12 ms·
Waymo in Portland
- two-sandwich 6mo agoThis is exciting! I wonder how they determine which cities are next in line? Probably regulation and governance?
- grubbs 6mo agoI think Baltimore soon. Seen them testing around the city.
- hdndjsbbs 6mo agoWouldn't Baltimore be the first Waymo market that actually gets snow? I don't think they've cracked driving in a real Midwest/northeast winter.
- tomwheeler 6mo ago> Wouldn't Baltimore be the first Waymo market that actually gets snow? No, we have them in St. Louis and it snows a few times per year here.
- hdndjsbbs 6mo agoLet me put it this way, I don't think they're operating in USDA Hardiness Zones of 1-5. https://www.botanicalinterests.com/community/blog/usda-hardiness_zone https://www.botanicalinterests.com/community/blog/usda-hardi...
- davidw 6mo agoPortland gets very occasional snow. But they'll probably just shut the Waymos down along with everything else that shuts when there's snow and ice.
- jrflo 6mo agoThey're currently testing in Minneapolis and plan to launch in the next year to the public, so they seem to think they can crack tough winters
- strictnein 6mo agoI really hope we're able to get them without the city council messing things up. The way they reacted to the news at first, you'd think Minneapolis was the first city to ever have autonomous vehicles. That, mixed with a heavy dose of "What about the buggy whip makers??"
- jrflo 6mo agoConsidering Minneapolis city council tried to ban Uber and Lyft entirely I have a strong feeling they’ll mess it up…
- vjvjvjvjghv 6mo agoWow. That will be a tough one. Driving on dry and even wet roads is quite predictable but snow is a completely different game.
- derwiki 6mo agoThey’ve been testing in Truckee, CA for years
- grogenaut 6mo agoportland gets snow
- lern_too_spel 6mo agoThey're in Detroit, Denver, Minneapolis, and D.C.
- Sleaker 6mo agoWe do get ice and snow in Portland, along with flooding and landslides. No, it's not the same as Midwest, but we do get a few days every other year or so that you just don't drive out in. The black ice around a couple curvy sections of i-5 are notoriously bad at night in winters. (Terwilliger)
- rootusrootus 6mo agoI have lived in the midwest, as well as Portland. It is good that Portland only occasionally gets ice, because in like-for-like conditions it is way more dangerous than the midwest. Primarily because of hills. I found driving in snow & ice in the midwest to be mostly a non-event, even on inadequate tires.
- whoodle 6mo agoThey’re being tested in Philly right now too
- xnx 6mo agoMultiple factors: market viability, climate compatibility, capacity, and definitely regulatory factors. Currently DC, NYC, Boston and Chicago are all being slowed down by anti-Waymo groups like Uber drivers and public-transit lobbyists.
- bojan 6mo agoWaymo is a sort of public transit. It's just an vastly more inefficient than any other form of public transit, but an order of magnitude more efficient than private passenger cars.
- smilekzs 6mo agoOr, more neutrally, a different tradeoff point between mass transit and personal cars.
- xnx 6mo ago> Waymo is a sort of public transit. Definitely, and at no cost to taxpayers. > It's just an vastly more inefficient than any other form of public transit Waymo is less efficient in the narrow case of transporting hundreds of people between two specific points at a specific time, but more efficient for almost every other case. If Waymo had dedicated right-of-way in the same way trains do, it would be more efficient.
- pavon 6mo agoDepends on your definition of efficiency. Any ride service will drive more miles thus resulting in more congestion and more energy use than personal vehicles, because in addition to driving from point A1 to B1, they have to drive from B1 to A2. They get closer with density but never match. They will also always be more expensive to operate per mile because you need to cover the cost of the driver (human or machine). The flip side is drastically fewer parking spaces needed, most of which can be located outside of the city core. And decreased costs due to fewer accidents.
