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California Approves Waymo Expansion to Los Angeles and SF Peninsula [pdf]

austinkhale
154 replies
19h10m

Fantastic news. I use them all the time in Phoenix. My mom uses them to get to her doctor appointments. I think people underestimate how much of a quality of life improvement these are for people even when compared to Uber/Lyft.

tempest_
137 replies
19h6m

people underestimate how much of a quality of life improvement these are for people even when compared to Uber/Lyft

I do underestimate it. What are quality of life improvements? Seems to be the same thing from a customer perspective.

I guess if you are concerned for your safety from the uber driver it is an improvement but it is the only one that comes to mind.

SeanAnderson
37 replies
18h33m

A recent Uber driver of mine encountered bay bridge traffic, said, "I know a shortcut!" and veered out of the line waiting to enter the bridge. Then, Uber Safety called my phone asking if everything was alright. Then, the driver realized he didn't know where I was trying to go, asked me, realized I needed to go to Oakland, and spent 10+ minutes going in a slow circle to get back to the line of traffic.

A few drives later, I had a group dinner reservation at a restaurant downtown. I'm not a big sports person and I didn't realize I was asking to go downtown on the Saturday before the Super Bowl. Uber told me I had to wait 4 minutes for pickup, but that turned into a 20+ minute wait as driver after driver canceled on me when they saw where I was asking to go. I had to text all of the guests and apologize for being late to my own reservation.

A few drives later, I had a long conversation with a gay driver who recently fled from Iraq because his sexual identity wasn't respected there. I'm a mid-thirties, single male. The first question the driver asked me when I got in the car was if I had a family. I said no. Then he asked if I had a girlfriend. I said no. Then he slowly engaged with me in conversation for 10 minutes trying to figure out if I was a potential date for him and had trouble understanding that while I fully supported his sexual identity that that didn't mean I was an opportunity for connection.

Last weekend, as I was espousing the benefits of Waymo to a friend, they called an Uber while we were heading down from a restaurant at the top of an elevator. When we got down to the bottom floor, he was dismayed. Someone else had gotten into the Uber, the driver didn't check names, and they were now travelling on his dime.

Surely it's not that hard to envision the scenarios in which an autonomous driver might be desirable?

bagels
16 replies
18h20m

How will waymo help with something like the super bowl? It's going to be overcapacity too.

ugh123
10 replies
18h0m

How will waymo help with something like the super bowl? It's going to be overcapacity too.

Ability to scale the amount of Waymo cars to an area is immensely easier than scaling the amount of Uber/Lyft drivers available and willing to go to said area.

nradov
8 replies
17h41m

Nope. Cars are expensive. Waymo won't keep a bunch of extras sitting around just so that they have reserve capacity to scale up service during unusually busy events. It's more profitable just to make customers wait, or ask them to pay a higher fare for priority service.

bigyikes
5 replies
17h9m

Cars are extremely cheap compared to their drivers.

aetherson
4 replies
14h45m

I don't think that Waymo cars are.

fragmede
3 replies
12h43m

Let's say the Waymo cars are $1 million each, which is probably high, given than a fully loaded i-Pace is $80k, which still leaves $920,000 for Google/Waymo devices and software costs to get to $1 million. Given the estimate for a human life at $7.4 million[1], I think they are.

[1]https://www.epa.gov/environmental-economics/mortality-risk-v...

foota
2 replies
11h54m

You could pay someone California's minimum wage 24/7 for 140,000 a year.

mckn1ght
1 replies
8h54m

Labor cost pretty much always increases while the cost of research technology decreases once it encounters economies of scale.

A car today at the admittedly high cost estimate of $1M will “pay itself off” versus your labor estimate in less than 8 years. Humans don’t get paid off and then work for free afterwards.

aetherson
0 replies
3h48m

A taxi doesn't have a lifespan of 8 years, and note that while I don't think that a Waymo car costs anything like $1M, it's also not actually the case that you pay taxi drivers $140k per year.

I see very little to suggest that a Waymo car costs less all-in over the course of about two years than a Prius and an Uber driver does, and that's the much more relevant comparison.

Nothing to say that this couldn't change in the future. But that's my guess for the status quo.

thereisnospork
1 replies
16h52m

What they can do is trivially reroute cars from the suburbs - a level of supply control Uber can only approximate with surge pricing.

nradov
0 replies
1h37m

It turns out everyone in the suburbs is also going to a Superbowl party. Whoops.

earthwalker99
0 replies
12h49m

Simply not true. The US is constantly flooded with fresh immigrants who can get drivers licenses and drive for super cheap on unlivable wages.

JumpCrisscross
3 replies
18h18m

How will waymo help with something like the super bowl?

It will commit to the ride and not cancel.

alistairSH
2 replies
16h58m

Only if it’s coded that way. And a profit-seeking org may not code it that way if the optimal solution (for them) is canceling and finding more lucrative passengers.

bastawhiz
1 replies
16h29m

A profit seeking org wouldn't take the ride in the first place instead of repeatedly accepting and cancelling. Or it would simply increase the price because it implicitly knows the value.

alistairSH
0 replies
1h26m

And yet Uber allows drivers to cancel, which has the same impact as an AI cancelling.

SeanAnderson
0 replies
18h14m

Waymo said it would take 30 minutes to arrive, but would've arrived in 30 minutes. I can plan around that.

timeagain
10 replies
18h18m

This is misanthropic tech vision at its finest. I got a job recommendation from an Uber driver. My aunt (against TOS) built a private driver business based on her personality after driving Lyft from the airport. I had a great conversation with a Somalian driver who’s favorite music artist was Dolly Parton. Once a driver saved me from a hairy situation with an irate customer who was chasing me and throwing things, I tipped him $20 and we laughed about it—I was just happy to have someone to witness the crazy.

Not to mention the thousands of people who currently make a respectable living driving people around.

But maybe I’m just one of those extroverts who doesn’t mind being around people.

JumpCrisscross
2 replies
18h15m

maybe I’m just one of those extroverts who doesn’t mind being around people

Sometimes I want a chauffeur, usually one I have a relationship with, often I want a reliable ride. We’re all better off for having the choice.

JumpCrisscross
0 replies
17h57m

would be nice to have an UberSSR option for sure

They ask for temperature and conversation preferences when you order a black car, which I find somewhat funny.

AlbertCory
2 replies
18h2m

Your assumption is that Uber/Lyft will now disappear and you'll HAVE to ride Waymo?

Seems dubious to me. Can't you still call an Uber in SF, where they've had Waymo for a while?

ugh123
1 replies
17h53m

I really don't see how a human-centered driving company survives with something that is near fully automated and new "drivers" can just be ordered up from Stellantis or whomever, provisioned, and sent on the road. The scaling laws just don't match up.

I say "near fully automated" because there's loads of operations involved, including human remote fleet management for when cars get stuck. But even that doesn't scale linearly with the amount of automated vehicles on the road, whereas Uber will always be at least 1:1 human:car.

AlbertCory
0 replies
17h18m

What is the cost in SF? This early review says the same:

https://archive.ph/7mPWk

So I don't see the point of theorizing, when we can get real-world feedback from customers.

ugh123
0 replies
17h57m

But maybe I’m just one of those extroverts who doesn’t mind being around people.

Maybe. Or you've just been "lucky" with the kinds of experiences you've had on Uber.

I've had some really annoying drivers, shitty drivers. People have reported assaults and some have ended up worse.

If this were a daily thing for people (which it could be in the future), I wouldn't want a 1on1 experience every day (twice a day) with a new driver each time, each with their own personalities, driving abilities, and needs at the moment. Forget that.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
17h27m

But maybe I’m just one of those extroverts who doesn’t mind being around people.

Maybe. I had a very boring experience overall with mine. I wouldn't have noticed if they were replaced with bots. That could be my lack of extroversion (or maybe getting all introverts myself. Few gave a vibe of wanting to chat. Just a job, after all).

But for the short term, I'm paranoid right now about autonomous driving because it is far from technologically sound. Probably more sound than the average driver, but we know that we hold tech a lot more accountable than humans. humans hold liability in human issues, companies are liable for tech issues and have the money to spend to fight any issues that arise (as we can see in real time with Tesla).

SeanAnderson
0 replies
18h4m

Great. I am happy you are satisfied with the quality of service you're given by human drivers. I would hope you would be equally happy with the increased enjoyment I experience from an automated driving experience.

We will have to agree to disagree on whether it's a beneficial change to society to disrupt human drivers with autonomous drivers. Personally, I found the argument that artists shouldn't be disrupted by AI much more defensible than saying drivers shouldn't be disrupted. It always seemed easy to look at previously disrupted jobs, like people getting up at 4AM to act as manual alarm clocks via peashooters on windows, and say yes, we should replace this simple act of labor with technology.

CalRobert
0 replies
9h4m

And how many people are killed by taxi or Uber drivers? Their stories matter too. If you're a pedestrian or cyclist you quickly realize how dangerous "professional" drivers are.

throwitaway222
5 replies
18h21m

Stuff where I want to be surrounded by robots all my life.

I mean, if a tree falls in a forest, does it make a sound? Even if yes, does it matter?

If we're just going to let the robots be the only thing we see all day long, why not just call it - hang up the hats build full AGI and blow up the humans.

SeanAnderson
1 replies
18h10m

I don't consider driving in traffic to be a pinnacle of human experience worthy of preservation. I certainly have concerns about AI automating away some jobs, but I thought stop-and-go city driving was something everyone could agree on as being worthwhile to eliminate.

I'm surprised there's such a staunch defense.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
17h32m

but I thought stop-and-go city driving was something everyone could agree on as being worthwhile to eliminate.

It's mixed. Driving is both a career and a pastime/hobby. I can certainly see a long term (30+ year) shift to AI driving being a hindrance to the latter, even if the efficiencies would be massive (e.g. there wouldn't be such thing as "stop and go city driving" to the extent of modern day driving. Stop and go is a product of inefficient human sensors and signalling).

As a career, yes. It probably won't exist in 20 years at this rate.

JumpCrisscross
1 replies
18h19m

we're just going to let the robots be the only thing we see all day long

This is an uncharitable reading of someone wanting peace and quiet from time to time.

alistairSH
0 replies
16h56m

Going downtown on Super Bowl night isn’t exactly peace and quiet.

But yeah, taxis and Ubers can suck sometimes.

konschubert
0 replies
18h17m

Yes it makes a sound and it matters as much as you want it to.

barbazoo
2 replies
18h22m

A few drives later, I had a long conversation with a gay driver who recently fled from Iraq because his sexual identity wasn't respected there...

Avoiding talking to humans altogether is one thing but couldn't we also just say "sorry I don't feel like chatting" or something like that?

SeanAnderson
0 replies
18h15m

Yeah, I could definitely set better boundaries. It's not a strong suit of mine.

JumpCrisscross
0 replies
18h16m

couldn't we also just say "sorry I don't feel like chatting"

I’ve been hit on by a few Uber drivers. (Early thirties guy.) They stop talking then forget after two seconds. Unfortunately, the person who crosses the first boundary isn’t deterred by the second.

That said, I do appreciate the chutzpah of the driver who tried to invite himself to my date for a threesome.

whimsicalism
20 replies
19h0m

Having a car to yourself is honestly just way better, maybe I'm just antisocial

Like I will easily pay a premium to have self-driving most of the time. I can play my music on the speakers, I can work more comfortably in the car, etc. etc.

Also, I find Uber drivers are pretty bad drivers often - comparative advantage

dangus
12 replies
18h58m

Owning a car yourself is the most costly option, so I would hope that it is the “best.” Purchase price, depreciation, maintenance, insurance, fuel.

Edit: to be clear I’m putting “best” in quotes because personal car ownership is pretty terrible in terms of value.

andrewprock
7 replies
18h43m

If you pay a lot for parking or don't use the car much this tracks. But if you have the volume, then owning a car is cheaper.

An affordable mid size car costs roughly $6k per year total cost for a new car, and about 2/3 that for a used car.

If you commute daily to work, that is 500 trips per year. Two weekend trips adds another 100 per year. Now we are talking about ~$10/trip if you own your car.

When you add the premium value you get from flexibility, then it's an even better deal. If you only drive 50x a year then yeah, just use services.

rufus_foreman
6 replies
18h23m

> An affordable mid size car costs roughly $6k per year

Show your math.

johnnyanmac
5 replies
17h2m

Really? do you want to see every little receipt from the GP?

