, but I bet full travel throughput (walking to the bus, waiting for the bus/train, walking to your destination) is the same or better with Waymo.
- standardUser 1y agoIn rural places, not only are there no buses or trains, there's hardly any taxis. Maybe during the day if you wait an hour or two, but you're not getting home at night without your own car. A couple robot taxis roaming around every rural country in the US comprehensively solves this problem.
- mritterhoff 1y agoAgree. Though I imagine the cost to run robot taxis in low density areas would be much higher than in high density areas, as there'd be a higher distance between rides, and so more wasted time and gas. I suspect that would slow adoption. Also if we dream big here, I wonder how robot buses would work in low density areas, maybe with dynamic routes and pricing?
- bsimpson 1y agoIt's insane that they need permits for 8 cars that have humans driving them in 2025, when they're already fully automated in SF. > We’re a tech-friendly administration Clearly not.
- asadm 1y agoI think caution is good here. We all saw what reckless admin + Uber did before they shut it down for good.
- ra7 1y agoNew York is a long way behind California in regulating autonomous vehicles. Fully driverless vehicles are also illegal there and it will require legislation for Waymo to deploy in the state.
- subarctic 1y agoThere's gonna be people driving them? What's the point then?
- starlust2 1y agoSounds like it's a person actively monitoring but not driving. The point is minimizing risk until safety can be proven.
- spankalee 1y agoThe permit gets them into the process for eventually deploying without safety drivers. That includes safety plans, emergency responder plans and training, and periodic reporting. They could just drive cars around like Tesla, but that wouldn't put them on a path to a fully autonomous service.
- bongodongobob 1y agoYou sound like a junior admin. "Why do we need to keep testing? It works in the SF office?" Because they are completely different environments.
- nickpinkston 1y agoIs this the first time Waymo is doing winter / snow testing at scale? I think some of the Pittsburgh-based self-driving firms may have tried this, but unaware how far they got.
- bryanlarsen 1y agoWaymo has done some winter testing in Buffalo NY.
- Workaccount2 1y agoWe'll see what happens when there is snow in the forecast. They might just call them all back for the storm.
- nickpinkston 1y agoYea, that's what I figured, but I also wonder how well anyone is driving in the slush and if the LIDAR / cameras are that disrupted by snow / ice / salt.
- jeffbee 1y agoThe game-theoretic aspect of this is interesting to me. A lawful robot will never make progress in Manhattan because the people will just walk across its path continuously, forever. To be an effective driver in Manhattan you have to intimate that you're willing to hit people, without ever hitting them. If humans believe that the Waymo will categorically never hit them, then the Waymo will never get a turn.
- convolvatron 1y agoits interesting. at beginning in SF the waymos would just stop cold anytime they saw a person or a bicyclist. now they're acting a lot more like a person. if I'm in the crosswalk they've started playing chicken just like a normal driver would, starting to go into the turn while watching to see if you're going to stop and give them the right of way. if you keep going, they will stop.
- jeffbee 1y agoThere are still plenty of humans in SF who are on to the nature of the game. A few of the shambling lunatics who inhabit the vicinity of 6th and Jessie know that they can just harass a Waymo and it will stand there forever.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- vinkelhake 1y agoI live in the bay and occasionally ride Waymo in SF and I pretty much always have a good time. I visited NYC a few weeks ago and was instantly reminded of how much the traffic fucking sucks :) While I was there I actually thought of Waymo and how they'd have to turn up the "aggression" slider up to 11 to get anything done there. I mean, could you imagine the audacity of actually not driving into an intersection when the light is yellow and you know you're going to block the crossing traffic?