- starkparker 6mo agoIf it's the latter then Portland makes little sense. There are no regulations allowing it and the bill to enable it is still in motion at the state level (and not a slam dunk). https://www.oregonlive.com/business/2026/04/self-driving-car-service-waymo-coming-to-portland.html https://www.oregonlive.com/business/2026/04/self-driving-car... > Hannah Schafer, communications director for the Portland Bureau of Transportation, said Waymo is welcome to map out the city streets. > “All they’re doing right now is basically taking pictures. Taking pictures in the right of way, anyone is allowed to do that. That’s not something that we regulate,” Schafer said. > However, she said the city would regulate the testing and driving of autonomous cars. > “No one can drive driverless vehicles in Portland without a permit,” Schafer said. “That is not allowed.” ... > Portland fought vigorously with Uber over the terms of its local arrival a decade ago and a battle is already brewing over Waymo. Portland council member Mitch Green staked out his opposition in January, telling constituents on Bluesky, “You should know I don’t support that.” ... > Oregon legislators considered a bill earlier this year that would have set statewide rules for self-driving cars, and would have prohibited local governments from imposing blanket prohibitions on autonomous vehicles. The bill died in committee following opposition from local governments.
- boc 6mo agoI've determined that my ultimate dream car would be something like a Rivian but with Waymo tech, so I can drive it manually when I want/need (snowstorms, off-road), but I can also let it drive me across the country at night while I camp in the back. Would absolutely change the way we move across the US, especially if you have hobbies that involve a lot of gear and equipment.
- quux 6mo agoThat's kind of a beautiful vision
- ge96 6mo agoThat would be something being asleep and waking up to a car crash
- ticulatedspline 6mo agoreminds me of an old joke: "When I go I want to die in my sleep like my grandfather. Not screaming and afraid like the passengers in his car"
- Polizeiposaune 6mo agoThe version I've heard a bunch of times had him as a bus driver..
- BenjiWiebe 6mo agoThe version I've heard: When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like Grandpa; not like Grandma, who died screaming "Look out for that car!"
- derwiki 6mo agoSnowstorms are probably when I’d most want self driving. Back in February driving from Tahoe to SF, they closed the road, not because of conditions, but because too many impatient drivers spun out. I trust Waymo to go the recommended speed and not get impatient.
- arnvald 6mo agoI wonder if at some point we'll see a hockey stick adoption of self-driving cars. For now every new city is worth a blog post, eventually they'll allow intercity drives. Will international adoption take off? Will I be able to use it on a country road to visit my family in 10 years?
- tootie 6mo agoThe inflection point will be cities building infrastructure and passing laws supporting self driving. Then it will hockey stick.
- conductr 6mo agoI'd assume so. Even the city launches are extremely limited to a section of the overall metro area that one would consider necessary for full local service. They are dropping a lot of seeds and then will allow them to grow. While it seems very slow, I have always enjoyed watching Google's taxi service GTM approach much more than I did watching Uber's.
- nickvec 6mo agoYou can definitely see a bit of a hockey stick forming in Waymo's reported rides per week. Nice chart in this article. https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/27/waymo-skyrocketing-ridership-in-one-chart https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/27/waymo-skyrocketing-ridersh...
- pavon 6mo agoIf Waymo's announcements come to reality, that is happening this year. Phoenix entered full service in 2020, then San Francisco and Los Angeles in 2024, and Austin and Georgia in 2025 (in partnership with Uber). But this year they are planning on rolling out in 13 cities! Miami and Orlando are already in full service. Nashville, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio are running invite-only service. Tampa, New Orleans, Minneapolis are in testing. San Diego, Detroit, Las Vegas and D.C. have been announced to launch this year, but haven't started testing yet. And that is on top of eight other cities that they are already testing in, but don't have timelines for offering full service. That is already a huge jump from two cities a year.
- Barbing 6mo agoStiff competition for humans, especially drivers outside the top quartile or so. Waymo appears to its passengers to drive much more competently than certainly any sub-average rideshare driver. Although I like jobs for humans, I hope these aren’t all just set on fire because there is promise in reducing fatalities. Want to find a way for offline vehicles that can go 65MPH to remain legal though. Without Flock every block either unless we (in USA) forget what the whole USA thing’s about. Edit: @Waymo would LOVE to see an industry-leading privacy pledge so good the EFF slaps their logo on it (even caveated), also your engineers are amazing
- georgeburdell 6mo agoRideshare drivers can speed
- dcre 6mo agoIs that supposed to be good?