I'll give a rough cost with my small sedan pre-pandemic

- Gas every 2 weeks (30 mile commute to work), fillin up the car is about $60. so $120 for gas. 120/month is 1440/year

- DMV costs are $150 a year

- car wash every few months. Let's make it monthly and more expensive than my actual washes. $50/month, 600 a year

- oil change every 3 months or so (probably less, but let's be conservative here). $70/quarter, 280/year.

- occasional repairs due to being an old car. sporadic, but let's throw in maybe $300 a year total.

- Finally, $100/month for insurance. $1200/Year.

so, ~4000/year. Given that that was a daily commute along with other short travel, it's cheaper than the idea of relying on taxis. Even if it was as cheap as $10/ride, it'd cost $4800/year to get to work alone. For my commute, it'd be more like $40-50/ride. Not even close.

ofc the rub here is that these are the costs for a paid off car, so if you don't own a car you need to factor in car payments, or the one time cost grabbing a used car. I grabbed my car for $5k before the car market (and every other market) went to hell, so it still very quickly paid for itself.

rufus_foreman
2 replies
13h40m

> oil change every 3 months or so

That's just plain stupid.

johnnyanmac
1 replies
13h26m

How is an oil change every 3 months stupid? Every 3000 miles I get a change, and I had to commute a minimum of 70 miles a day. Comes out to 42 days per milestone, or 8-9 weeks if only counting weekdays. I felt like I always put it off and the math checks out.

My driving went way down during the pandemic, but it's probably a better normal metric to measure my routine before a global anamloly.

600 a year on car washes?

I was being very generous there to prove a point. I don't do a car wash monthly and I don't get the highest tier of car wash either.

Even the "stupidest" spending on my car for daily travel and I don't come within a stone's throw of justifying taxis, financially speaking save on.

rufus_foreman
0 replies
13h17m

I think I last got an oil change early on during the pandemic.

Sometime around then.

I do think my car needs a car wash. Not necessarily this month, but definitely within the next year or so. It costs $5 in quarters at the car wash. Maybe $10. Not $600 a year.

If you are spending $600 a year on car washes, I want to start a business, and I want you, specifically you, as my customer.

bombcar
0 replies
15h19m

It's all down to miles per year, a new car should last 100k miles "without major repairs" and if you drive 10k miles a year (whatever, if it's more it's more in favor of the owner) a car should last at least 10 years.

A new car is $40k, a 10 year old car seems to go for about $10k, so say $3k a year. So with a brand new car, still getting "around" that $6-7k a year.

Or to put it another way - at some point it HAS to be cheaper to own, because someone owns the car that is driving you around!

Solvency
0 replies
15h3m

I bought a 2022 vehicle and my annual registration is $600.

seanmcdirmid
1 replies
18h49m

You can't park your own car at the airport safely and economically for a two week trip.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
17h15m

yeah, That's the only time I really consider Uber, when doing long term travel and parking costs/risks outweigh the cost of a taxi.

whimsicalism
0 replies
18h14m

owning a car in sf is miserable, i lasted 1 year

JumpCrisscross
0 replies
18h47m

Owning a car yourself is the most costly option, so I would hope that it is the “best.”

I drove a car into San Francisco once. Never again. Not having to worry about parking, being able to nap or work en route, not having to get stressed by traffic, etc. Massive improvement in QOL.

deprecative
4 replies
18h47m

It's pedantic to most, I'm sure. Just FYI, though, antisocial is to be opposed to society - like Timothy McVeigh. Asocial is probably what you're looking for.

skyyler
1 replies
18h41m

To be extra pedantic, I believe you meant Ted Kaczynski.

Timothy McVeigh was trying to make the US government pay for specific things it did to "his people"; Ted Kaczynski was lashing out at the industrialised world after living in isolation in his cabin in the woods.

s1artibartfast
0 replies
18h25m

IMO, Anti-social is defined in context of and from the perspective of the dominant social structure.

Both individuals and groups who are in opposition and sufficiently disruptive are anti-social, hence the distinction.

Asocial = a loner

Anti-social = against society, either as an individual or group.

lolinder
1 replies
18h21m

You're not just being pedantic, you're also wrong [0][1][2][3]. Their usage is 100% standard and is encoded in every dictionary I can find, and etymonline lists it as the original definition dating back to 1797 [4], with "hostile to social order or norms" first recorded a few years later.

[0] https://www.dictionary.com/browse/antisocial

[1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/antisocial

[2] https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/antisoci...

[3] https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/anti...

[4] https://www.etymonline.com/word/antisocial

CalRobert
0 replies
9h1m

Usage seems different between US and UK. I didn't understand ASBOs at first since I thought "what's wrong with teens wanting some alone time?"

wnc3141
0 replies
18h53m

The incentive to race through traffic is felt from the back seat in my experience

aledalgrande
0 replies
17h47m

Like I will easily pay a premium

which would probably be the same as Uber after tip

NewJazz
17 replies
19h3m

Yeah that one comes to mind. Personal safety is often a factor influencing public transit decisions as well.

dangus
16 replies
19h0m

Private transit*. Uber and Waymo are private transit.

Something to note is that actual public transit (buses and trains) has something like 10x fewer annual deaths than private vehicles, because fatal accidents almost never happen in them.

Personal safety is a much less statistically relevant concern compared to personal injury.

seanmcdirmid
6 replies
18h46m

Something to note is that actual public transit (buses and trains) has something like 10x fewer annual deaths than private vehicles, because fatal accidents almost never happen in them.

I've never had a fent zombie wave a knife in my face on private transit, but it has happened a couple of times on public transit. I get that it is technically "safer", but we have a long way to go before normal people will feel safe on it (in the states, other countries obviously do this better by not allowing their buses and light rail to be turned into roving day centers).

dangus
3 replies
18h42m

Did you get injured or die? 30,000 people die of car crashes every year, about half resulting from a much more common and legal drug.

How many people die of assaults on public transit every year? I’ll let you look that one up.

Fear isn’t the same as risk. Lots of people are afraid of planes. Not a single passenger died of as a result of a commercial airline incident last year in the United States.

seanmcdirmid
2 replies
18h28m

No I didn't die, but I wasn't happy either. Enough that I feel like I have more control over my fate if I drive.

Fear isn’t the same as risk.

I don't think you've ever had a knife waved at you by a crazy person before. Don't be an idiot, if something looks really dangerous, it probably is.

How many people die of assaults on public transit every year? I’ll let you look that one up.

The first one this year in our city was just 4 days ago.

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/law-justice/man-fa...

That article also lists out recent violence on public transit in my city (like the guy hitting people with a hammer on the train). In comparison, 36 people were killed in car crashes in 2022, 28 in 2023.

dangus
1 replies
2h50m

I'm not saying that it wasn't dangerous, I'm saying that the statistical probability of the situation you were in happening and resulting in an injury or death is lower than the probability of injury or death in a motor vehicle.

You might feel like you have more control over your fate when you're driving, but as the say in the deep bowels American political culture, "facts don't care about your feelings." The same factually-incorrect risk evaluation is used by people who prefer driving over flying on a commercial airliner.

31% of all fatal crashes in 2021 involved drunk drivers, a much more common drug which is 100% legal. You don't have control over your fate in a car when other drivers on the road make up all of the moving objects that you can run into.

Not to mention the fact that crime can still happen to you while you are driving, a common example being carjacking. [1]

Your own numbers that you provided tell us the opposite story that you want to tell. The very first transit death this year just happened almost 3 months into the year. Meanwhile, 28-36 yearly car crash deaths in Seattle averages out to over 2 deaths every single month. That means by the time someone died on transit, something like 6 people had already died in car crashes in the Seattle area.

Obviously, more people are driving than taking transit, but still, in Seattle almost half of all trips downtown involve public transit.

[1] https://mynorthwest.com/3951485/docs-mom-called-911-before-b...

seanmcdirmid
0 replies
1h49m

Most DUI crashes happen at night, when public transportation is going to be even less useful, and Uber/waymo are important in making things better. Carjackings don’t happen here, although they do happen south of here (a poor girl got shot dead in tukwila a few weeks ago). KiaBoyz are a problem, especially with our non pursuit law (the girl was killed by kids who were let go by Seattle police earlier in the day because they couldn’t chase them).

I always take transit downtown despite the risks, it’s just too convenient, but that’s just occasionally. My wife takes it also, a lot more, and it’s a completely different fear factor for a woman traveling alone. However, that’s all we really use it for, for anything else we drive. This is in contrast to my experience living outside the states, where I could actually live without a car.

All of transit’s safety issues are actually preventable by just being more strict about what people can get away with on buses (eg no smoking fent on the bus) and enforcing fares (not for the revenue, but people who don’t pay fares are more likely to cause other problems). I’m pretty sure if anyone tried these things in Lausanne, multiple swat teams would be on them quickly (heck, I’ve seen that happen for just not paying fares, don’t mess with Swiss police or even Swiss transit police). If Seattle wants us to use transit more, they need to take safety more seriously. Other countries do that, they get better results. Otherwise, we will lean more heavily on private transit like Waymo.

standardUser
1 replies
18h11m

Some of my most terrifying moments in life have been in cars on the road. I've had a few dicey moments on public transit, which I use constantly, but nothing as truly life-threatening as the near misses I've experienced on the freeway.

seanmcdirmid
0 replies
18h0m

All of my scary moments in a car were on long road trips where public transit doesn't really apply, and with pedestrians walking out in front of my car on green lights (probably fent related also).

NewJazz
3 replies
18h33m

I don't think you understand.

I was specifically saying that people prefer private transit to public transit because of safety related concerns.

dangus
2 replies
18h19m

Are the concerns rooted in statistical fact or just fear? Most people in the United States basically can’t imagine an alternative to car-first infrastructure.

NewJazz
1 replies
18h10m

Does it matter?

If somebody is too afraid to ride the bus because they think they'll get raped, does the facts really matter? Or their feelings of physical insecurity?

johnnyanmac
0 replies
16h45m

If somebody is too afraid to ride the bus because they think they'll get raped, does the facts really matter?

on a micro level, no. On a macro level, yes. People have individual fears, but those individual fears shouldn't influence the decision of multi billion dollar transport budgets. As cold as it sounds, injury or harm is built into the costs of such transportation.

With all that said, LA has indeed gotten much less safe, and public transportation has never really been "good", per se. On a micro level, I literally could not get within 2 miles of work from bus schedules one way, and 5 miles the other after work (back when work was in town). It wasted enough time that it would have been worth considering biking 15 miles a day instead of using a bus. If I wasn't in such poor shape it'd take almost the same time (which was double my driving commute).

rvnx
1 replies
18h40m

There is a big difference between Uber and Waymo.

You can actually be safer in a bus (aka public transit) than in Uber depending on where you live.

With Uber, every time you take a taxi, you are playing the lottery, hoping you get a normal driver, who is not tired, who is not dangerous, etc.

With Waymo, you get a private car, all for yourself.

dangus
0 replies
2h45m

Waymo has still not proven to be as safe as a public bus. It can get into a crash just like any other vehicle. It can (e.g.) be hit by a drunk driver in ways that are likely to be much more injurious to the passengers than if the same situation happened to a bus. Buses have far more inertia than the vehicles around them, they're more visible, and they are driven by professional, trained drivers. Waymo has not provided enough specific data that points to their vehicles being safer than public transit or their driving skill outperforming a trained professional driver (not just a random person with a license off the street like Uber uses). I'm skeptical considering how death rates are a full 10X lower on public transit compared to automobiles. Even if Waymo is twice as safe as a human-operated automobile, that still makes it 5x less safe than public transit.

https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/home-and-community/safety-topics...

standardUser
0 replies
18h13m

Most of this country is a sprawling mess that does not lend itself to traditional mass transit options. Yet those same spaces have an abundance of well-maintained roads. At a certain point we need to accept we are not Europe and we need transit solution suited to our multi-trillion dollar pre-built infrastructure. Self-driving cars are likely to be a big part of that.

deprecative
0 replies
18h44m

Yeah, but public transit is socialist and helps the poor and minorities so we can't have that in the states beyond the massive cities that more or less force the issue.

The distinction is absolutely important between public and private transit. However to most folks they'll be the same thing in the end. Maybe local governments can buy cars for private public transit, which could be nice depending on funding and all that.