- setgree 1y agoSemi-related, but just once in my life, I want to hear a mayoral candidate say: “I endorse broken windows theory, but for drivers. You honk when there’s no emergency, block the box, roll through a stop sign — buddy that’s a ticket. Do it enough and we’ll impound your car.” Who knows, maybe we’ll start taking our cues from our polite new robot driver friends…
- wahnfrieden 1y agoNYPD cops don't like enforcing traffic violations: https://i.redd.it/w6es37v1sqpc1.png https://i.redd.it/w6es37v1sqpc1.png (License holders and drivers on the road are up in the same period that summonses are down, too. Traffic is up since pre-covid.) Now that I live in Toronto we face the same challenges. Politicians may introduce traffic laws to curb dangers and nuisances from drivers, but police refuse to enforce them. As they don't live in the city, cops seem to prefer to side with drivers over local pedestrians, residents or cyclists who they view antagonistically. Broken window works for them because they enjoy harassing pedestrians and residents of the communities they commute into. So there is a bigger problem to solve than legislation.
- miltonlost 1y agoPart of the problem is we have police doing far too many jobs. We need to separate out traffic enforcement, mental health responses, and other works into their own focused units. Especially the mental health responses, as far too often police refuse to or (at best) don't know how to de-escalate in those situations.
- BowBun 1y agoSaw my first Waymo car yesterday in Manhattan (SoHo) and wasn't sure if it was finally happening! Super excited!
- boringg 1y agoI can't wait to hear how it goes in NYC -- its going to be a total cluster - with the significantly more chaotic behavior on the streets, bike scooters, pedestrians and then the oddness of the streets/aggressive driving necessary behavior. Give it one month if they saturate it too much there will be political blowback on waymos causing traffic chaos. Queue track record in SF as datapoints.
- lvl155 1y agoI don’t think people commenting and downvoting us realize how things are in NYC. Not only do you have to deal with insane chaos you also have to deal with malicious drivers. Hit-and-run in NYC is shockingly high because it’s a no-fault state. People don’t stop after accidents. It’s gotten really bad since the pandemic.
- HankStallone 1y agoI think some people pushing for driverless cars everywhere are assuming it will necessitate much stricter driving laws and penalties for human drivers to make their driving compatible with the robots. And they're fine with that, but they know it's not a selling point, so they don't talk about it.
- standardUser 1y ago> insane chaos Hardly. I live in downtown Manhattan. I used to live in downtown San Francisco and between the streetcars, cable cars, hills, and the extraordinarily large homeless population, it feels far more chaotic in the denser areas. NY by comparison is big, flat and orderly. I feel significantly safer as a pedestrian here than I ever did in SF. And it's a much more pleasant place to drive.
- lvl155 1y agoOk. I am glad you feel safe as a pedestrian but what does all that have to do with autonomous vehicles. I am native to NYC. SFO has 800K people. NYC is literally 10x the size. Nice comparison.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- jurking_hoff 1y ago[dead]
- massung 1y agoI haven’t lived in NYC, but I have lived in Boston. Isn’t the real concern winter? Has Waymo (or any other self driving tech company) shown that it can handle the snow well: non-visible lanes, downshifting to avoid braking, etc.? Definitely interested in how this turns out.
- adrr 1y agoThey tested in Buffalo last year and have in tested Michigan. https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/inside-the-self-driving-cars-youve-been-seeing-around-buffalo https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/inside-the-self-driving...
- massung 1y agoDidn’t know that. Good for them!
- tacticalturtle 1y agoEven if they never actually solve winter driving, they could just… not drive during the winter? If there’s a high probability of below freezing temperatures, cars can just make their way out of the city to some parking lot to hunker down. Or move them elsewhere in the country during the winter months.
- 1970-01-01 1y agoHaving a seasonal service is not a bad idea. The big problem with that is cutoff times. Too early and people will complain when they can't get a ride when no snow is on the ground. Too late and you're liable for everything that happens when the road is covered in thin ice or sleet, including leaving someone stranded. You will need very accurate weather predictions for operating over the winter months.
- tencentshill 1y agoGM and Ford do quite a lot of self-driving testing in Michigan.
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- Zigurd 1y agoGemini has an API for gesture recognition. It might come in handy.
- lvl155 1y agoNo chance Waymo can operate in many parts of NYC. Good luck getting through double parked cars in Astoria and elsewhere.
- starlust2 1y agoMaybe not immediately but gathering the data on those areas will eventually lead to their ability to drive there.
- lvl155 1y agoThat type of tolerance in moving vehicles will take at least a decade.