- fainpul 6mo agoYES! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fm567YGy5c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fm567YGy5c
- whatgoodisaroad 6mo agoonce we've refactored humans out of driving, the speed limits can go way up
- cucumber3732842 6mo agoI don't think so. Engineers design a road for 55. Police say make it 40 for $$ and pretext. Public says make it 60. Karen says make it 30. Politician says they don't care as long as Karen stops screeching, the public doesn't hate them and the police doesn't hate them. End result ->45 Refactoring the humans out would only change a couple of the less influential inputs to that equation. It might actually make it way worse if the public loses interest.
- zerotolerance 6mo agoI feel like this post and most (if not all these comments) are an ad.
- lotsofpulp 6mo agoSelf driving cars are such a huge quality of life improvement that people would advertise it for free. I would rank it up there with mobile broadband and smartphones in terms of influence.
- nickthegreek 6mo agoThe amount of trips I would suddenly be interested in taking would skyrocket.
- xnx 6mo agoMy personal enthusiasm can come off this way, but I'm excited for it as a cyclist, someone whose brother was killed by a driver, and general cutting edge technology hobbyist.
- pkulak 6mo agoSame here, as someone who doesn't drive much, and is generally a "vulnerable road user". I've seen Waymos drive. When they screw up, it's by stopping dead under an abundance of caution. They never speed. They can spot a ped or cyclist from blocks away. Every time I take an Uber home, the driver is guaranteed to drive 40+ on the 20mph road in front of my house while blasting through crosswalks with people waiting to cross. The data is not really in yet (still not enough miles to really say if they are safer), but they pass the eye test. The rain will be a real test though!
- xnx 6mo ago> the driver is guaranteed to drive 40+ on the 20mph road in front of my house while blasting through crosswalks with people waiting to cross ...while high on marijuana and watching TikTok > The rain will be a real test though! Maybe, between the fog of San Francisco and the downpours of Miami, they Waymo Driver is very experienced.
- porphyra 6mo agoA Waymo was recently stuck on some light rail tracks in Phoenix this year [1]. Portland has a rather diverse bunch of streetcars and trams concentrated in its downtown core. Hopefully they don't get stuck on the tracks or block the trams. [1] https://www.azfamily.com/2026/01/08/waymo-passenger-flees-after-car-drives-phoenix-light-rail-tracks/ https://www.azfamily.com/2026/01/08/waymo-passenger-flees-af...
- walrus01 6mo agoDefinitely a big concern, but given the number of times in my lifespan that I've seen pictures or video of human-driven vehicles that have got stuck on railroad crossings (or just straight up drunk people trying to drive linearly down a railroad track)... I would be curious to compare stats of 100,000 hours of human drivers getting stuck on grade crossings or doing something dumb, such as trying to drive around crossing barrier arms, vs 100,000 hours of automated driving. I would bet the automated driver does a lot better. I recently saw a video from (I think not Phoenix) of 3 waymos that were next to each other blocking traffic in an intersection, refusing to move, because they were facing a traffic signal intersection where the signals had reverted to blinking red mode. Humans who paid attention when learning to drive will understand this means the intersection has reverted to a 4-way-stop due to the traffic signal failure. The problem is that multiple red lights were blinking in view of the waymos not in sequence with each other, so the waymos interpreted it as a alternating-blinking red railroad signal crossing, and all of them refused to proceed, even when it was their "turn" in a 4-way-stop arrangement.
- conductr 6mo ago> The problem is that multiple red lights were blinking in view of the waymos not in sequence with each other, so the waymos interpreted it as a alternating-blinking red railroad signal crossing, and all of them refused to proceed, even when it was their "turn" in a 4-way-stop arrangement. What's the hot fix for this? Are they just stuck until a tech can physically go out and reset and move them? Or can someone in a office somewhere remotely get alerted, look at the video feed/data, and override it with instruction on how to proceed? Silly stuff like this happens all the time even with human drivers, I feel like the important piece when hearing that the technology encountered an issue is how long did it take to resolve?
