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Re: Waymo Via

#31

Post by umeshunni »

justicezyx wrote: post #11

Everyone (Pony.ai started trucking as well) is converging to trucking as the canonical use cases. Let's see how this affect the existing self-driving firms.

In hindsight, trucking seems on the more obvious usecase for autonomous vehicles rather than daily commutes or ridesharing.

1. Most time spent and miles driven are on freeways rather than city streets. Last mile can still be done via human drivers meeting at an off-freeway ramp hub.

2. The cost and availability of labor is a significant damper on trucking. Remember during the oil boom in Alberta, Canada, how truckers were making six-figures and higher due to the high demand.

3. Humans get tired, can't drive for more than 8 hours due to legal restrictions and safety concerns. These are problem that machines can solve.

4. (Mostly) don't have to deal with pedestrians, bicycles, bad weather and other complexities. If there's a snowstorm, trucks can just do what they do now, wait it out at a truck stop.

Re: Waymo Via

#32

Post by rleahy22 »

darawk wrote: post #29
mikeyouse wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arizona basically threw their citizens to the wolves with a 2015 self-driving car law that allowed anything and everything to go (you wouldn't even have to register your cars as self-driving for a period). This attracted tons of firms to test their cars in a lax regulatory environment but since the famous Uber death and a number of self-driving accidents, they have tightened the rules somewhat. I suspect they're stil…

Thrown their citizens to the wolves and caused all of one death, and no other problems to speak of? Seems like they made a great call to me.

Yeah cause screw that person who died.

Re: Waymo Via

#33

Post by quaquaqua1 »

dangus wrote: post #28
markstos wrote: post #23

As a bike/ped advocate, I believe self-driving cars will ultimately be safer than humans. Yesterday I was nearly hit crossing street twice: once by an inattentive driver and once by an intentionally reckless speeder. Oh the other hand, my brother has done a fair amount of truck driving and I'm aware it's a common job in the US. Maybe now that Bloomberg has dropped out he get together with Yang and use his billions to…

The idea that Bloomberg and Yang share any sort of common philosophy is laughable.

That's awkward, why did Yang tweet and go on TV saying how awesome Bloomberg's operation was?

Re: Waymo Via

#34

Post by johnbrodie »

trenning wrote: post #12

Does Phoenix have laws that make them more attractive for testing or just location preference?

Both lack of regulation as well as weather, road condition, and road layout. Most of the Phoenix metro area is a grid, fairly modern as streets are constantly redone as we've grown so new-ish signs that are largely unobstructed by trees, etcetc.

As a motorcyclist with a 45 minute commute, I'm on the cautious side when it comes to self-driving tech on the roads, but I have to say that anecdotally it's been fine so far. I'd be willing to bet I see ~10 Waymo vehicles a day. I've had plenty of issues with normal cars/drivers, have never had nor seen an issue with Waymo.

Re: Waymo Via

#35

Post by fma »

quaquaqua1 wrote: post #33
dangus wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that Bloomberg and Yang share any sort of common philosophy is laughable.

That's awkward, why did Yang tweet and go on TV saying how awesome Bloomberg's operation was?

operation != philosophy...

Re: Waymo Via

#36

Post by trenning »

VectorLock wrote: post #13

Does a self-driving truck need a sleeper cab? Is the sleeper compartment filled with equipment?

For long haul you'd still want someone riding in the cab who can do basic maint I think, plus off loading the truck a lot of the times is the duty of the driver. Some companies advertise 'never tarp again!' because tarping your load on flatbeds is the driver's responsibility. Also for in-transit maint airlines need repair, trailer power needs to be checked especially for reefers. I'm not sure about otr truckers but for ltl the driver is offloading trailer.

I can see the training and responsibilities shift as things become more automated, but for what a driver costs, I can't see them getting rid of an incab person for otr trips which leave the city. The response time and costs for fixing minor maint like a broken air line would be crazy. Also someone gotta fill those tanks up.

Re: Waymo Via

#37

Post by tim333 »

chrisco255 wrote: post #9

Are these semis truly driverless or does the testing that Waymo is conducting still require staff to monitor the drive? I want to parse through the hype here. Fully automated, point-to-point, driverless semis seem far off, as Hotz of Comma.ai was pointing out. Am I wrong on this assumption?

Pretty sure they'll still be using people to monitor things for now.

Re: Waymo Via

#39

Post by zarmin »

quaquaqua1 wrote: post #33
dangus wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that Bloomberg and Yang share any sort of common philosophy is laughable.

That's awkward, why did Yang tweet and go on TV saying how awesome Bloomberg's operation was?

He works for CNN?
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