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Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

blog.waymo.com

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Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#261

Post by petre »

stouset wrote: post #43
austinkhale wrote: post #5

I live inside the original area in Phoenix where they did their training. I have to give kudos where it's due. I originally _hated_ their cars constantly driving around our neighborhood, but I was persuaded to try one a few weeks back. It completely changed my mind. They are now my favorite way to get around. I am a very happy, frequent customer and hope they keep adding coverage and more cars. This is absolutely the…

I'll contrast this with Cruise, which are driving autonomously in San Francisco. I hate them. At least in the area I'm in (the Inner Sunset), they often cruise around with no passengers while waiting for a request. While doing so, they circle around idling at 10-15mph, pausing for 30 seconds or more at stop signs. It's long enough where just when you decide they've completely stopped and start to go around, they "wak…

> a left-turning Muni bus was unable to complete the turn

In Italy this would be resolved by the passengers getting out of the bus, lifting and moving the car out of the way.

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#262

Post by speedgoose »

cheonic20058 wrote: post #203
what_ever wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tbh, you shouldn't compare Tesla "AutoPilot" with these full self driving options.

> Tbh, you shouldn't compare Tesla "AutoPilot" with these full self driving options. Right. Because Tesla FSD “beta” is not guaranteed, even if you pay for the monthly subscription. And even if you did have Tesla FSD beta, it’s a pile of shit. It’s gets worse every quarter as they continue to remove safety sensors from vehicles due to supply chain issues.

We haven’t watched the same FSD videos on YouTube lately but ok.

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#263

Post by speedgoose »

what_ever wrote: post #45
trgn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - The cars are very safe, very conservative drivers So great to hear. Seeing videos of self-driving Tesla made me fear for the worst.

Tbh, you shouldn't compare Tesla "AutoPilot" with these full self driving options.

The Tesla full self driving private beta is more comparable, but not able to drive by itself for long time.

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#264

Post by throwaway5371 »

dymk wrote: post #251
abecedarius wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most buses off rush hour are sparsely populated. Look up actual energy efficiency of American mass transit systems per rider mile. https://www.templetons.com/brad/transit-myth.html Re traffic: with robot-driven cars, congestion pricing would be technically easy. This is an example of not considering possibilities created by the new tech.

Congestion pricing is congestion pricing because traffic is bad. Waymo doesn’t solve traffic.

it solves static traffic, which in many cities will solve traffic

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#265

Post by bobthepanda »

Chathamization wrote: post #246
bobthepanda wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In cities where space is at a premium, a bunch of people standing, or on a bicycle, will always beat out people sitting down with room for an engine and a trunk. Average occupancy of a car is 1.5 in the US, and that number shrinks as household size declines. (It’s also worth noting that there’s no reason that automated technologies wouldn’t also spread to buses and trains. In fact, you can already automate trains. Th…

> In cities where space is at a premium, a bunch of people standing, or on a bicycle, will always beat out people sitting down with room for an engine and a trunk. It depends. For example, you can theoretically fit more people into crowded bike lanes than you can into crowded streets. But around here at least, bike lanes don't get a lot of people. I lived by one for years that I don't think I ever saw a bicycle on on…

Most of the time the issue with bike lanes is really an issue of a bike lane network.

Where a wide high-quality network is deployed quickly, you do often see high ridership increases, but usually in the US what you see is a bunch of scattered lanes that barely reach anywhere in an unbroken link, and no one wants to ride a journey that is even 5% dangerous.

But for example, London has seen 25% growth since pre-COVID by deploying more lanes widely: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/london-cycling-covid-...

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#266

Post by differentView »

dundermuffl1n wrote: post #220
dangus wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It blows my mind that someone living downtown in a city the size of Phoenix (relatively large) needs to use a car at all. It’s really a shameful failure of urban planning.

You must not have walked outside in Phoenix - you can't walk a block in that weather.

That's a bit extreme. I lived in a city with a similar climate for over a decade and had no problem walking, running, biking, and playing basketball in 110+ degree dry heat. I now live in a relatively humid area and I wouldn't go hiking when it gets over 85 degrees.

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#267

Post by twoWhlsGud »

panick21_ wrote: post #39
mertd wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, human drivers don't do terribly well on that front.

Drivers do fine if the infrastructure is designed for humans rather then for cars. The reason so many people die in US cities is because of policy, not because people can't drive inherently.

Driver quality in the US is much lower than in cycling hotspots like the Netherlands or Denmark. Infrastructure helps, but better drivers are critical.

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#268

Post by MarkMc »

> we are now serving over 10 thousand trips per week to public riders, not including employees. With this latest expansion, we intend for those numbers to accelerate rapidly to 10 times that scale by next summer.

Waymo cars are safer, cleaner and cheaper than Uber, which has never made an operating profit and has abandoned its self-driving development.

Uber is stalled on the railway tracks while the freight train of self-driving tech hurtles towards it. How is it still worth $76 billion?

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#269

Post by TulliusCicero »

abecedarius wrote: post #167
dangus wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It blows my mind that someone living downtown in a city the size of Phoenix (relatively large) needs to use a car at all. It’s really a shameful failure of urban planning.

Is a 20th-century mass transit system actually preferable to robocars once the technology is mature? My guess is it's the cities like Austin, planning new transit systems without designing for synergies with robocars, who are failing at urban planning.

Cars take up too much space. Relying on cars instead of mass transit means everything has to be more spread out, which makes walking and biking a lot worse.

Re: Waymo One doubles service area in Phoenix, continues growing in SF

#270

Post by hansworst »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #269
abecedarius wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is a 20th-century mass transit system actually preferable to robocars once the technology is mature? My guess is it's the cities like Austin, planning new transit systems without designing for synergies with robocars, who are failing at urban planning.

Cars take up too much space. Relying on cars instead of mass transit means everything has to be more spread out, which makes walking and biking a lot worse.

If everyone can share a small fleet of self driving vehicles, they don’t need to take up a lot of space at all. I’m assuming you were talking about parking space; I don’t see how self driving cars would take up significantly more space than mass transit while on the road.
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