- guywithahat 1y agoThere's a great YC saying which approximately says "you should get the easiest customers first". They even made a video about it, saying tech startups sometimes try to go for the hardest customers to "prove themselves" and it just hurts their business. I sort of wonder if that's happening here. SF, Austin, LA, etc, are all great cities to build autonomous vehicle startups in. There are many more major cities which don't get snow, have minimal rain, and are well thought out in terms of driving layout. NYC seems like the most difficult city to operate in, and while I believe it's a lucrative market it seems like a mistake.
- bryanlarsen 1y agoThat's why Waymo started in Phoenix. They're well past that phase.
- fsaid 1y agoWaymo should add a thin layer of "assertiveness" for actual deadlock that their self-driving architecture could cause. While in Austin, I was in a Waymo that blocked 3 lanes of incoming traffic while attempting to merge into a lane going into the opposite direction. It was a super unorthodox move, but none of the drivers (even while stopped for a red light) would let the Waymo* merge into their lane. Thank God for the tinted windows, people were pulling their phones out to record (rightly so). It felt like I was responsible for holding up a major portion of Austin 5 pm traffic on a Friday. Wish it just asserted itself ever-so-slightly to get itself out.
- kjkjadksj 1y agoI find that in LA people routinely cut off the waymo or refuse to let it in. After all why not it is a robot, not someone who might legitimately harm you like a road rager. It also tends to fail the cultural left turns. That is, sending 2-3 cars left during yellow not just one like in other places. Seeing it stuck awkwardly in an intersection for another cycle from failing to make an assertive left turn is somewhat common. Waymo also avoids certain challenging environments by excluding it from its service coverage, namely hilly neighborhoods.
- dgs_sgd 1y agoI think we're going to see more examples of this as Waymo's popularity grows. Basically human drivers taking advantage of Waymo's far more passive driving style. Maybe some rules of the road will have to change, or the Waymos will get dedicated lanes to solve this problem.
- freeone3000 1y agoImagine if we had dedicated lanes for giant Waymos, that could hold dozens of people. The future of transport.
- dgs_sgd 1y agoI would like that just as much as the next guy but the problem of public transport cannot be addressed until you first address the problem of anti social behavior on public transport.
- primitivesuave 1y agoI exclusively use Waymo in SF, even if it costs a bit more than Uber. You'll most often get a great human Uber driver, but there's a very real possibility that the person is a bad/unsafe driver or the ride is unpleasant for a myriad of other reasons. With a Waymo, you know exactly what you're buying.
- mjmsmith 1y agoAs a regular bike rider, I'd rather take the lane in front of Waymo vehicle than a human driver.
- whamlastxmas 1y agoI would rather every vehicle be high quality autonomous than humans, I think if all cars could signal both their locations and intentions we’d probably never have accidents and save millions of lives
- beeflet 1y agoyou could just stick a transponder in the car, but it would be very dystopian
- whamlastxmas 1y agoYou mean like the one we carry on us 24 7?
- xyst 1y agoI would wager Waymo fails to integrate in NYC. Austin, and SF are child’s play.
- flappyeagle 1y agoHow much? What time horizon?
- Hilift 1y agoFYI if you live near a Waymo charging and cleaning station, it will be constant BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP and shopvacs running all the time.