OkayPhysicist
0 replies
17h35m

The fundamental problem with public transit in most of the US that has it is that it's not the best option. And when it's not the best option, you get a selection bias towards passengers that most passengers wouldn't want to ride with. Which encourages more people to take other options. Rinse repeat.

I like BART. It's actually really convenient, connecting where I live, where I work, and where a bunch of my friends live. Unfortunately, I have a negative experience upwards of half the time I ride it. Sometimes, it's minor, just some person talking nonsense to themselves in the corner. Whatever, puts me on edge because I lose confidence that this person won't transgress social norms in more extreme ways, but I can live with it. Sometimes the entire car smells like a latrine. Sometimes it's a dude laying across the aisle pleasuring himself. Also not going to kill me, but also is something I'd rather avoid, and absolutely can by not riding public transit.

Uber, by contrast, I only have to worry about the driver making me uncomfortable, and that's relatively rare. Maybe 1 in 10 rides will involve a driver either driving like a maniac, or reeking of BO.

With Waymo, there are none of those issues. Hop in a vehicle, it's clean, it drives safely, and there's no naked lunatics.

singleshot_
9 replies
18h55m

I don’t need to be given a numeric rating by my chauffeur on how well I sit in the back of a car. The social play-acting part of ridesharing apps became exhausting to me (admittedly: an introvert) sometime during the first ride.

jmward01
3 replies
18h36m

I agree. Not everything in life needs to be a personal interaction. I just want to get from A to B. One of the reasons I like an actually functioning mass transit system is that you just get on and get off. Subways don't rate people (yet) and that is something I think good regulation could enforce here too. The problem is we have a long history of bad regulation when it comes to mass transit so we will see.

Teever
1 replies
18h26m

What makes you think that people who take Wayne rides aren't automatically rated?

hypothesis
0 replies
18h2m

Was not Uber plan to use human drivers as a stop-gap to autonomous driving? I doubt that they will remove ratings if they ever achieve that.

And Waymo is going to the same destination, just approaching from other direction.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
17h24m

One of the reasons I like an actually functioning mass transit system is that you just get on and get off.

would be nice to get that one day. In the meanwhile I guess LA is spending that budget here on Waymo for even more cars in traffic.

waych
2 replies
18h46m

Is it better to leave it to an AI algorithm watching you in the back of the car? One way or another passengers are going to get rated.

singleshot_
0 replies
18h43m

Of course, you are dead right. Thanks for thinking that situation all the way through, friend.

fiddlerwoaroof
0 replies
18h43m

Yeah, imagine losing your gmail account due to some automated system malfunctioning and simultaneously losing access to the transportation system you depend on.

simplicitea
0 replies
17h7m

....you can just not participate and keep to yourself and I guarantee you'll have a 5 star rating from every driver in america

mavhc
0 replies
18h19m

But the safety of the driver is increased if bad passengers are eliminated from the job. Taxi driver is more dangerous that Police Officer in USA

ra7
9 replies
18h59m

Just the safe driving alone is a big improvement. Every time I get into an Uber, I hope and pray the driver isn’t aggressive and erratic. You always know what you’re going to get with a Waymo.

Plus, nice and clean Jaguar I-Pace vehicles. No person to talk to and no tipping.

hacker_newz
8 replies
18h56m

You trust an entity you can't interact with over a human being?

zht
0 replies
16h44m

a car cannot rape me

rajup
0 replies
18h37m

100%. Seeing the idiots we give driving licenses to these days, I’d pick the machine every single time.

ra7
0 replies
18h54m

Having experienced Waymo’s driving, definitely.

gst
0 replies
18h28m

After a total of 41 Waymo rides so far: Yes, absolutely.

_qua
0 replies
18h39m

Granted I've never been in a Waymo but I've definitely been picked up by Uber/Lyft drivers who were extremely erratic and likely drunk or high.

__loam
0 replies
17h6m

You can call their customer support line if you have a problem.

TulliusCicero
0 replies
18h5m

Have you seen human beings? Especially when they're driving?

CalRobert
0 replies
9h3m

Yes

ericmcer
6 replies
18h43m

For now they are still just cars with no driver. Once they are fully trustworthy though, the interior of the car could be repurposed in some interesting ways. Take out all the driving controls, add a desk, move the climate/radio control to a central console, captains chairs. The possibilities are endless.

JumpCrisscross
3 replies
18h21m

I’ve wanted a lay-flat ride between San Francisco and the South Bay for ages.

SoftTalker
2 replies
15h37m

Crash safety and the need for seatbelts will limit what can be done with the interior. There won't be any lay-flat seating.

JumpCrisscross
1 replies
13h45m

won't be any lay-flat seating

If crash rates go down, and you have a flat surface that you’re strapped onto that is angled and has an airbag-like system to ensure as many G’s as eyeballs in or out, sure we could.

olelele
0 replies
3h33m

As far as my imagination goes any efficient seatbelts for a person lying down will be very painful in even a small incident if the passenger has a scrotum.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
16h56m

You can check out the Hyundai Ioniq 7 for an idea of a non-conventional interior. Even then it still needs a driver's seat for the current day, so it can radicalize even further.

Though I'm not sure if we'll ever fully get to such a state. I can see driver's seats still being mandated in case of failure and a need to revert to manual driving.

jmward01
0 replies
18h25m

I've been thinking exactly along these lines myself. I bet a lot of people are thinking that self-driving + electric will bring van life to a whole new level. It may become the reality that a large number of people actually, purposefully, live in self driving vehicles/homes since removing the 'car' part greatly improves the living part.

simplicitea
3 replies
19h3m

I was about to ask the same thing; I have a hard time seeing the ways it ends up a net gain when driving is still a decent job for a lot of people, and rideshare drivers keep to themselves anyways

deprecative
1 replies
18h42m

A car that can drive itself will always be the better option to the companies that can afford the market share. Nobody cares about how automation will remove jobs for folks. These things are important to note. Your opinion as a customer is secondary to the cost to the provider.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
16h42m

Nobody cares about how automation will remove jobs for folks.

no one cares until it happens to them. I guess that attitude is part of the reason why this will succeed in the end.

ilaksh
0 replies
18h57m

You might find it easier to understand if you had lost a friend or loved-one in a car accident.

Society will have to adapt to the advancements in AI and robotics.

The status quo is not a good option because (globally) cars cause over a million fatalities each year and over 20 million injuries. Driving, riding, or walking near vehicles is one of the most dangerous activities in modern life.

An extremely high percentage of deaths and injuries will be prevented as self-driving cars are deployed, since almost all accidents are due to human error.

csharpminor
3 replies
18h40m

It’s one of those experiences you didn’t realize you wanted until you have it.

- No need for chit chat, you can just work / talk on the phone / play music

- No 18-hour shift sweat and deodorant smell

- No cursing at other drivers or awkward apologies because of fear of a bad rating

- Smooth, predictable driving. I have yet to have a “holy shit” moment in a Waymo, but this happens regularly in Uber / Lyft.

Also on safety, about 50% of the population has to worry a lot more about being abducted/hit on/stalked/etc. Uber and Lyft know this and have gone to great lengths to recruit female drivers, set up safety hotlines, etc. Not having to worry about the driver is a big deal.

johnnyanmac
2 replies
17h16m

IDK, It just sounds like some people have bad experiences and is using negativity bias to justify early tech (and ofc a skewed audience who seems to abhor socialties). All my uber rides were boring and uneventful. I see no need to pay a premium to guarantee that.

Meanwhile the driving experience of autonomous drivers is still not at a satisfactory stage for me. Maybe it worked fine in SF, but LA has some pretty rough, unmaintained roads to navigate.

mahkeiro
0 replies
10h50m

In my previous job I took 1000s of taxis all over Europe getting all kind of experience (including getting in an accident with a drunk taxi driver). Uber are an improvement that removed a lot of shady things but riding a Waymo in Phoenix is for me the best experience as there is almost no unknown.

akira2501
0 replies
15h23m

and ofc a skewed audience who seems to abhor socialties

At the same time every other story involves a horror over "going to dinner." They apparently don't abhor socialities, they just abhor having to be in the presence of the "lower caste."

crawshaw
3 replies
18h21m

Safety is the most important point across all customers. But as someone who is less concerned with safety, I still get enormous value out of Waymo. Let me try to explain:

Consider the distribution of Uber/Lyft drivers you have had. All the way from smooth driving, well-maintained car, through to erratic behavior and unpleasant environment. Imagine if the next time you got a driver you really like, you said "this driver only from now on" and that was the consistent experience you always got out of Uber/Lyft.

That is what Waymo is like. It is the same every time I get in. I do not have to think or adapt to a new environment. It is like sitting on my own couch at home.

s17n
2 replies
18h13m

That's because the cars are all brand new Jaguars that are impeccably maintained. If Waymo succeeds in becoming a widely used service that is price competitive with Uber, the experience won't be this good forever.

crawshaw
1 replies
18h8m

This fancy a vehicle? Maybe not, though I don't see why they wouldn't maintain a premium brand of some sort.

More importantly: the fleet is owned and maintained by Waymo. So they can achieve a higher degree of consistency. It is not the fanciness I value, it is the consistency.

Put another way: I can get a fancy car and a good driver with Uber Black. I would rate my waymo experience slightly above Uber Black.

s17n
0 replies
16h55m

Yeah, Uber used to just be what Uber Black is now, if you remember. I'm sure that both the consistency but moreso the average quality of Waymo will eventually decline (although the experience will of course always be more consistent than Uber). They aren't going to maintain a premium brand because they have billions of dollars of engineering costs that they need to amortize over the biggest possible pool of revenue.

maximus-decimus
2 replies
15h32m

Today my Uber driver wore so much cologne it made me wanna puke after a 5 minutes ride. The other day, one tried to convert me to his religious group.

Solvency
1 replies
15h29m

I can't even buy fruit from a certain grocery store because some kid there must were cologne. The fruit absolutely reeks of it.

Waymo cars will be no different. All it takes is one Armenian guy visiting Glendale slathered in cologne to nuke one of those cars permanently for all time.

iaseiadit
2 replies
17h7m

I usually have a good experience, but just in the last few weeks it’s been bad:

- Driver started watching TikTok videos on his dashboard-mounted phone while driving

- Driver going way over the speed limit in stormy weather

- A driver was clearly sick, coughing and sniffling and sneezing the whole ride

- Got in a car and it reeked of marijuana

- Got in a car and it reeked of BO

At this point I’d probably prefer a robot driver.

sowbug
1 replies
17h0m

Some of these will still happen, even in a self-driving car, because of prior passengers. In fact they might be more of a problem because passengers won't have another human in the car inhibiting their impolite or gross behavior.

I look forward to Snow Crash's self-cleaning public restrooms.

NewJazz
0 replies
2h29m

Pretty sure you get filmed while you are in the car so smoking is going to be a challenge.

JumpCrisscross
2 replies
19h0m

What are quality of life improvements?

Not having to tip. Having the car take a sensible route and not some idiotic detour Waze thought was clever. Having a car that’s always paying attention instead of being on a perpetual phone call. Being able to make phone calls without feeling obnoxious or worrying about one’s rating. Being in an objectively safer ride. Not having to listen to a rant about how the angel Mohamed saw was actually a demon because he was scared or get given a sermon about why being gay is evil. Not having drivers cancel on you because they don’t want to go where you need to.

NewJazz
1 replies
18h33m

You don't have to tip anywhere for any reason.

rufus_foreman
0 replies
18h20m

Can you respond to a reasonable interpretation of "don't have to tip"?

ugh123
1 replies
18h2m

Seems to be the same thing from a customer perspective.

Have you never been "forced" to talk to an Uber driver? :)

fragmede
0 replies
17h28m

Have you accepted Jesus into your life yet?

washywashy
0 replies
18h47m

Consistent driving and ride quality could be a benefit

unshavedyak
0 replies
17h54m

When i was in florida at Orlando, my wife and i experienced several of the worst Uber/Lyft drivers i can imagine. We're talking regularly breaking the law while driving, drivers. My wife also regularly encounters drivers she is uncomfortable around.

In general i'd vastly prefer a non-human experience.

sbuttgereit
0 replies
18h36m

I've used Waymo a couple of times now and absolutely find the experience superior.