- jaredcwhite 6mo agoNice, looking forward to all the, ahem, creative protest to be done on the robocars if they ever do show up here. heh
- ortuna 6mo agoSo, these streets are so tiny and pedestrians are used to just walking out on crosswalks because most people stop at crosswalks
- alexose 6mo agoOh man... this will be so awesome as a pedestrian/cyclist. When I see a Waymo coming, I can actually have some reasonable expectation that it will stop for me!
- jeffbee 6mo agoEvery town says the exact same thing when Waymo shows up, and it's never true. There's nothing unique about Portland drivers, streets, sidewalks, or pedestrians.
- financetechbro 6mo agoThis is a false blanket statement. Portland has very short (walkable) blocks, many one way streets, and it is true that most often than not cars actively stop for pedestrians to cross the street
- jeffbee 6mo agoNone of those things are unique to Portland. Waymo already operates in San Francisco, Boston, and Philadelphia.
- ortuna 6mo agoI feel like I've lived in enough places and they're pretty small relatively speaking but whatever, seems like we'll see how it actually plays out. I'm not saying it's going to randomly speed up to 80mph and crash into a building and explode. Just that I'll finally have a chance to witness those hilarious videos in person
- arjie 6mo agoThat seems like a dream environment for these cars. They are very good about waiting for humans to cross. To be honest, a Waymo at the front in an intersection means that it's going to be much more relaxing as a pedestrian or bicyclist crossing. This is especially true in intersections with a no-right-on-red where Waymos will obey but human drivers in San Francisco rarely do.
- lraJah 6mo agoA population with more spirit to resist than SF. I wonder if they bring out the traffic cones. What will they tell the unemployed drivers? "Coal miners need to code" doesn't work any more. Become a data thief/labeler perhaps?
- Jblx2 6mo agoI wonder what percentage of people in Portland are resistors. Do they outnumber the homeless?
- SunshineTheCat 6mo agoIf they don't show up as green Subaru Outbacks with a bunch of bumper stickers on the back they'll stick out like a sore thumb.
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- well_ackshually 6mo agoThe same Waymo that says that they don't give a shit that they're stopping in bike lanes because their selfish passengers pay for it? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47912645 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47912645 Good luck to Portland getting fucked by Waymo.
- nickvec 6mo agoHuman drivers (especially Uber/DoorDash drivers) stop in bike lanes all the time without repercussion. Pointing the finger at Waymo for this doesn't negate the larger problem of it not being enforced by local traffic enforcement.
- QuercusMax 6mo agoI've personally reported a taxi driver for parking in a bike lane, and I hope he lost his cab license for it because it was really egregious. PBOT actually asked me for official testimony.
- josefresco 6mo agoI wonder how long Google will continue to subsidize this at a substantial loss? Estimated $30–40 billion spent in the last decade that only really pays off if they dominate the market.
- nickvec 6mo agoThey have the money to do so, and investors are aware that it is a long term play. Waymo is already dominating the market for all intents and purposes.
- persona_reuse 6mo agoIt's the Uber model. Operate at a subsidized low price, create stickiness, push out the previous generation, enshittify and raise the price, $$$.
- arijun 6mo agoAre they losing money on a per-ride basis? I assumed they had large R&D costs, but that each ride would be near break even.
- creato 6mo agoI don't think Waymo needs to dominate the market to succeed. They just need to scale up (time)x(number of vehicles) enough to amortize the R&D costs of the self driving capability. Paying a driver is a big chunk of a taxi/Uber's costs, so eliminating that leaves a lot of room to maneuver.
- tgsovlerkhgsel 6mo agoWaymo now generates more than $350M in annual recurring revenue, says https://ideas.darden.virginia.edu/waymo-fully-autonomous-future https://ideas.darden.virginia.edu/waymo-fully-autonomous-fut..., and quotes $130-150k per car. So one year of revenue buys ~2500 cars at those prices, which is roughly the size of their fleet (~3000 according to Wikipedia). It seems plausible that newer cars will be cheaper as designs get optimized, economies of scale hit and what used to be really expensive cutting-edge hardware becomes commoditized and goes down in cost over time. They certainly also need support including contractors that assist cars that get need human input, maintenance etc. and the electricity for the cars isn't free either, but just based on these numbers, it sounds like they are likely close to being profitable if you ignore R&D. If you assume $10 a ride, and a car giving 3 rides an hour for 12 hours a day, that's $360 in revenue per car per day, close to the $320 you'd get from $350M/3000/365. That means each car pays for itself in about a year (ignoring all other costs, of course). Based on this and the assumption that cars last for more than 2 years, I'd guess that Waymo is only "unprofitable" (not sure how this works in accounting terms) due to ongoing R&D and expansions and there really isn't much more to "subsidize".