- QuantumNoodle 1y agoLots of comments sharing their waymo experience, so I'll hop on the bandwagon :) I visited Austin for a work trip and went out of my way to get waymo rides for work events, reimbursed of course ;) , managed to score 3 rides. The airport is out the coverage map so I had a real person behind the wheel both ways. Objectively, the waymo was way safer experience because one driver was a local and drove like one (e.g. rolled through stop signs, drove past a long queue to merge at the end, etc.) and the other smelt like weed in the car. Luckily, both trips we arrived unharmed. In comparison, the Waymo drove pretty well, imo and very consistent. Nothing extra ordinary but no reason to stress. The difficult part of riding the waymo was all moral cope: it cost just as much (minus tip) as paying a real person, driving past homeless people under a bridge in an autonomous vehicle felt unsettling, and my driver from the airport in my home city was wonderful and hard working. I don't typically like to chat in the cab, and the driver didn't initiate, but I was feeling empathetic and guilty so I struck up a conversation. By the time I got home we were enjoying ourselves and the driver was sharing animal facts because I had learned he was a real enthusiast that could not make a living solely on ecology. We were laughing and joking around together. (Google, if you're reading do NOT try to replicate this experience with AI) I'm glad I got to try it and out of my system. Still would prefer trains or more public transit over more cars :p
- meagher 1y agoThis is great long term for having cars that follow traffic laws since human drivers in NYC are awful (kill/injure pedestrians, bikers, and other street users all the time). Not so great for getting cars out of NYC and pedestrianizing more of the city/moving towards more “low traffic neighborhoods” as I imagine Waymo and other similar companies are going to fight against these efforts. Edit: Lots of people talking about human drivers taking advantage of self-driving cars being more cautious/timid. Good news is that once you have enough self-driving cars on the road, it probably slows down/calms other traffic (see related research on speed governors).
- Workaccount2 1y agoBelieve it or not, NYC is actually the safest city in the country for pedestrians and bicyclists.[1] [1]https://www.wagnerreese.com/most-dangerous-cities-cyclists-pedestrians/ https://www.wagnerreese.com/most-dangerous-cities-cyclists-p...
- meagher 1y agoI’d believe it, but the fact that any pedestrians/bikers are killed/injured by cars in NYC is unacceptable.
- guywithahat 1y agoI mean if we required a license to own a bike in NYC we could see a significant reduction in injuries/deaths, same for pedestrians. Cars are already heavily regulated and likely aren't the underlying issue. There are many ways to interpret data, but one often comes to the conclusion that pedestrians and bikers are the root cause of most accidents.
- paulgb 1y agoCars are only “heavily regulated” in the sense that you pass a test once when you are a teenager and then never have to pass a test again, just pay a nominal fee to renew your license. I am curious what data you are looking at that gives you the impression pedestrians and bikers are the root cause of most accidents. As a frequent pedestrian / biker here, I see a car doing something unhinged about every mile I walk. On Wednesday I almost got hit by a car flying the wrong way down a one-way street and then running a red.
- enricozb 1y agoNYC is so dense it could be a bikers' paradise in the US. Why are we supporting even more car infrastructure :/
- mertd 1y agoBike infra is forever stuck in the limbo of building half-assed solutions and then complaining not enough ridership is taking it up.
- crazygringo 1y agoBecause half the year it's freezing cold or blistering hot? With CitiBike and so many bike lanes it basically already is a biker's paradise. Obviously there could be lots more improvements, but the people who want to bike already do.
- aziaziazi 1y agoEvery fall on Brussels there's an ad for public bikes. It reads "Ride a bike, it warms you up" (Faites du vélo, ça réchauffe).
- crazygringo 1y agoA slogan doesn't make something true. And more specifically, your torso can be roasting while the freezing wind is giving your face frostbite, and your legs are frigid. There's a reason why skiers wear face masks and huge goggles and snow pants. Not usually very practical in cities, however.
- enricozb 1y agoI doubt that people who bike their kids in baskets daily in Amsterdam would do the same in NYC, given how dangerous it is. The risk tolerance required to bike in NYC is much higher.
- SnuffBox 1y agoI hate to break this to you but outside of microscopic Reddit bubbles like r/fuckcars and similar, people generally don't have a problem with car infrastructure and cars as a whole and most people see cyclists as the vegans of the transport world.
- jackmalpo 1y agoif these take over, people are just going to walk in the street in front of traffic (even more) since they know they'll stop lol
- mritterhoff 1y agoPrioritizing pedestrian right of way sounds like a perk to me.
- mehlmao 1y agoOnce again, if you're going to test your self driving car on public streets, all data should be open and public. Car companies shouldn't be competing on how to prevent life-or-death incidents, they should be cooperating.
- standardUser 1y agoOnly one company still pushing for autonomous testing on public roads has not been committed to transparency, and it ain't Waymo.
- randyrand 1y agoForcing people to tackle the problem from different angles without sharing is the best way to avoid local minimum.