As mentioned, the driving is sane... with other taxi and taxi-like services that can be hit or miss. But it's more than that.

When I get in taxi I can't help feel like I'm invading the driver's space in some way. The awkward conversations, the awkward silences, the music I'd never choose to listen to on my own, and that list goes on along similar lines; not to mention that many drivers feel like they have to engage in one way or another order to get a decent gratuity I feel more like I'm continuing to be "sold" something after the ride starts. It's just not pleasant.

In a Waymo, I don't feel any of that. I put something I want to listen to on the sound system or just enjoy the ride. Sure, I know there is staff somewhere watching me, but that doesn't bother me nearly so much as being in an incidental, albeit fleeting, social relationship with someone I might not otherwise chose to engage with.

So yes. A self-driving car is my first choice if my pickup/dropoff allows it.

pokstad
0 replies
18h43m

George Hotz said it best: “self driving is already here, it’s called Uber”

dkjaudyeqooe
0 replies
18h59m

The big one: dealing with people, any people, sucks.

Nothing is better than being able to go about your business without have to worry about social niceties and endless other tedious things associated with human beings.

derwiki
0 replies
1h47m

Yea, rideshare drivers are aggressive to the point of making me feel unsafe. I’d rather have granny Waymo drive me around.

bastawhiz
0 replies
16h28m

It makes me super anxious when drivers run stop signs, drive in the shoulder, or perform other maneuvers that I'd never perform while driving myself. Knowing I'm in a car with no risk of an accident due to knowingly breaking the law would bring me a great deal of peace.

_acco
0 replies
18h36m

- Safety: My gf much prefers to Uber/Lyft at night.

- Consistency: You know what you're getting.

- Privacy: Especially nice when traveling with a group.

- Instant pick-up estimate: It can take a while to find a driver with Uber/Lyft, and often the initial estimate is not fulfilled. While Waymo times are generally higher, you know before you press the button what the exact wait time will be.

__loam
0 replies
17h8m

Super minor but I've gotten sick in ubers like 3 times in the past year from erratic driving. Has not been the case for waymos.

AlbertCory
0 replies
18h4m

I think the "improvement" is that it ought to be cheaper. Whether it actually is remains to be seen.

Some people, like his mother, can't drive anymore. They might be encouraged to stay in the homes they're used to, instead of moving to assisted living.

Solvency
8 replies
18h34m

I feel like no one in this thread lives in LA. This is going to be an absolute catastrophe. Driving out here is like Thunderdome. There is zero way in hell I'd ever trust some Waymo car to make some insane left turn across 6 lanes of rush hour traffic out here, let alone the freeway.

OkayPhysicist
3 replies
17h29m

I see it as a trial by fire. If Waymo can handle LA, it can handle anywhere (that doesn't have awful weather).

tziki
0 replies
10h40m

SF traffic seems harder to handle than LA traffic.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
16h38m

Fire indeed. Good luck to everyone else, but I won't be in that kitchen.

fragmede
0 replies
17h22m

One step at a time. Computers are already better than humans in terms of braking with ABS brakes. Driving in awful weather conditions is just a matter of sensors - as a human I can't see in the dark, but IR sensors can. Same for snow. Something with radar on different frequencies than visible light can see through snow and do better than humans can.

hn_throwaway_99
1 replies
18h18m

There is zero way in hell I'd ever trust some Waymo car to make some insane left turn across 6 lanes of rush hour traffic out here, let alone the freeway.

This quote highlights why I would trust it more. I have been an Uber that essentially tried to make that turn, and it was insane. I'm hoping Waymo would be smart enough to try alternate routes (that said, I've had Google Maps route me in West Hollywood going across major boulevards without a light during rush hour, which is basically impossible).

JumpCrisscross
0 replies
18h8m

I have been an Uber that essentially tried to make that turn, and it was insane

This announcement makes me more willing to travel to LA for work.

cdogl
0 replies
18h14m

As someone who doesn’t live in LA: I can’t imagine what your freeways are like given your characterisation of an ordinary road. Our “freeways” max out at 4-5 lanes each way. From what I can tell, getting from A to B is a stressful full time job for the people of your good city.

Rebelgecko
0 replies
17h19m

I've taken Waymo in LA and Santa Monica and honestly it's fine. Some drivers freak out because it actually stops at stop signs and it doesn't speed, but it feels much safer than 90% of Ubers I've taken.

The cars also has much better depth perception than I do, which makes it pretty good at those unprotected left turns

sixothree
2 replies
18h45m

How does the pricing compare?

okdood64
0 replies
17h23m

I've found it to be 10-15% more expensive for local SF rides than Uber/Lyft.

fragmede
0 replies
17h25m

Varies. Sometimes it's lower, sometimes it's about the same, sometimes it's higher for some reason. It really just depends.

jseliger
2 replies
19h6m

I use Waymo all the time in Phoenix and Scottsdale too, and it's great.

afhjafh3883
1 replies
18h24m

Dumb question but does it have a person monitoring in the driver seat? Or are you the only one in the car?

bigmadshoe
0 replies
18h16m

You’re the only one in the car.

bagels
0 replies
18h22m

How is it better than Uber/Lyft?

_acco
54 replies
18h27m

I love Waymo and use it all the time.

One aspect I'd still like to see them figure out:

As a bike commuter, I share the road with Waymo often. When cycling, you're always checking the eyes of other drivers to confirm if they see you.

I've had a couple incidents where I was a little thrown/unnerved because I couldn't confirm if a Waymo was registering me. It ultimately behaved fine, but I had to put my guard way up because I just couldn't tell.

I've wondered if they could use the light/display on top to signal acknowledgment? How do you simulate the precision of a gaze with a machine that's "seeing" everything at once?

konschubert
10 replies
18h16m

As a biker, I feel MICH safer around self driving cars because I know they are paying attention.

I don’t need to check if they see me. They do.

iancmceachern
4 replies
15h26m

I'm the exact opposite. I've had a couple incidents that make me not trust them.

(Weird this was down voted, just sharing personal experiences)

dataflow
2 replies
15h19m

With Waymo? Or others?

iancmceachern
1 replies
14h52m

Waymo and Cruise.

I live right near Oracle Park where there was a big Cruise Yard, and there is a ton of traffic and cruise, zoox, etc self driving cars circling the neighborhood endlessly.

It's not as if I've had a overtly terrible single incident. It's as though they're causing unsafe driving conditions for pedestrians, cyclists and other motorists regularly.

Driving unreasonably slow and erratic, stopping in the middle of streets, blocking traffic, not responding to the need for them to move or respond as human driver would.

They're problematic. I could start a youtube channel or something it happens enough in my day to day life.

acchow
0 replies
12h36m

All of your descriptions perfectly match my experiences with Cruise but not at all my experiences with Waymo.

I bike by Oracle park almost every day.

emptysongglass
0 replies
11h46m

Because you didn't share why. Also, please don't complain about downvotes, it's in the HN guidelines.

somethoughts
1 replies
17h0m

Going forward - I think it's important to not just categorically say all self driving cars are safer than human drivers. It's probably better to say I feel safer around Waymo and <insert other trusted company> self driving cars.

With such complexity and unknowns within the codebase - there is likely going to be a much higher amount of variability w.r.t. safety and AI decision making. I'm not so sure I'd categorically say a self driving car from say Nikola or some SPAC'd startup would make me feel all that safe.

amelius
0 replies
1h40m

"I feel so safe around commit 07cc283a8344 of the Waymo software."

jeffrallen
0 replies
4h53m

they do

Until you're being dragged under them.

candiddevmike
0 replies
17h33m

Seeing a bike and recognizing a bike are two different things with self driving cars. I like OP's idea of having a visual cue that it recognized a bike.

SoftTalker
0 replies
15h49m

That's the exact opposite assumption I'd make. As a biker, a pedestrian, or a driver.

jessriedel
10 replies
16h41m

They have tried many variations out, but so far they don't seem to think they work better than doing nothing. The only communication the Waymo's currently do it to signal that they are stopping for pedestrians, both to the pedestrians themselves and also to the cars behind.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/10/13/23913251/waymo-roof-dome...

wavefunction
5 replies
10h54m

Even if the cars had a "I'm currently deciding" indicator it would be a major improvement. My only issue with these sorts of anti-socialized services is not being able to promptly and easily sue for remedy. Maybe a blood price on a few mid-level managers (or possibly higher depending on the situation) if the service ends up killing people. That would put my heart at mind in the marketplace of the future.

sagarm
1 replies
9h15m

Maybe we can start with putting a blood price on human drivers, since they have direct culpability?

nextaccountic
0 replies
8h59m

When a human driver is negligent or reckless, they don't potentially endanger millions of people at once. So there's a difference

danlugo92
1 replies
10h0m

"I'm currently deciding" indicator

Million dollar idea right there

gleenn
0 replies
9h32m

Isn't that constantly happening? Every millisecond it's "deciding" what to do.

krisoft
0 replies
7h48m

My only issue with these sorts of anti-socialized services is not being able to promptly and easily sue for remedy.

What do you mean by that? Do you think if their cars hurt someone or cause damage to property you can't sue them? What is the basis of this belief?

Sakos
3 replies
6h24m

I don't know how aware Waymo cars are of their surroundings. Why don't they have a (or something like a) 360 degree string of LEDs (for example on the roof) that lights up a few in the direction of human obstacles if they're close enough? Bonus points if they're colored to indicate everything is ok or there's potential caution/danger.

They're still trying to do this weird universal signage when they need some way to replicate eye contact and 1-to-1 signaling. I feel safe biking or driving around other cars because I can directly communicate and negotiate with other traffic participants. I can't do that with an automated car as they're currently designed, and I feel like that's a huge flaw.

jessriedel
2 replies
3h55m

I don't know how aware Waymo cars are of their surroundings.

Waymo cars are extremely, extremely aware of their surroundings. They have a category, distance, speed, and distribution of possible future paths for all cars, pedestrians, and bicyclists within sight over 360 degrees.

Why don't they have a (or something like a) 360 degree string of LEDs (for example on the roof) that lights up a few in the direction of human obstacles if they're close enough?

I don't think it's so obvious this helps. What is the threshold for how far away something is before it's indicated on the ring? If I'm standing just outside that distance, how will I know it's because of distance rather than because I haven't been seen? If the distance is set long, how will I know it sees me and not something behind me?

The natural way to get around these problems is for the car to "point out" everything it see using, e.g., fake eyes. But now you have a car covered in eyes surveilling the neighborhood, and people don't like that either.

Sakos
1 replies
3h44m

What is the threshold for how far away something is before it's indicated on the ring? If I'm standing just outside that distance, how will I know it's because of distance rather than because I haven't been seen? If the distance is set long, how will I know it sees me and not something behind me?

I feel like this is a non-issue. The LEDs can be a certain size. They could be dimmable so their brightness can be modulated by distance.

All the things you mention are an issue with real drivers too, but we make it work because we can signal and communicate. Give these cars the same functionality and experiment. This isn't an insurmountable issue, but it is one that needs to be addressed that isn't being addressed at all. Throwing up your hands and saying it's too difficult is less than helpful. They're putting these things on the road with people. They have a responsibility to figure this stuff out. Especially if they want to go beyond a handful of cities.

jessriedel
0 replies
1h31m

Strong disagree that this is all non-issue/obvious. There are plenty of cases where it's better to not communicate rather than try and communicate in a way that is likely to be misinterpreted. Regarding your "just make the LEDs dimmable", this just adds more opportunities for confusion; humans will have no idea how the distance-brightness relationship is calibrated, it will appear different depending on the lighting conditions, etc. Just like consider how many gauges you have ever seen that communicate a continuous variable based on the brightness of the display. (Very few or none).

No one is throwing up their hands. Human-autonomous-vehicle communication is a whole research field. Waymo has every incentive here to both make the vehicles safer and to make pedestrians feel safer (holding actual safety fixed).

The ultimate test is not your first gut reaction as to whether they have done "enough", but rather it's whether the vehicles are safer than human-driven ones, and the evidence so far strongly points to that being the case.

cj
6 replies
17h5m

Ditto as a motorcyclist.

