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S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

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Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#291

Post by dghlsakjg »

dekhn wrote: post #264
dghlsakjg wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've participated and watched critical mass any number of times. I've never seen cyclists target cars randomly. The only time you will be surrounded in a minivan is if you try to drive through the cyclists, or otherwise act aggressively or unsafely. Critical mass is a protest movement. If you drive your vehicle into the middle of a protest against vehicles in a way that puts people in danger, don't be surprised when…

The situtations I'm describing (covered in the press at the time) were not defensive- they were actively offensive. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflicts_involving_Critical_M... Swarming a car and preventing it from moving- sure, the safest thing for the car to do is stop driving, but... I don't think that's really a good defense of confrontational bikers.

You should read through the link you just posted.

Most of the incidents involving cars were instigated by the drivers of cars. I couldn't find an instance where a car wasn't trying to ride through the cyclists, or the driver hadn't picked a fight verbally.

Can you highlight an incident where cyclists antagonized an otherwise passive observer in a car?

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#292

Post by coryrc »

jtriangle wrote: post #237
cashsterling wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why the other reply to this post got downvoted to hell. THe person has a point. Fully autonomous cars are cool... don't get me wrong. But electric cars and autonomous electric/gas cars are probably not the right solution to our person transport needs. using energy to move a 4000 lb vehicle to transport one or two 200 lb humans is not energy-efficient... most of the energy is spent just moving the vehicle…

Cool, you have an affordable, tenuously waterproofed, chinese mass produced e-bike, it's your only available mode of transportation, you need to go into the office for a meeting, and it's raining. Welcome to hell. Also, not sure if you've used public transportation recently, but man, it SUCKS. Far less time efficient than a car, often crowded during the times you want to use it, and ZERO enforcement of proper etiquet…

I agree with you on public transportation.

But pre-pandemic I e-biked to the office rain or cloudy in Seattle 4 days a week. Albeit Seattle rains aren't usually heavy.

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#293

Post by splonk »

hosh wrote: post #165
dekhn wrote: post #115

"Skyrocket" is a word people use when they don't have the data to support their claim, but want to make it sound as extreme as possible. When I hear "skyrocket" I think "several orders of magnitude in a very short time". But the source of the quote with skyrocket, basically admits that they didn't have any quantitative evidence to support a massive change in incidents. Remember: reality is banal. Things are far bette…

There may not be data to support this, but on the other hand, informal perceptions -- even if unsupported by data -- matters a great deal with products and systems. But I would ask the people living there what they perceive, not just relying on a news reporter.

I have no particular data to support this, but anecdotally, my biggest issue with Cruise testing a couple years ago was that it was excessively cautious - randomly braking for no obvious reason, dithering at intersections trying to yield, that kind of thing. I could live with that.

Now (literally yesterday) a driverless Cruise car trying to make a left turn was yielding to me walking across the intersection, and then suddenly decided to go before I'd cleared the intersection. Would it have hit me if I hadn't scurried out of the way? I don't know, but it didn't inspire confidence, and it doesn't take many experiences like this to turn public opinion. Cruise in particular seems to have made their cars more aggressive in my small personal sample size.

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#294

Post by foota »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #263
Loughla wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is that this isn't so much about privately owned cars and/or taxis, but the real politics is in over the road trucking, and these incremental steps are just part of that. If self driving over the road trucking happens (and that's sort of inevitable), politicians seem to legitimately believe it will collapse our economy. It seems like all self-driving anything gets lumped in with that.

Considering that the most popular job in the USA is "truck driver", they might have some clue about what the damage might be. Eventually they can retrain, but we are going to be throwing a whole generation out of work without a very good alternative.

I don't think this is accurate, see: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/no-truck-driver-isnt-the-m...

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#295

Post by jasonlotito »

throwaway9274 wrote: post #145
dekhn wrote: post #115

"Skyrocket" is a word people use when they don't have the data to support their claim, but want to make it sound as extreme as possible. When I hear "skyrocket" I think "several orders of magnitude in a very short time". But the source of the quote with skyrocket, basically admits that they didn't have any quantitative evidence to support a massive change in incidents. Remember: reality is banal. Things are far bette…

Absolutely right. To situate in terms of recent events, there have been three stages of trying to delay / influence the California CPUC robotaxi expansion approval vote: 1. Tried a politician scare campaign. Failed because it was too transparent it was an attempted distraction from their terrible public safety record. 2. Tried coning and disabling the vehicles. Failed because it was too transparently astroturfed, leg…

Since you aren't someone who lives locally to this or is affected by this, why do you think it's "too vital to the revitalization of SF."