- darquomiahw 6mo agoWhy would anyone take a Waymo when you can ride the Trimet MAX for $2.50?
- Jblx2 6mo agoBeing slow and inconvenient would be the main reasons. Less exposure to communicable diseases and other unpleasantness are secondary reasons.
- jeffbee 6mo agoBecause MAX is on rails it can and does come to a complete halt for indefinite periods of time whenever some jackass in an Escalade parks it on the track. I know this firsthand and I only lived in Portland for one month.
- QuercusMax 6mo agoAre you sure you're not thinking of the Portland streetcar? Max does not have nearly the same issues.
- persona_reuse 6mo agoMAX has dedicated right-of-way outside the city centers, but in the cities it shares city streets. Tourists drive / stop-at-lights in the dedicated lanes a lot. Streetcar is more susceptible to being stopped because someone parked over the white line, but with 20 minute headways it takes longer to cause a problem.
- oasisbob 6mo ago> Portland has always been a pioneer in urban design, balancing its independent spirit with a deep commitment to sustainable, forward-thinking living. People should research the racist history of American cities before publishing broad, vapid, and likely LLM-generated statements like this. If you're going to say a place has "always been a pioneer in urban design", you should take the time to acknowledge that Portland's early urban-design efforts were deeply racist and explicitly segregated. https://www.portland.gov/bps/planning/adap/history-racist-planning-portland https://www.portland.gov/bps/planning/adap/history-racist-pl... https://habitatportlandregion.org/the-early-history-of-portlands-racist-housing-strategies-part-one/ https://habitatportlandregion.org/the-early-history-of-portl...
- Ritewut 6mo agoI just wish the US would build trains. All I want.
- n8cpdx 6mo agoYou need density for trains, but Portlanders think it is a war crime to ask you to work from an office or tear down a dead mall to build housing, so…
- Ritewut 6mo agoPortlanders do not think this. Survey people in Portland and you'll find they want trains as well. NIMBYs don't and NIMBYs make up the majority of people who actually have the time and wealth to go to city meetings.
- n8cpdx 6mo agoI heard people in the kitchen at work whining about the loss of Lloyd center (dead mall) which is set to be replaced by 5,000 housing units.
- hackable_sand 6mo agoBut you didn't join the conversation, just listened from a distance and made assumptions?
- 28484848 6mo ago[flagged]
- Cider9986 6mo agoThank goodness that Waymo has no plans to use the cameras recording you in the car for targeted ads. I will feel so secure and private being recorded at all angles in a car I don't own and can't sue. "Waymo: ‘no plans’ to use in-car camera data for targeted ads" (https://www.theverge.com/news/644770/waymo-interior-camera-ai-training-ads-privacy https://www.theverge.com/news/644770/waymo-interior-camera-a...)
- fhka 6mo agoI also don't understand why people aren't more upset about the privacy issues. They have your whole travel data, your face, your voice, "private" conversations. And the people in the Philippines who can intervene in the "self" driving can comment on your bodily features if bored.
- bitpush 6mo ago> I also don't understand why people aren't more upset about the privacy issues. Because nobody is forcing you to take a Waymo? I dont think it is as hard to understand. Its like saying "You dont understand why people arent more upset about spicy food because your stomach cant handle it.."
- xnx 6mo ago> your voice, "private" conversations. Waymo microphones are only activated when you contact support.
- GuinansEyebrows 6mo agotruly not trying to be snarky here but i don't understand why you would place this level of trust in an Alphabet Inc brand.
- xnx 6mo agoOf all the organizations with access to my data (e.g. ISP, social networks, cellphone service provider, current US government, etc.), I absolutely trust Google the most. Do you think Google is lying about the microphone?