Making eye contact with drivers makes riding a lot easier. You know they see you.

marssaxman
4 replies
15h52m

When I'm on a motorcycle, I assume they are never seeing me - but it's still useful to see them, and I can often tell what they are about to do before they've started doing it. I have not yet had the chance to share the road with a robot, but I wonder whether that feeling for traffic will still work.

rukuu001
1 replies
13h59m

Yeh, the only time I assume a driver has really seen me is when we make eye contact.

(But - twice in 20 years I’ve had the chilling experience of a driver making eye contact and pulling out in front of me anyway.)

guenthert
0 replies
9h27m

I don't think that's actually all that uncommon. I'll give them the benefit of doubt and assume that they habitually turn to look, but don't actually see or that they grossly misjudge your speed.

That was more of a problem in my 'Sturm & Drang' time. These days grannys on their electically-assisted bicycles are faster than me, hence I don't surprise car drivers any more.

cj
0 replies
15h44m

Agreed.

It would be nice if there were a simple directional light on the top of robotaxis that indicates where it’s intending to go next (directional light) and how imminently it will begin moving (perhaps how fast the light blinks) when e.g. at a stop sign.

Rapzid
0 replies
9h27m

The motorcycle safety courses teaches NOT to assume a driver sees or will yield the right away because of "eye contact".

stouset
0 replies
8h26m

As a motorcycle I have been pleasantly surprised by the fact that they always seem to see me and give way when lane splitting.

I was very harsh about the extremely poor interactions with Cruise, but I have yet to see anything to sour me with Waymo.

montag
1 replies
16h40m

Cylon + vehicle = KITT (Night Rider)

toast0
0 replies
12h27m

Both shows produced by Glen Larson. Some call it a Larson Scanner.

Andrex
0 replies
17h2m

I have very little BSG in my head but I still jumped to this solution. Odd.

tzs
2 replies
4h42m

Assuming that they will eventually have displays around the sides to show ads, they could also use those to show nearby people who they see and how they plan to maneuver around them.

So if they are showing an ad on the display on your side it means that either it doesn’t see you or thinks you are far enough away that it does not have to account for you in its short term planning.

If it sees you and is taking you into account it could show a diagram showing you and what it plans to do.

jajko
1 replies
4h21m

If they will be running around with displays showing ads I'll never be without few rocks in my pocket just to keep things balanced and maintaining healthier society.

I know it sounds harsh, but force feeding me ads I definitely don't want to see while being unable to avoid them (stay home ain't no argument in civilized world) is unacceptable, and there is no but XYZ to make that stance any weaker.

Ads are a cancer of society, not the worst one but the core principle is rotten beyond reason - manipulate general population at your will, against their default choices, for money or power (or worse).

derwiki
0 replies
1h51m

How do you feel about billboards?

AlbertCory
2 replies
15h41m

since I'm out walking the dog often, in the dark and in daytime:

Often you can't tell if a human sees you. Even in day, they may have tinted windows, or the sun might make it impossible. At night, you definitely can't tell.

suzzer99
1 replies
12h11m

As a constant pedestrian, my main concern is people turning right at a light as I'm starting out in the crosswalk. In that case you can usually check their eyes from the side even at night. If I don't have confirmation they see me, or if they aren't obviously stopping for me, I don't go.

If it's someone at a 4-way stop, you can usually tell when they come to a stop far from back the crosswalk. Otherwise I don't walk out in front of them. I also try to be aware if I'm in their blind spot.

AlbertCory
0 replies
11h53m

yes. Always cautious. And yell "Stop!!!" if in any doubt. Better to have them be pissed off than running over you.

pavlov
1 replies
7h23m

In the now defunct Apple Car, the windshield exterior was a giant OLED that rendered weird big eyes using the same code as on the Vision Pro. Apparently Johnny Ive insisted on this expensive external screen to make the car feel more human.

(Not really. But you never know?)

heliophobicdude
1 replies
18h22m

So like Apple Vision Pro's EyeSight but for a Waymo?

whimsicalism
0 replies
18h15m

as a biker, they are seeing you and that is how i always assume

nox101
0 replies
13h16m

There was a Honda concept car years back that had LCDs in front of the headlights. They used them to make eye expressions to signal things

ironmagma
0 replies
17h41m

The cars could see you at one moment, and then not see you the next. They lack any good object permanence unlike humans, so I'm not sure surfacing this information would help.

foota
0 replies
15h30m

You can imagine some ominously humorous implementations of this. Red dot laser for pointing out people?

eep_social
0 replies
17h33m

I've wondered if they could use the light/display on top to signal acknowledgment?

They have started trialing exactly this as of about two weeks ago. [edit: But I haven’t seen it operate up close yet.]

andbberger
0 replies
18h16m

even without eye contact i'll take a waymo over a sf driver every time when biking in the city...

__loam
0 replies
17h12m

I agree that the UX could be better but it's definitely seeing you better than a human would. It can see you behind shit and around corners and in blind spots. Whether it reacts correctly is another story, but additionally, there's a strong incentive for Waymo not to hit you because of the regulatory regime. They have to report all collisions to a regulatory body and they have to send in all the data they had showing why they hit you. If they're at fault, you're almost certainly getting a big payout.

SeanAnderson
0 replies
18h22m

Yeah, I agree there is opportunity for improvement here.

Maybe they should take a note from the Apple Vision Pro and display a pair of eyes on the windshield looking at you? (/s ?) :)

Geisterde
0 replies
6h15m

I really like the idea, maybe eyes and gaze come across as a bit creepy though.

Adj_and_Styles
0 replies
13h8m

Japanese already tested it, with googly eyes. It seems to work. Modern cars are expensive, some extra plastic and servos is not going to break the bank.

https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3543174.3546841

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-11250965/Jap...

https://videos.dailymail.co.uk/video/mol/2022/09/26/56244997...

British used a LED matrix. More "output" options (frowns and smiles, text), similar results.

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/news/first-ever-uk-ghost-driver...

https://www.theengineer.co.uk/content/news/pedestrian-study-...

zk
34 replies
19h8m

This is incredible news. In the next 10 years more and more transportation will shift to self driving and save thousands of lives and prevent many more injuries. Already in San Francisco waymo's are and feel much safer than human driven rideshare.

matsemann
31 replies
19h4m

While autonomous driving helps a bit on safety, that's just one of the many issues with the car dependence in our society. It might even expand the issues, if it ends up with less people using public transport and relying on these kinds of things.

dkjaudyeqooe
26 replies
18h42m

Waymo is public transport, but you mean mass transit.

People don't use mass transit because it sucks, blaming other modes of public transit doesn't cut it. The design and implementation of it is what keeps people from using it.

The good news is automated vehicles will add flexible options for new types of public transport that are between single-trip taxies and mass transit and will lower costs to all kinds of public transit.

accurrent
10 replies
18h11m

European and Asian nations tend to have perfectly usable mass transit (including developing countries). Sure there are some us cases for cars, but for daily commute its not needed.

To add to it mass transit is generally heavuly subsidized that means that less well off people can get to work/school at low costs. It reduces poverty and income inequality.

dkjaudyeqooe
4 replies
17h47m

Mass transit is great when it's available, which means in places of high density, which is why you list Asia and Europe. It's right there in the name.

I live in Europe in a village of about 1500 people are there is no usable public transport (2 buses a day).

Relative to total area, mass transit is almost nowhere. That's also true for for total road kilometers.

I agree with your last sentence, but for those who live outside of cities or other places of high density, public transport is unusable or unavailable. Governments roundly ignore people who live in these places (due to expense and political irrelevance) so there is always a fairly decent percentage of the population that is "public transport poor".

johnnyanmac
3 replies
16h33m

I live in Europe in a village of about 1500 people are there is no usable public transport (2 buses a day).

and how would waymo fix this? Waymo is still a private business and needs to weigh the costs of deploying to a smaller town vs. simply not supporting that range. It's the same issue as government.

dkjaudyeqooe
2 replies
16h9m

Automated vehicles will enable smaller buses that drive themselves and make serving these places profitable to service. Automated taxi services like Waymo also ultimately be cheaper too.

zorowithenma
1 replies
5h37m

Nah bro, they would instead send those cars where they would get much more profit. You just can't expect too many cab bookings in a small town of 1500. Idk bout EU but here in India we have public transport to even remote places and it is sure profitable and many people do use it everyday, even if the population is less many use public transit instead of own veichles in towns.

hnaccount_rng
0 replies
1h16m

I don't know. One "problem" is the salary around here. You simply cannot generate enough revenue from anything below 30k people for anything more than school buses (which are both predictable and tax-funded). But you wouldn't need that many rides to justify a taxi. Those _are_ around, even though typically you need to call well in advance. So even if there is like one of those autonomous taxis for a dozen 1.5k villages that will probably be both enough for any reasonable situation and an improvement wrt to the current state

jltsiren
3 replies
17h24m

Subsidizing public transit to make it affordable is a terrible idea. If you want good public transit with stable funding, you must build it primarily for the middle class. For people who pay more taxes than they receive benefits and who could choose to drive instead.

Driving has high fixed costs and low marginal costs. If you have a car anyway, using it for yet another trip is cheap. If you want to make public transit competitive with driving, you must make the fares low enough. That often means paying a substantial fraction of the expenses from taxes. But why would you do that? Because once a city grows large enough and dense enough, public transit becomes cheaper than car infrastructure. Because it requires less subsidies than driving.

johnnyanmac
2 replies
16h25m

For people who pay more taxes than they receive benefits and who could choose to drive instead.

that doesn't make sense. You just described the issue: they can choose to drive. And many do in the US.

Government subsidizes transport to get more people into the city hubs, which bolsters the economy of business as more people can reach downtown, which gives the town/city more money in taxes. These business have fixed costs so it's not like a rich person is going to be proportionately better to business than a poor person buying the bare necessities.

It makes a lot more sense to target people who are taken out of the economy pool otherwise without such transportation. Especially if we're talking about a large city like LA.

----

and while it's a cliche, it needs to be asked in this context: what even is "middle class" here?

If you want to make public transit competitive with driving, you must make the fares low enough. That often means paying a substantial fraction of the expenses from taxes.

I argue that such a "low enough bar" for a state like California will never outdo the convenience of a car. You're right in the long term that less cars => lower road maintenance => less road subsidies => more money to go around to other parts of the state. But we're not starting from scratch here.

jltsiren
1 replies
15h36m

Public services used by people who can afford the alternatives are universally better than those intended for the poor. If you don't use the service yourself, you don't care that much about the quality, and you are more likely to support funding cuts. Because the poor are a minority, most people don't really care about services used by them.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
15h13m

If you don't use the service yourself, you don't care that much about the quality, and you are more likely to support funding cuts.

If you don't use the service it doesn't matter if it's a hunk of junk or a limousine, it's your tax money for a service you don't care about and will cut it anyway. You may be more likely to cut a limousine if you don't personally use it.

Because the poor are a minority, most people don't really care about services used by them.

I don't know about minority, especially in these times. But minority or not, welfare programs take up 20% or so of government spending. It's a large enough population being serviced that it can't be ignored.

barbazoo
7 replies
18h18m

Waymo is public transport

Is it? Doesn't "public transit" at least somewhat imply that it's a business that has to operate under the rules of some democratically elected institution?

Waymo will ban you, price you differently based on who/where/when you are, etc. I wouldn't expect any of that from "public transit".

gretch
2 replies
18h1m

price you differently based on who/where/when you are, etc

public transit already does this

https://www.bart.gov/tickets/discounts

-Seniors 65 and over get 62.5% off -Youth 5-18 years old get 50% off

vlovich123
0 replies
17h2m

Muni is free for seniors and youth.

That's a different kind of price segmentation than the kind of price discrimination that these companies can do. Also even without discounts public transit is substantially cheaper than taxi services (like 1/10th the cost). Some arguments I've seen is that the city should just make public transit free as you can offset the hit by getting rid of fare enforcement / fare machines.

barbazoo
0 replies
14h14m

I was thinking more of individual pricing

tialaramex
1 replies
16h50m

Yes, it's public transit. Public doesn't mean "there aren't any rules" it just means public. You can't light barbecues in my local public park, and the bloke who tried to knife a bus driver isn't allowed to ride the public buses here.

johnnyanmac
0 replies
16h20m

Public transportation service means the operation of a vehicle that provides general or special service to the public on a regular and continuing basis consistent with 49 U.S.C. Chapter 53.

