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Tesla CEO Elon Musk said Friday that Tesla would reveal a robotaxi product in August, though he gave no details. Waymo and Cruise both insist that safety, including the safety of their contract workers, is a top concern. But several drivers have accused the companies of exploiting loopholes to get cars back on the road in defiance of local public health orders.
Cruise Robotaxi Rides Will Be >$3/mile, But They'll Get Better - Forbes
Cruise Robotaxi Rides Will Be >$3/mile, But They'll Get Better.
Posted: Thu, 17 Aug 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
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We wanted to test the robotaxis' ability to drive through multiple types of terrains and ordered routes from a Safeway in the Sunset—where construction has closed off lanes along Taraval Street—to Alta Plaza Park up in Pacific Heights. In San Francisco, the futuristic nature of driverless vehicles has become a tourist attraction. Waymo, a spinoff of Google, had announced details for its service in Los Angeles in January as it sought state regulatory approval and local support. Within the last year, Waymo has offered free "tour" rides in Los Angeles, and last month, it received regulatory approval to expand to a paid service, despite pushback from the Teamsters union and the Los Angeles Department of Transportation. What's clear is that Waymo and Cruise are together showing the best progress. But don't forget that they have somewhat different business models.
Autonomous vehicles
Maybe there are lingering safety or reliability concerns that Waymo wants to squash before expanding in a big way. At first glance, Cruise cars are most readily identifiable, with their blood orange stripes and clunky rooftop robotaxi gear. Waymo said Tuesday that more than 50,000 people were on its waitlist to use the service. The company did not say how many users it would allow to fully use the app starting Wednesday. Last month, the company said it was starting with a Los Angeles fleet of fewer than 50 cars covering a 63-square-mile area from Santa Monica to downtown L.A. For 2019, Waymo amassed 1.45 autonomous miles in California, with a disengagement about every 13,000 miles.
California regulators to decide the future of Cruise and Waymo
Now, city officials are asking the CPUC to pump the brakes on authorizing the companies to add more AVs to the roads. They cite specific instances when Cruise’s robotaxis have obstructed emergency vehicles as evidence that the robotaxi experiment may have gone too far. If you haven’t been following, the CPUC approved the last remaining permits to Cruise and Waymo, giving the two companies the green light to offer commercial robotaxi services across San Francisco 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Yet I know of only one company—Waymo—that has launched a fully driverless commercial taxi service. And I only know of one company—Nuro—that's running a driverless commercial delivery service on public roads.
One, involving a left turn, had the other vehicle speed and go straight at a left turn lane, but the Cruise froze and made it worse. I want to clarify that the driving is done by the Waymo Driver on the car – there is no remote person driving the car. Amid the news, Waymo's chief product officer, Saswat Panigrahi, told CNBC that the self-driving car unit hasn't seen a change in tone from regulators or a shift in the company's public perception. My guess is that Waymo realizes it is behind and is trying to play catch-up. Cruise seems to be on target to launch in SF sometime before the Dubai 2023 launch [Dan Anman] -- which means sometime probably in 2022. My guess is that Waymo had a come-to-Jesus-moment and -- JKrafcik was booted -- they about-faced and started hitting SF hard.
Another robotaxi company wins (25 percent)
But despite mounting challenges, San Francisco’s robotaxis are rolling along. By Andrew J. Hawkins, transportation editor with 10+ years of experience who covers EVs, public transportation, and aviation. His work has appeared in The New York Daily News and City & State.
More from this stream Self-driving cars: Google and others map the road to automated vehicles
The car made only one jerky turn and successfully passed a delivery truck stalled on Masonic Avenue. A Cruise spokesperson said vehicles attempt to “optimize for the safest route” based on factors like traffic, real-time feedback from the fleet, roadblocks and closures. The Los Angeles Department of Transportation said the Waymo expansion was happening too soon, without enough local oversight of autonomous vehicle operations, but in an order last month state officials said that those concerns were unfounded. Tesla also insists that its Autopilot semi-self-driving system could enable full autonomy in the future.
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All told, from pickup to drop-off, the Waymo took roughly 27 minutes to drive from Taraval Street to Alta Plaza Park—roughly seven minutes slower than an average car or Uber driver, but certainly faster than public transit. Various China-based tech startups are also testing self-driving cars on California roads, drawing scrutiny from lawmakers. Meanwhile, Cruise is starting up again, but this time with humans in the driver's seat. Elon Musk has promised to unveil his robotaxi this summer, and while your doubt about anything Musk says is well warranted, you never know.
The company soon plans to launch commercially in Austin, its fourth city, and also recently began test-driving vehicles in the winter weather of Buffalo, New York. The Standard wanted to know how these two Bay Area-based autonomous vehicle companies fared against each other in a ride from the city’s southern neighborhoods up to the tip of Pacific Heights. From car design to the feel of the ride to the names of the vehicles themselves, the two self-driving rides couldn’t be any more different.
It's never been entire clear how much money Alphabet is spending on Waymo, but around $1 billion a year seems to be the price to play in the space. And this week, Waymo announced a $2.25-billion initial funding round, its first-ever outside investment. But unlike with other Big New Tech innovations I've seen in the past — anyone still have a 3D TV in their living room? I think the people behind the tech will figure out its possibilities, its limitations, and the places it does and doesn't make sense. According to the San Francisco Police Department, between June 2022 and June 2023, Cruise vehicles were involved in 30 collisions, six of which resulted in injuries.
Data shows Cruise and Waymo's sudden driverless taxi expansion in S.F. - San Francisco Chronicle
Data shows Cruise and Waymo's sudden driverless taxi expansion in S.F..
Posted: Fri, 10 Nov 2023 08:00:00 GMT [source]
You can't wait for the rain in real life to occur exactly when you want to push your system in that way, but being able to simulate rain requires that infrastructure but also enough algorithms and realism on top to be able to push this. Waymo took The Standard on what appeared to be the most efficient driving route through congested roads such as 19th Avenue and Fulton Street along Golden Gate Park. Cruise and Waymo offered very different routing options, with the Waymo choosing a more direct route along busier roadways and Cruise opting for a more circuitous route. Waymo said it informed its test riders about the change Monday in an email, which someone also posted to Reddit.
You really are in a car, driving around the city, with no one in the driver's seat. But others raised concerns about being stuck in a vehicle for hours a day with another person without the ability to socially distance. They chafed at being asked to come back to work while the salaried employees in the engineering and software divisions of these companies got to continue to work from home. Before issuing any permits, the SFMTA argued that the CPUC should collect better and new AV data (including unexpected stops and duration of the stops) and create a performance evaluation framework and methods for analysis of the data.
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