- starkparker 6mo agoFor context, this is coming in as TriMet is laying off staff, reducing service frequency, eliminating bus lines, and cutting parts of light rail routes due to a $300M budget shortfall. The cuts were exacerbated by state Republicans getting a proposed payroll tax repeal onto the ballot next month; TriMet relies heavily on payroll taxes that are deeply unpopular among the self-employed and small business owners, so the budget is going to get worse before it gets better. https://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/2026/04/trimet-officials-vote-on-major-changes-to-portland-area-bus-routes-shortening-of-max-green-line.html https://www.oregonlive.com/commuting/2026/04/trimet-official... https://www.portlandmercury.com/news/trimets-present-crisis-and-uncertain-future-48283837/ https://www.portlandmercury.com/news/trimets-present-crisis-... At the same time, Portland's city council is debating whether to cap the cut of driver pay that rideshare companies take: https://www.opb.org/article/2026/04/13/uber-lyft-driver-pay-portland/ https://www.opb.org/article/2026/04/13/uber-lyft-driver-pay-... So at the same time that public transit is retreating and rideshare company labor overhead is threatening to increase, Waymo shows up with a convenient solution to both problems.
- ptero 6mo ago> The cuts were exacerbated by state Republicans getting a proposed payroll tax repeal onto the ballot next month Sorry to nitpick, but why is the next month's ballot (and in general the issues that have not been voted on yet) affecting current service?
- starkparker 6mo ago> A scheduled increase to Oregon’s transportation taxes, including those that help fund TriMet, is on hold after an effort to repeal the hike secured enough signatures to send the issue to the ballot next month. from the Oregonian article I linked The service changes take affect in August, in large part because they can no longer expect the funding for them to exist by then. > “The agency’s current position is that they have to cut service now to avoid worse cuts later, although worse cuts may be coming later anyway,” Walker wrote. from the Mercury article I linked
- 6mo ago
- MostlyStable 6mo agoI wonder how large the footprint will be. I live in the greater Portland area, but not in the city proper. There are definitely situations where Waymo would be great, but my guess is that they won't start off serving my specific area.
- underdeserver 6mo agoThey didn't mention it was Oregon. Maybe they're rolling out to Portland, Maine?
- chung8123 6mo agoThere are definitely hints that it is Oregon on the page.
- TheGRS 6mo agoI'm a little sad to see this because I'm moving northward to Seattle next month, I've lived in Portland proper for over 16 years, and Seattle doesn't have Waymo yet. Great timing lol. Portland will probably be a great testing ground for them because generally speaking you have a lot of tech curious and tech averse people here living together. When we got electric scooters there were both tons of people using them and a lot of people throwing them in the Willamette. Pretty big artistic community that doesn't look kindly on AI right now. This has no real bearing on Waymo's success, but I'll be interested to see how they navigate the PR part of it.
- lotsofpulp 6mo agoWaymo has already been mapping Seattle for months. I don’t see customers in Portland having access before Seattle.
- llbbdd 6mo agoGod willing. Unfortunately Seattle has a recent history of award-winning marksmanship when it comes to turning its own feet into Swiss cheese. A few years ago we passed a brilliant gig worker minimum wage law which: 1. Caused rideshare pricing to skyrocket, resulting in 2. way fewer people taking rideshare trips, so 3. drivers end up making less than before, and 4. when you do take one, 95% of the time the driver pulls up two blocks away and plays chicken with you to capitalize on the minimum wage amount while doing the least and incurring the least miles on their car. Handshakes all around. I'm sure we have the most brilliant minds at work figuring out how to kneecap Waymo as much as possible so we can maintain this standard of service.
- darrinm 6mo agoThey announced back in September that they’re coming to Seattle. https://www.king5.com/article/traffic/traffic-news/autonomous-rideshare-waymo-seattle-expansion/281-0ea27688-6afa-401d-8d21-07fb4e5c3044 https://www.king5.com/article/traffic/traffic-news/autonomou...
- jasenc 6mo agoPersonally never happier to have left Portland than right this moment.
- hyperadvanced 6mo agoWhy? Are fearing the inevitable torching of one of these or fooling yourself into believing that waymo wont take over the world?