From the FTA. and for those who really want to dive into the law of it: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/49/subtitle-III/chap..., whose own definition is:

(A) means regular, continuing shared-ride surface transportation services that are open to the general public or open to a segment of the general public defined by age, disability, or low income; and

in a legal sense, Waymo doesn't seem to meet even these high level definitions. So it's likely classified as private transportation unless I'm missing something.

OkayPhysicist
1 replies
17h20m

People can (and should) be banned from public transit, too.

barbazoo
0 replies
37m

I’ve never seen that happen and I disagree that it should. Not saying it doesn’t happen.

hiddencost
5 replies
18h25m

It sucks because we don't fund it. Europe does fine.

hn_throwaway_99
2 replies
18h10m

I hate the comparisons to Europe, because they're apples to oranges. I've been in European cities and I totally agree, it's a joy to be able to take public transit and/or walk everywhere. But most European cities were built long before the car.

Older US cities (Boston, NY) have great public transit/walking options, though I agree deferred maintenance is taking its toll. But if you look at cities designed around the car, for many of them it's just prohibitively expensive to add things like light rail or subways now. Austin TX will be adding more light rail, but the price tag keeps exploding and the route keeps getting shorter.

I'd be curious if anyone could point to any city that was built around the car where they subsequently made substantial public transit improvements that carry more than, say, 10% of commuters.

coalteddy
0 replies
1h43m

US cities love their cars. Not even in city centers do they prioritize pedestrians over cars. That has nothing to do with apples or oranges. It's a priority thing and not costs. There is no reason to need cars in city centers. Makes cities ugly, loud and dangerous compared to europe or asia.

renewiltord
0 replies
17h53m

Almost everything where people ask for "more funding", that service is junk and adding money just means you go from getting junk for cheap to getting junk for expensive. I've seen zero cases of it going from junk to even mediocre. I've seen numerous examples of junk going from cheap junk to expensive junk, especially in US public services.

The "more funding" is always allocated towards existing rent-seekers.

And my opinion with getting junk is that if I'm getting it, I want to be paying as little for it as possible.

As a quick test for what you feel, try this. You read a headline that says "This city school received the most government funding of any school in the US". Do you think that school is "great" / "mediocre" / "crap"? My personal immediate inclination is that the school is probably shit.

Aloisius
0 replies
17h37m

Europe doesn't really do fine. Outside a handful of cities, cars are the dominant form of transit there too.

GeneralMayhem
0 replies
16h51m

Waymo is not public transport in the sense that most people mean it, which describes only state entities, as opposed to the private sector. Public transit exists to serve the public good, doesn't need to turn a profit, and is accountable to government (ideally elected) officials. Waymo is a for-profit entity that can do more or less whatever it wants within the bounds set by CPUC. I think it's a net good, but it's still private industry.

skybrian
1 replies
18h58m

For longer travel, a convenient way to get to the bus or train station might make public transit more popular.

seanmcdirmid
0 replies
18h41m

Ya, smaller door to transit center transportation is something we can even begin to consider once autonomous driving works. Like how old retired PLA soldiers used to drive tuktuks from Beijing subway stations to your apartment in the 1990s for a 5 mao or one kuai.

wilg
0 replies
18h59m

Unfortunately self-driving seems to be an easier problem to solve than improving public transit policy anywhere in the U.S.

madeofpalk
0 replies
18h25m

My biggest objection with cars is parking them. It's wasting space dedicated to inefficiency.

Self driving cars have much less use for parking garages in the middle of the city, so I think it's a net-positive.

konschubert
0 replies
18h10m

Maybe one day, when the last human driver is banned, I’ll be able to ride my bike without fear.

1970-01-01
0 replies
17h36m

I made a similar observation just yesterday. SAE level 5 will reset our current understanding of parenting to where it was 30 years ago. Groups of children will be able to safely travel around town without adult supervision.

clay_the_ripper
34 replies
19h10m

As a resident, I don’t support this at all.

Waymos are annoying to have on the road - they go extremely slowly (with good reason) and make weird traffic moves.

Do we want our roads getting clogged up with super slow taxis that steal jobs from ordinary people and give them to the tech industry?

rufus_foreman
12 replies
19h6m

> Do we want our roads getting clogged up with super slow taxis

Can't we just pass some laws that require Waymos to drive above the speed limit at all times, like normal drivers?

NewJazz
6 replies
19h4m

Please be irony.

JumpCrisscross
5 replies
18h53m

I don’t think our speed limits are universally set to be obeyed. If they were set at 25 with the expectation of 30 to 35, it does make sense to acknowledge that if autonomous vehicles will actually do 25.

NewJazz
4 replies
18h35m

Yeah, they are actually. They do research and surveys into traffic speeds. Just because it is difficult to enforce doesn't make it any more justified to go 35 in a 25. That is a big difference, by the way. Almost twice as fast. The fastest humans can run at 25 mph (albeit at short distances). Zero humans can run at speeds of 35 mph. So not just a mathematical difference but a physiological difference as well. Suddenly only the fastest dog breeds can outrun your car... Sorry Lil corgi (they top out at 25 mph typically). Or I dunno, old people, kids, disabled people...

Slower is safer!

dragonwriter
1 replies
18h15m

35 in a 25. That is a big difference, by the way. Almost twice as fast.

1.4 times as fast is not "almost" twice as fast. 50 is twice as fast as 25; 49 is 1.4 times as fast as 35 which is 1.4 times as fast as 25.

TulliusCicero
0 replies
17h46m

You're correct, but it is true that 35 mph would be roughly double the kinetic energy, which probably matters for accidents.

rufus_foreman
0 replies
18h16m

> Yeah, they are actually

Wait, you are asserting that speed limits are set expecting that everyone will obey them?

JumpCrisscross
0 replies
18h20m

do research and surveys into traffic speeds

I know, I’m asking if they adjust for how humans actually drive. There are places in America (funny enough, Phoenix and LA) where going 25 in a 25 will subject you to aggressive driving from others.

1970-01-01
2 replies
18h30m

How about this: Since they are statistically better than average drivers, we study the results of sending them around town 10% faster than the speed limit.

dragonwriter
1 replies
18h19m

It's well known that speed differences on the road are a major cause of safety problems, so unless you are going to have segregated self-driving corridors, having them operate at a higher speed than other traffic is dangerous even if the speed would be safe for them if the other traffic was also self-driving at similar speeds and safe for the non-self-driving traffic if the other traffic was non-self-driving at the lower speed.

1970-01-01
0 replies
17h58m

It's well known that speed differences on the road are a major cause

the speed differences you are referring to are road design situations such as highways dumping traffic into downtown traffic. delta V isn't recognized as a severe problem by IIHS nor DOT. speeding very much is.

source: https://highways.dot.gov/media/13876

--What is the effect of speed differences? In addition to absolute speeds, the speed differences between vehicles also have an effect on the crash rate. This effect is studied in two ways. The first type of studies are those that compare the crash rates between roads that have a large speed variance (large differences in vehicle speeds during a 24 hour period) and roads that have a small speed variance. These studies mostly conclude that roads with a large speed variance are less safe (Aarts & Van Schagen, 2006). The second type of studies are those that concentrate on the speed differences between the individual vehicles that were involved in a crash and all the other vehicles. The first studies of this type were conducted in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s, e.g. Solomon (1964). These studies always found a U-curve: the slower or faster a car drives compared with most of the vehicles on that road, the more the risk of being involved in a crash increased. However, more recent studies, especially those carried out in Australia (e.g. Kloeden et al., 1997; 2001; 2002) that used more modern measuring instruments and used a more accurate research design, reached a different conclusion. They still indicate that vehicles that drive faster than average on that road have a higher crash rate; vehicles that drive slower, however, were found not to have an increased risk (Figure 3)

fragmede
0 replies
17h2m

Or, we could recognize how farcicle it all is, and abolish the limits and make them guidelines, with tickets still being given for being reckless. If we're all safely doing 79 mph anyway, because it's not the 1950's and technology has advanced, just let us do that without risking a ticket.

Speed limits in a school zone should be 15 mph, but we care more that the children are safe than some number. If we have robots that are able to react inhumanly fast and are proven to be able to stop and not run people over, then they should be able to go at whatever speed that has them not running people over.

dragonwriter
0 replies
18h21m

Can't we just pass some laws that require Waymos to drive above the speed limit at all times

A law that sets the legal maximum speed as also the legal "must not meet or fall below" speed.

I dunno, seems problematic.

gkoberger
7 replies
19h7m

They’re much safer, and tech has already stolen from drivers (via 50% cuts). Yes, we do want safer transportation. Evolving as a society is important.

kriiuuu
5 replies
18h51m

Show me indenpendant research that they are safer. I can’t find any.

Aloisius
2 replies
18h37m

If they were less safe than human drivers, one would there would be more accidents where Waymo was at fault than another party.

Having personally gone through several years of AV collisions reports to California a few months back, that wasn't the case. Indeed, in most of the small number of cases where Waymo was at fault, there was human driver in control of the vehicle.

The were a four cases where the Waymo was at fault. One hit a chain strung across parking lot. There was a minor collision with a parked car. One ran over and killed a dog. One hit a vehicle while trying to reverse.

There were dozens where the other party was at fault (lots of rear ends).

subarctic
1 replies
18h9m

Now that you put it that way, it's probably tough to get in an accident with a waymo without being found at fault. How often does a car stop suddenly and unexpectedly, get rear ended, and get found at fault?

Aloisius
0 replies
17h13m

Never. If you rear end someone because you were following too closely to stop without hitting them, you're at fault. There's a reason why the three second rule is taught.

There are some rare exceptions like if someone's tail lights are out, but nothing that would apply here.

ilaksh
0 replies
18h27m

They have been submitting data to the DMV for some time. Do you believe they are falsifying their data?

Supermancho
0 replies
19h6m

NIMBYs don't want progress if it makes their lives more difficult, even if it's only in their mind.

NewJazz
4 replies
19h5m

This is a complicated comment.

Do they really drive that slow... Or just, like, the speed limit? Or generally safe(r) driving speeds? All things equal, slower is safer!

Why would roads be anymore clogged than they are already? Because transportation becomes cheaper? So should we jack up fuel prices or insurance prices so there are fewer cars on the road? Real questions.

And onto the "stealing jobs" comment... Under this ethos, why would anyone automate any task?

w45yw45ywtg
1 replies
18h36m

As a nitpick that I'm sure varies from state to state... All things can't be equal if you're going slower than the rest of traffic since by definition there's a speed differential relative to the vehicles around you. In drivers-ed in California for example the advice from the dmv is actually to go the speed limit /or/ keep with the flow of traffic. If everyone around you is doing 80 in a 65 zone then you should still speed up at least a little or move into a lane where the flow of traffic is slower. Automated vehicles interestingly are an odd case because no company is going to tell their vehicles to break the law even if social norms encourage otherwise.

unshavedyak
0 replies
17h43m

I expect it'll help - though. Ie reduce the average, making more lanes of traffic safer by body blocking the speeders.

Though, I do expect there to be an initial surge of aggression when people are forced to reduce their speeds by 15mph.

unshavedyak
0 replies
17h45m

Do they really drive that slow... Or just, like, the speed limit? Or generally safe(r) driving speeds? All things equal, slower is safer!

So i have no idea about Waymo, but man i can only imagine how much drivers will rage over them the more of them there are. God knows they'll go the speed limit, and so many drivers absolutely loathe that.

As it is, i drive 5 over just to reduce the insanity of people passing/etc. Which, i still get aggressively passed quite a bit, but that 5mph matters. I'm used to drivers going ~10-15mph over the limit, and every mph under +10 is a significant problem for them.

I look forward to these on that point alone. The more cars there are on the road normalizing ideal speeds (whatever they may be) the better. People are far too aggressive on the road in my experience. At least as a WA native.

brokensegue
0 replies
19h1m

they drive conservatively but at reasonable speeds

whimsicalism
3 replies
19h6m

Not at all my experience and I get a ton of value out of Waymos.

steal jobs from ordinary people and give them to the tech industry

technological progress is good, it is good to reallocate people's talent if we no longer need drivers

pokstad
2 replies
18h39m

That’s not how humans actually work. Driving is one of the last big job sources for millions of Americans and when it disappears there will be many people out of work. Expect more homeless and drug use when people have difficulty transitioning in a post driver world.

mavhc
0 replies
18h14m

Were you also against the introduction of the plough?