- pengaru 1y agoI hope Waymo can get their cars to stop blocking crosswalks and running red lights.
- afcool83 1y agoI live in one of the areas they are actively testing/training in. Their cars consistently behave better and more safely than most human drivers that I’m forced to share the road with. As semi-autonomous and autonomous cars become the norm, I would adore to see obtaining a drivers license ratchet up in difficulty in order to remove dangerous human drivers from the road.
- ethics13 1y agoIf only we can get autonomous cycles that also a danger to pedestrians and themselves.
- Natsu 1y agoIf you actually ride in one, you do notice some off behaviors that I didn't pick up while just driving alongside them. That said, I agree that the bad human drivers have done things far, far worse than any of the cars. The biggest gripe with riding in one is that they're slow, both because of super cautious driving and because they won't take freeways yet.
- mgens 1y agoA month ago I saw a Waymo turn left into a tiny alley in Palo Alto and continue at full 25mph speed, which was alarming. I guess the alley is marked as a regular road in the software? Highlights how even if it's safer than humans on average, they need to minimize these weird behaviors in order to get socially accepted and avoid $$$ liability when there is an accident.
- vesrah 1y agoNew speedbumps were installed in a school zone near my housing complex recently, we're a heavy Waymo area and I watched one of them launch itself over one without slowing down.
- potato3732842 1y agoThey installed one of those near my friends house. There's a couple mechanic shops in the vicinity used it for diagnosis while driving exactly the posted speed limit. It lasted about a month until the people who complained it into existence complained it out of existence.
- EasyMark 1y agoif it can do WDC or NYC it can drive anywhere
- awad 1y agoWhile it could stand to be more aggressive at times, especially at intersections, FSD works fairly well in NYC and can do all of less-than-legal-but-necessary things a normal driver can do (such as cross over a double yellow if there is a double parked car blocking the road) so I don't see why Waymo would have any trouble on that aspect at all.
- nosrepa 1y agoI'm mostly curious how they'll handle winter.
- ethan_smith 1y agoWaymo has been testing in snow conditions since 2017 in Michigan and more recently in Chicago, using specialized sensors and machine learning models that can detect road edges and lane markings even when covered with snow.
- Nelkins 1y agoI can’t wait until this is available in more rural areas of NY. I would love to be able to take this thing to/from a bar where there’s no public transport and very low density of Uber/Lyft.
- bravoetch 1y agoFunny to see people in this thread about human vs robot driving quality. Anyone that's zipped around ina waymo knows they're pretty great. We should be moving to ban human driving asap. It would be safer, and more relaxing.
- sureshv 1y agoHope this does well but the subway + walking is the way to go. Uber, taxis, etc are way too slow getting around manhattan per my recent trip.
- kevin_thibedeau 1y agoSo how are they going to make left turns on two way streets with heavy pedestrian traffic? It is essentially impossible to accomplish that in NYC without skirting the law to turn on red or impede on pedestrian space.
- onlyrealcuzzo 1y agoI imagine that at least most of the time it's possible to just drive a different route that takes more time. Is it not?
- brettgriffin 1y agoIt is, and this is what they will have to do. A lot of left hand turns in NYC - even in the outer skirts of the four major boroughs - cannot be made until the light has turned red, requiring a "New York/Pittsburgh Left". They will have to route the car around in a manner that allows it turn from the right in that intersection.
- paulnpace 1y agoWhile driving a car, it is possible to do something, even on accident, that can land a person in jail. These crimes do not have the option of paying a fine in lieu of prison time. A "self-driving" car can cause the same accident but gain advantages over a human driver that the person ultimately responsible is no longer held to the same set of laws. This seems to undermine foundations of law, placing the owners of those assets into a different legal category from the rest of us.
- hnpolicestate 1y agoHoping and voting for Mamdani in the hopes that he bans Waymo to protect drivers who are trying to earn a living.
- hnpolicestate 1y ago[flagged]
- bamboozled 1y agoMan I would Be nice if children could play outside again . Cars are the single biggest reason I don’t let my kids roam free
- diebeforei485 1y agoThis makes a lot of sense in the outer boroughs