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

cpuc.ca.gov

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

#201

Post by AlbertCory »

timeagain wrote: post #156
SeanAnderson wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 l…

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 t…

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?

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

#202

Post by ra7 »

bcherry wrote: post #191
ra7 wrote: post #2

New Waymo operating area: https://twitter.com/saferroadsorg/status/1763687210447196417

I wonder if they're allowed at SFO?

They are not. SFO, owned by the city of SF and at the behest of city officials, have been notorious in blocking Waymo: https://missionlocal.org/2023/11/waymo-rebuffed-by-sfo-sf-gu...

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

#203

Post by gretch »

barbazoo wrote: post #152
dkjaudyeqooe wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> 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".

>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

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

#204

Post by ugh123 »

bagels wrote: post #145
SeanAnderson wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 l…

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

> 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.

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

#205

Post by seanmcdirmid »

standardUser wrote: post #178
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

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.

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).

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

#206

Post by MenhirMike »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #168
timeagain wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 t…

> 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.

It would be nice to have an UberSSR option for sure, for the people that just want a ride.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FUQYPfL0Pg

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

#207

Post by SeanAnderson »

raylad wrote: post #177
SeanAnderson wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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

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.

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

#208

Post by hypothesis »

standardUser wrote: post #128
fragmede wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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.

> 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.

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

#209

Post by 1970-01-01 »

dragonwriter wrote: post #150
1970-01-01 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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 l…

>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)

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

#210

Post by seanmcdirmid »

SeanAnderson wrote: post #207
raylad wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

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.

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.
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