OkayPhysicist
0 replies
17h52m

It is not a good thing to employ a bunch of people in pointless jobs just because we don't have anything else for them to do. That's not labor, that's toil.

sobellian
0 replies
19h0m

While we're at it, do we really want our textile mills getting clogged up with dangerous mechanized looms that steal jobs from ordinary people and give them to the capitalists?

sbuttgereit
0 replies
18h24m

I regularly drive on roads with driverless Waymo cars and they're fine, at least where I live in San Francisco. They do drive the speed limit and, as compared to other drivers, they don't take the same sorts of chances that I see typically taken... which I appreciate. The only discomfort I have with them when I'm in a driving situation (as a driver) is that I find comfort in seeing the other drivers around me see me: if I make eye contact with someone I can hope there is awareness of my presence. That might not be a completely rational thing to get comfortable with... that person may have seen you or seen right through you... but it does ease my emotional tension right or wrong. Natrually, with a Waymo, that can't happen.

But all in all I've not had a problem with them doing anything unexpected or strange when I encounter them on the road. My couple rides in a Waymo at this point over the past several weeks have been great.

Needless to say, I wholeheartedly support their presence on the road and am glad to hear the program is expanding.

mindstorms6
0 replies
2h49m

Driving the speed limit is a feature not a bug - and crucially all of the Uber drivers I've had in SF drive terribly. It's like I'm in Mario Kart.

We should be excited about not having humans drive and automating them out of this task they clearly don't want to do.

Kronopath
0 replies
19h6m

Yes.

afhjafh3883
27 replies
19h12m

Has anyone tried it recently? Does it work well? How does the price compare to Uber?

Kronopath
14 replies
19h8m

In SF, up-front prices have been comparable to Uber’s, except that you don’t have to pay tip, which automatically makes it 15–20% cheaper.

The few times I’ve tried it, the service has been good and its driving was safe. The only downside is that there seems to sometimes be longer wait times.

bossyTeacher
13 replies
19h4m

In europe, you don't pay tips to uber drivers. Surely, if the tip is compulsory, it should be called a service fee

Kronopath
4 replies
18h58m

Legally, it’s not compulsory. Socially and culturally, it definitely is. In the US, if you don’t tip 15%, you’re either an asshole, or you’re saying there’s severe issues with the service.

I’m not going justify this culture—I don’t like it either—but that is the way it is.

relativ575
2 replies
17h18m

I'm in the US and a frequent Uber users, and I've only tipped once over 10 years. My rating is 4.93, so I don't think the drivers see me as an asshole.

noitpmeder
0 replies
14h31m

It's doubtful drivers are able to see whether or not a rider tipped before they are prompted to rate them.

bossyTeacher
0 replies
16h38m

It is possible there exists a table called dbo.user_ratings with a boolean column called IsAsshole, and you might have tons of rows there all with a 1 on the boolean column but the Uber APIs don't return that value. CEO Travis could tell us if it exists

huytersd
0 replies
15h19m

No one using an Uber tips.

pkaye
3 replies
18h47m

Uber didn't originally have tips but the US Uber drivers wanted tips and pushed to implement it.

abecedarius
2 replies
18h11m

How many of them really wanted it? To me when Uber added tipping it seemed to come out of the blue. (And it was stupid and bad for everyone except possibly Uber, because the equilibrium total fare in a marketplace with reputation tracking is not going to be raised by turning part of it into a tip, it just adds uncertainty and friction.)

pkaye
1 replies
16h57m

I don't know how many of the wanted it but here is an article that talks about it. Atleast is New York City they were forced to implement it and then it expanded from there.

Uber might finally be forced to change its tune after New York City's Taxi and Limousine Commission introduced a proposal this week that would require ride-hailing companies operating in the city to allow riders to tip their drivers. The need to follow a rule like that in one of Uber's biggest and most important markets could force the company to allow tipping across the country or around the world.

The Independent Drivers Guild lobbied for the New York proposal, which it estimates will lead to over $300 million per year in tips for New York drivers.

https://mashable.com/article/uber-nyc-tipping

abecedarius
0 replies
4h32m

Thanks for the info. Can't see why anyone would downvote you, unless it's that the writer of that story is totally picking a side.

whimsicalism
0 replies
19h3m

it's not compulsory and culture is different in US

renewiltord
0 replies
18h26m

I don't tip on Lyft. 5 stars. 800 rides.

I don't tip on Uber. 4.89 rating. 700 rides.

I have friends who tip and tbh when I don't get a ride, they don't get a ride and when they get a ride, I get a ride. So obviously the tipping means nothing.

Occasionally I might tip, but only if I got something out of it. And it's rare. I think I might have tipped on 10 out of the 1500 rides.

noitpmeder
0 replies
14h28m

I'd only tip a uber/rideshare driver if the experience was above and beyond... I do not expect this kind of service from every driver, nor do I expect them to try to provide it every time.

It should be a reward for exceptional service, not a default assumption for average (or so help me, sub average) service.

SeanAnderson
5 replies
19h2m

It's cheaper than Uber if you're the type of person to tip your Uber driver 20%. Very infrequently it's cheaper without tip, but usually it's a bit more expensive.

Crucially, it doesn't care if you ask it to drive into heavy traffic. I'm so over Uber giving me an estimated time for pickup, having the driver get within range to learn additional details about the trip, then cancelling on me because it doesn't fit their desires. I was late to a reservation a couple of weeks ago because I wanted to go downtown during Superbowl Weekend and an estimated 3 minute pickup morphed into a ~20 minute delay as I waited for an Uber driver to commit to the drive.

raylad
2 replies
18h12m

I routinely see it priced at double Lyft or Uber in SF.

SeanAnderson
1 replies
18h0m

It's certainly going up in price as people get off the waitlist and the number of vehicles allowed in service stays fixed. I'm optimistic, though. I would travel a lot more if the price was cheaper, I assume Waymo has enough data to realize that, and they will act in a way that creates a larger market, rather than squeezing the existing market, once they have the legal ability to do so.

seanmcdirmid
0 replies
17h57m

They don't really need to decrease in price so much as not increase in price. Human labor keeps getting more expensive while the tech is probably getting cheaper, if they are just competing with Uber/Lyft, they can wait this out. On the other hand, they could definitely grow the market for taxi-like services like Uber did when it initially came out, but without unsustainable VC subsidies.

ryandrake
0 replies
18h52m

I'm so over Uber giving me an estimated time for pickup, having the driver get within range to learn additional details about the trip, then cancelling on me because it doesn't fit their desires.

I remember waiting for a Lyft that was perpetually 8 minutes away, because driver after driver canceled the ride when they saw the destination and presumably didn't want to drive that far. After about 9 or so cancelations and about 45 minutes, I finally got a pickup. Not having to deal with that shit is worth a few extra bucks to me.

milesskorpen
1 replies
19h9m

My impression, using it ~1x/week in SF: Slightly more expensive than uber (+10%?). Takes a bit longer to show up (+25%?). Utterly magical experience.

whimsicalism
0 replies
19h3m

where I live, show up time is usually around 7-20 minutes compared to around 2-4 for Uber. in the west of the city, it is more commonly ~15-20

whimsicalism
0 replies
19h4m

Ranges from slightly cheaper to a lot more than uber (usually about equal or slightly cheaper if you count tip)

Pickup time is significantly more, especially if you are trying to get picked up in the west of the city

jeffbee
0 replies
19h9m

I take them in SF regularly, for trips that aren't well-served by Muni. It works well. I've never had even the slightest criticism of how it drives. Compared to Uber, it costs more but never drives on the sidewalk and doesn't operate a Prius with 900,000 miles on the odometer and no windshield wipers.

aetherson
0 replies
19h7m

I've tried them about three months ago. They're a good experience, but maybe slightly worse pickup/dropoff than an Uber, and no less expensive, so they're kinda more "fun to have done once," than anything else.

Rebelgecko
0 replies
17h9m

For the free rides they've been doing in LA, they still tell you what it would normally cost. It's usually been within a couple bucks of Uber/Lyft, but Waymo doesn't ask you to tip.

It works pretty well. Sometimes it makes nonoptimal choices for where to drop off, but I can't say that it's worse than humans at making those decisions.

The screens in the car showing it's view of the environment are super impressive. It often sees pedestrians before I do, and it has some really cool features like warning you about relevant traffic when you get out of the car (not generic warnings but detailed info like "there's a scooter passing on the left" when you unlock the doors).

Some minor annoyances: storage space isn't great. I don't think the frunk is user accessible. Driver's seat isn't usable.

standardUser
15 replies
18h47m

I was very bummed on a recent trip to SF to find there was a waitlist for Waymo and I couldn't use the service! But I've since been 'accepted' so my next West Coast trip I'll definitely be taking a driverless car. I was a long time SF resident so I'll use my local knowledge to choose the most ratchet route possible.

The potential for self-driving cars to bring down the cost of rides is very exciting to me. I've been carless for decades and though I'm a huge proponent and user of mass transit, we have to be realistic. Most of this country is exceptionally ill-suited to mass transit and is custom-built for car traffic.

hamandcheese
7 replies
18h28m

For now, Waymo in SF costs significantly higher than Uber. I just checked and was quoted double - $25 to go from the outer richmond to Japantown.

tobinfricke
4 replies
18h25m

Hmm, in my (limited) experience, I've seen Waymo being within +/- $1-2 of Uber.

raylad
1 replies
18h17m

From my not-so-limited experience, it's often double.

zoba
0 replies
17h56m

I also see 2x prices for Waymo.

hamandcheese
1 replies
16h8m

This is what I'm more accustomed too, in this particular instance though there was a 25 minute wait.

I'm guessing the rain right now might be increasing demand for rides.

tobinfricke
0 replies
12h23m

Yes, Waymo often has a much longer wait time (fewer cars).

But then the Uber drivers often cancel. So maybe it comes out in the wash.

silentsea90
1 replies
17h39m

It is still a fun novelty mode of ride with limited supply and is priced accordingly and is not a mass transport option yet. Once the supply of cars rises the prices will fall to establish a new equilibrium hopefully much lower than Uber.

hamandcheese
0 replies
16h10m

There are tons of waymos, pretty much everywhere you look. I think it's beyond the novelty stage now.

fragmede
6 replies
18h33m

I don't know about bringing down costs. The amount of money that's been invested in this wants to get paid back, so they're gonna be charging as money they can for this to be worth it.

standardUser
2 replies
18h24m

As long as there is competition the prices will be low (eventually). Labor is almost always the most expensive part of any service and these technologies reduce the need for labor considerably.

hypothesis
0 replies
17h58m

As long as there is competition the prices will be low (eventually).

We don’t have to wait here. Is BigCo lowering prices on YouTube subs? Are they lowering ad spend for people?

You could claim that they’re a monopoly in those cases, but then that would undercut your expectations above.

GeneralMayhem
0 replies
16h55m

That's only true if there's competition with similar costs, though. Uber and Lyft can't reduce prices without collapsing, so Waymo has no incentive to charge anything less than what they charge minus one cent and they'll have all the demand they can handle.

JumpCrisscross
1 replies
17h4m

amount of money that's been invested in this wants to get paid back, so they're gonna be charging as money they can

As they should be. They’re currently competing with Uber and Lyft, and charging a novelty/quality premium. There will be a halcyon period as they scale and print money, but others will notice and start fighting that monopoly.

huytersd
0 replies
16h18m

If I’ve learnt anything over the last 10 years it’s that self driving is hard and Google has a huge moat with how good Waymo already is.

alphabetting
0 replies
17h17m

If apple spent 10B on their car, I wouldn't be surprised if Waymo spent 50 or 100 over 15 years and they invented the modern robotaxi. I think they've earned the ability to charge whatever they like. I'd also happily pay more than Uber rides whenever it comes to my area. Riding a couple in Arizona was amazing.

whimsicalism
3 replies
19h5m

when does this roll out?

ra7
2 replies
19h1m

Approval is effective immediately, but no idea when Waymo will deploy vehicles in those areas. Their fleet size is small (~700 cars).

whimsicalism
0 replies
18h59m

shit I hope this doesn't raise prices if I'm now competing with all of South Bay

fragmede
0 replies
11h43m

Not for long!

bcherry
3 replies
18h6m

I wonder if they're allowed at SFO?

johnneville
0 replies
11h38m

i've struggled to get an uber for some early morning flights and can see it being easier to waymo to millbrae bart and connect to SFO than waiting a long time or paying insane surge prices for uber

fragmede
0 replies
11h46m

Which is strange. You'd think officals would be jumping at the chance to bilk Google out of money that they can line their pockets with.