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#296

Post by AlbertCory »

pushedx wrote: post #265
AlbertCory wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone quoting "miles driven" is being disingenuous. How many of those miles were in the Bay Area plus Arizona?

How does the location have anything to do with the total number of miles driven?

Because the weather is so much more favorable in those two areas. States with extreme weather, especially snow & ice, are vastly more challenging.

It's like saying you tested your multi-platform app for 10,000 hours, but 9,800 of those hours were on Windows.

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#297

Post by twelve40 »

throwaway9274 wrote: post #145
dekhn wrote: post #115

"Skyrocket" is a word people use when they don't have the data to support their claim, but want to make it sound as extreme as possible. When I hear "skyrocket" I think "several orders of magnitude in a very short time". But the source of the quote with skyrocket, basically admits that they didn't have any quantitative evidence to support a massive change in incidents. Remember: reality is banal. Things are far bette…

Absolutely right. To situate in terms of recent events, there have been three stages of trying to delay / influence the California CPUC robotaxi expansion approval vote: 1. Tried a politician scare campaign. Failed because it was too transparent it was an attempted distraction from their terrible public safety record. 2. Tried coning and disabling the vehicles. Failed because it was too transparently astroturfed, leg…

sorry, confused

> their terrible public safety record

whose public safety record? the politicians'? or, who would even be materially interested to lobby against robocars and Google? honest q.

automakers seem to be generally onboard with robocars and trying their own. Cabbies have been wiped out as a force by Uber. Even Uber seems generally onboard with robocars. So who is this mysterious powerful Luddite villain?

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#298

Post by dekhn »

wheatzies wrote: post #247
hosh wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There may not be data to support this, but on the other hand, informal perceptions -- even if unsupported by data -- matters a great deal with products and systems. But I would ask the people living there what they perceive, not just relying on a news reporter.

I live in SF and have experience taking cruise rides so I can provide some (obviously anecdotal) information. Overall I'm a big fan of the autonomous vehicles companies but there are downsides with their current abilities. Pros: - As mentioned in the article, the cars generally follow traffic laws. I see a lot of drivers run red lights around my apartment, but at this point I'm fairly confident that a Cruise won't ac…

Self driving cars need fake eyeballs (just like the cars in Cars) that make eye contact.

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#299

Post by jasonlotito »

jtriangle wrote: post #237
cashsterling wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why the other reply to this post got downvoted to hell. THe person has a point. Fully autonomous cars are cool... don't get me wrong. But electric cars and autonomous electric/gas cars are probably not the right solution to our person transport needs. using energy to move a 4000 lb vehicle to transport one or two 200 lb humans is not energy-efficient... most of the energy is spent just moving the vehicle…

Cool, you have an affordable, tenuously waterproofed, chinese mass produced e-bike, it's your only available mode of transportation, you need to go into the office for a meeting, and it's raining. Welcome to hell. Also, not sure if you've used public transportation recently, but man, it SUCKS. Far less time efficient than a car, often crowded during the times you want to use it, and ZERO enforcement of proper etiquet…

Rain jackets.

Outer wear solving this problem has been around for a long, long time.

Re: S.F. says incidents by Cruise, Waymo driverless taxis are ‘skyrocketing.’

#300

Post by 8note »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #258
Aurornis wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A 60lb e-bike can also transport a 200 lb person whilst using far less resources (both to make the vehicle and to operate it) and space. E-bikes are great for the situations, climates, and people who can use them. E-bikes are not a substitute for the majority of people’s transportation needs. I think the young, healthy people who live in moderate climates with good weather, short commutes, and little need to haul a…

> and little need to haul anything often forget The dutch created the cargo bike for this very reason. But they have the climate and biking infrastructure to support that kind of lifestyle. We (Americans) don't, I wish we did.

The climate isn't a big deal, finland has the climate for biking too, it's mostly about having the infrastructure and maintaining it.

If cold was a problem, cars wouldn't work either because they'd be unable to handle snow. However, we maintain our car infrastructure and plow the roads

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