- hitekker 6mo agoSeems like a hostile market for Waymo. Many Portlanders despise tech giants and are strongly anti-car & anti-AI, far more than SF. Not to mention Portland's political / governance / people problems already inclines the population to anger.
- hyperadvanced 6mo agoIf Waymo is still operating there by the end 2027 I’ll eat my hat.
- Jblx2 6mo agoHow long does Waymo generally take to map and otherwise get ready for a new city rollout (permits, etc.)? I guess I wouldn't be surprised if they haven't even started offering rides in 2027.
- hyperadvanced 6mo agoNo idea. I would just assume whatever they’re doing there gets shouted down in short order by the locals who are known for being kind hearted, incredibly naive, and violent.
- boogieknite 6mo agowonder if these will end up in the willamette too https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2019/06/divers-pull-11-e-scooters-from-willamette-river.html https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2019/06/divers-pull-11-e-sco...
- gigatexal 6mo agoAre they sure? Portland is a special kind of crazy. I can say this cuz I’m a native now living in Berlin. locals are going to trash the cars and do all sorts of damage.
- ge96 6mo agoThe dream of the 90s is alive I take it
- insane_dreamer 6mo agoSurprised Portland is allowing Waymo in, considering that they have a decent public transport system (judging by US standards, not European standards), with light rail. Public transport ridership took a massive hit with the pandemic and never fully recovered. Waymo does not solve a public transport problem. I don't mind that it takes money from Uber, Lyft, etc., but the damage it also transfers income from human taxi drivers (what little they can salvage from Uber, Lyft) to a large corporation. I see it as a net negative for society, not a net positive.
- nunez 6mo agoI've got to retract some shade I've thrown at Waymo when discussing Tesla FSD in the past. Like others, my biggest objection with it was their approach to scaling. Tesla aimed for the vision-only general solution with FSD, while Waymo held strong to its LIDAR-first geofence strategy. I held this opinion before using Waymo, as it wasn't available in my city (Houston, TX). I've used it several times after being invited into their Early Access earlier this month...and, wow, I couldn't have been more wrong. Waymo drives incredibly well. Like, INCREDIBLY well. Tesla FSD v14 drives well too, but Waymo feels more confident in edge case situations (of which there are many in the city driving space) and, well, I can be on my laptop or whatever during the trip. Ironically, Waymo pushed me towards using public transit in Houston, so it's incredibly sad to read that this expansion is happening as Portland's public transit system is getting defunded. The time and mental sanity I've gotten back from not driving has been immense and undeniable. (It's weird how "bus-pilled" I became after my first few Waymo trips given that I grew up in NYC taking the bus and subway all of the time.) All that said, based on how slowly Tesla is scaling their (inexcusably much more nascent) Robotaxi offering, I don't think ANY of our cars are going to get "unsupervised" FSD with the hardware they were shipped with.
- TheAlchemist 6mo agoIt's good to hear that more people are realizing that Tesla is nowhere near where they claim to be. For anobody observing it from the sidelines, it was obvious for the past 3 years at least, that Tesla will not achieve real unsupervised FSD with HW3, and now it's also obvious it will not be wiht HW4. It's also obvious they are very well aware of those facts, despite lying to investors and customers for the past 10 years.
- nunez 6mo agoI stanned for them so hard. Oh well; live and learn. It's still the best autonomous driving system that you can buy, though now that Hyundai onlined their Waymo production line, needing a car might be a thing of the past in a few years. Maybe that's why they pivoted so hard into Optimus (at the cost of their auto division).
- cheema33 6mo agoI live in Portland. Took an Uber to the airport early in the morning. The driver was extremely reckless. Nearly wrecked several times. This has never happened before. We reported him. But, yeah, looking forward to using Waymo.
- yieldcrv 6mo agookay so now imagine Portland with transportation budget cuts and no Waymo like, do you guys hear yourself? these are unrelated things, cities are always grappling with stuff like this, and at this point in history Waymo is expanding to all cities and will opportunistically prioritize some cities over another while continuing their total rollout
- theanonymousone 6mo agoHaha. Somehow I mistook this to be related to Wayland.
- insane_dreamer 6mo agoApparently Waymo hasn't yet received a permit from the city of Portland, so whether they actually operate there remains TBD.