Kronopath
2 replies
19h12m

Does this mean they can go on the highways? If so that’s a significant upgrade to the Waymo service in the SF Bay Area, as it can now take you between towns.

dekhn
0 replies
19h7m

I've already seen self-driving waymos on freeways (as they are called here) within SF.

fragmede
0 replies
11h44m

This changes the calculus for Google employees to live in SF and commute to Mountain View. They already run shuttle buses but with this, they can make it easier for their employees to commute at off hours by giving them priority for rides.

SeanAnderson
0 replies
19h5m

Still no Oakland :( Hopefully that's next.

Rebelgecko
0 replies
17h16m

Wow, it's huge that they'll be doing LAX (dropoffs only I assume?)

pjs_
4 replies
18h36m

I speak to VCs quite a bit and recently I was hanging around with a bunch of them, they were all making fun of the state of self-driving cars, ah, stupid industry, will never work, whatever.

But to me it's strange, if you go to San Francisco today you can see cars driving around with nobody inside. They drive around, they pick people up, they mostly don't crash into shit. There's nobody behind the wheel. I know that everyone is incredibly quick to point out their flaws and relative safety rating and remote interventions and so on but can we just take a step back, even for a moment, and acknowledge that they freaking did it, they basically did the thing that a lot of people said would never happen - the car drives around all day with nobody inside, of it's own volition!! It's amazing! Am I a deranged silicon valley optimist for thinking this?

I agree that there's still endless work to do, some companies are probably behaving in a way that is dangerous, they aren't half as good as you want them to be, it's not clear whether they are good for society or financially viable etc. etc. but it just seems weird that so few people are willing to be like, "fair play, they basically pulled it off, round of applause", even just for a second.

The only real reason that would make sense to me is if this is actually just a giant fraud and they are driving the things over LTE/4G a much larger fraction of the time than I have been led to believe. Anyone know the realistic ratio of self-driving to remote control? The fact that the safety statistics are 100X worse or whatever is obviously deadly serious but on a scale of six or so orders of magnitude it remains meaningfully impressive to my dumb brain.

beezlebroxxxxxx
2 replies
18h27m

I agree that there's still endless work to do, some companies are probably behaving in a way that is dangerous, they aren't half as good as you want them to be, it's not clear whether they are good for society or financially viable etc. etc. but it just seems weird that so few people are willing to be like, "fair play, they basically pulled it off, round of applause", even just for a second.

They're victim of the self-driving hype machine, which is not entirely Waymo's fault. Lots of people and companies were really promising the world with self-driving cars after making the initial "novelty" proof of concept stuff possible. But now they're in the nitty gritty of actually making it safe, dependable, reliable, and trusted, in less than ideal conditions (or in non sunny California conditions at all) and people and companies are finding that it's far harder to follow through on that.

To Waymo's credit, they have been steadily plugging along without crazy marketing or PR to overhype their product. They just have to win the long-game, if they can.

GeneralMayhem
1 replies
16h50m

or in non sunny California conditions at all

It does at least rain in San Francisco, and I've taken Waymo in the rain. It did more than fine. Plus, you know, night time.

NegativeLatency
0 replies
16h19m

Having lived in SF and elsewhere, even heavy SF rain is nothing compared to further up the West coast. I remember parts of the infra in SF failing when it rained more than one inch.

duped
0 replies
13h30m

they were all making fun of the state of self-driving cars, ah, stupid industry, will never work, whatever.

As Sinclair said, "it is difficult to get a man to understand something on which his salary depends on him not understanding."

The road to self driving cars is a capital intensive and entrenched in regulatory quagmire. Those two things are enough to keep VCs away.

But if you think about it, every trip that someone takes in a self-driving vehicle is a trip that they didn't take their own car or a taxi. Most trips are not complex, and most problems are with other human drivers. As the market grows the difficulty of the problem domain will shrink. If you can reach critical mass, infrastructure can be adjusted to specialize for self-driving cars.

That said, the illusion of self driving cars is that you can provide mass transit at affordable prices using existing infrastructure and specialized hubs/depots/fuel/roads for the vehicles. But we already have that, they're called busses. But busses are for poor people, so we don't invest in them.

afhjafh3883
4 replies
18h23m

What kind of car is the Waymo underneath?

SeanAnderson
3 replies
18h22m

Jaguar I-PACE

afhjafh3883
2 replies
18h20m

Surprised they would go with a luxury car

travoc
0 replies
17h45m

It’s a Ford.

konschubert
0 replies
18h8m

Money is not the object here.

bossyTeacher
3 replies
19h3m

Can't wait until they expand to europe

n2d4
1 replies
18h24m

Does anyone know/have a hunch which European cities are most likely to get these cars first?

bossyTeacher
0 replies
16h38m

Probably cities with good road infrastructure

MaxHoppersGhost
0 replies
18h38m

I foresee protests and lots of regulations/special taxes with driverless taxis coming to Europe.

1024core
3 replies
16h53m

Just yesterday, walking in the inner sunset neighborhood of SF, I saw an old lady in a 1980s Volvo come to a 4-way stop. She looked really old, as in probably even 90+. She wasn't sure about the rules of the stop sign: she came to the stop and was hesitating to go. Other cars were waiting for her and some of them started just going through, creating a very dangerous situation. Eventually she mustered the courage to just make her turn. That made me think: her life would be so much easier if she didn't have to drive at all to go run her errands. She was creating an unsafe situation for everyone, not just herself.

The City (SF) has a fleet of transport vehicles that transport Seniors (old folks) around town. It would be much more cost effective to just have a bunch of Waymos available to Seniors.

johnnyanmac
1 replies
16h36m

Safer, maybe. cost effective, I don't see it. especially compared to this aforementioned fleet of transport vehicles.

mlyle
0 replies
13h52m

You don't think fleets without drivers will be cheaper than fleets with drivers?

zht
0 replies
16h49m

someone needs to get the seniors in and out of the cars...

robterrell
2 replies
19h9m

I've seen Waymos on the 280 between San Jose and SF countless times over the past year. I guess those were not operational rides, just tests?

whimsicalism
0 replies
19h6m

yes or perhaps returning home? i have frequently wanted to go to south bay, it doesn't even let you go to the airport

npinsker
0 replies
18h50m

Waymo employees can use the cars in a larger area, though most of those are likely tests.

cdme
2 replies
18h16m

No thanks — driving in LA is dangerous enough.

konschubert
1 replies
18h9m

Thanks to Waymo, it will beocome a little bite safer.

cdme
0 replies
15h46m

Having spent years driving there and the complexity/lackadaisical traffic patterns and enforcement — I quite doubt it. I'd expect them to have their own Cruise moment.

rangledangle
1 replies
16h23m

Any reason why Waymo is so much more expensive than alternatives? I went across SF last weekend and Uber/Lyft was around $16. Waymo was $56.

AuthConnectFail
0 replies
16h22m

they are usually couple of dollars more (for $20 range rides) but I think their demand supply is so skewed that it surges almost all the time it feels like

nox101
1 replies
13h21m

If Waymo was not too expensive and easy to get at rush hour in LA I'd certainly consider it. If I want to leave work between 5:30 and 6:30 pm, my commute can be 60 mins. At 8pm it will be 20 mins. That sucks but if I could use the 60 mins then it sucks less.

On the other hand, unlike Uber/Lyft, Waymo can't scale like they do. For them, demand pricing means more drivers with their own car driving when there's lots of people to pick up. For Waymo, they'd go broke trying to have enough cars for high demand times that would all sit idle (and have to drive somewhere to park) off peak.

Taking it up a notch. I'd be nice to redesign cars that have no driver. A bench, a desk, small buses for shared rides, or something.

jraby3
0 replies
11h49m

There’s probably a smart way to ride share during peak times using a service like Waymo. Could be the best of both worlds.

I could also envision a future where a car owner allows his car to be used for Waymo if he isn’t using it, and receives some compensation.

VoodooJuJu
1 replies
18h29m

Look at these comments:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39568066

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39568076

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39568083

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39568119

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39568226

That's the value-sell of self-driving cars: placating an anti-social techno-"patrician" class that fears people, a class who now has the luxury of avoiding them.

Self-driving cars seem to be a technological solution to a modern socio-cultural pathology, nothing more. That's not healthy. Seems like the better solution would be to address the pathology directly and eliminate it, rather than create workarounds for it.

How did you find yourself in a low-trust society, with anti-social leanings? And how can we fix that? That needs to be addressed.

flask_manager
0 replies
16h41m

I dont think you can create a high trust society deliberately; It takes multi-generation level time-spans, and in a low trust environment there is no mechanism to guarantee your plans will be carried forward; even if you currently have dictator level control over society.

Creating highly trustworthy technology is the best we can do, and reliable transportation is a big part of this.

I also suspect targeting and removing the worst interactions people have with strangers (and for many this is the random nature of a human driver, either from a taxi or other drivers) would create a higher trust society overall, as there is less cause to be wary.

Animats
1 replies
18h32m

I'm in the new service area, and look forward to this being available.

Do you have to have a Google account?

Do you have to accept the Google Play Store?

fragmede
0 replies
17h11m

You do need a Google account. I'm on iOS so don't have a Google play store though.

xyst
0 replies
4h5m

Great, more cars on the road.

I don’t know why people are excited. Whether it’s self driving or driven by a meat bag, it just means one more car on the road. One more car sitting in a parking lot/street/parking garage or driving around aimlessly until it gets assigned.

Instead of helping to alleviate traffic. TNCs were shown to actually increase traffic in urban areas [1]. I expect this won’t be any different with “self driving” vehicles.

[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00678-z

slater-
0 replies
9h15m

Let’s solve our societal car problem with more cars.

renewiltord
0 replies
19h13m

This is fantastic news. Waymo is great and the best road companion I've had.

om154
0 replies
18h22m

This is awesome. I think I'd honestly prefer a Waymo from Los Angeles to San Diego over a flight through LAX!

nmca
0 replies
12h59m

The driving is extremely smooth in general --- much smoother than many taxi journeys I've taken in that past.

I found myself in a corner case recently, with an illegally parked car blocking the street, we got partially round, blocked by another vehicle and then a fire engine with sirens approached from behind, the waymo handled it excellently!

modeless
0 replies
18h58m

Is this the only approval they need? I guess they will need to build some facilities in various places. Maybe they can start right away with the facilities they already have in Mountain View?

milesskorpen
0 replies
19h7m

How long will it take for this to go into effect?

lulznews
0 replies
18h20m

So Google is betting the farm on this right?

ildjarn
0 replies
5h54m

Just what LA needs, more traffic.

huytersd
0 replies
16h20m

Waymo is absolutely fantastic. I’ve used it two dozen times and it feels really safe and competent.

habosa
0 replies
10h22m

An underrated thing about Waymo:

If you open Uber and the app says a car is 9 minutes away that’s really anywhere from 5 to 15.

With Waymo if they say it’s 9 minutes to get a ride they mean 9 minutes. They’re not waiting for a human to accept your ride, they’re scheduling resources.

The lack of variance makes delays much more tolerable, IMO.

atum47
0 replies
19h2m

Waymo is awesome. Got to try it 3 months ago in Phoenix, love the whole experience. Amazing to see how the car deals with every trick thing that you find in traffic. Plus the Jaguar they use is a great car.

anon373839
0 replies
17h52m

So, will these be geofenced to a small area, or turned loose on the whole Southland? If it’s the latter, I’m genuinely impressed: LA’s roads and freeways have a florid variety of edge cases unlike anywhere else.

anon115
0 replies
12h24m

im beginning to see them in my neighborhood i feel unsafe around them tbh

SeanAnderson
0 replies
19h9m

Hell yeah. This is the best news I've read today. Waymo has completely replaced all usages of Uber for me whenever possible. Expanding the range makes me thrilled. Hopefully they're able to put more vehicles on the road, too, because wait times have been going up.

The app isn't updated yet, though. I wonder how long it'll take?

1970-01-01
0 replies
17h54m

I think they should go to Las Vegas next. They would fit in nicely with the LV experience.