Tokyo is one of the new cities, interesting. Is this the first non-US city waymo has tested in?
Thats a great choice. High trust city, super high density.
Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
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Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#22I wonder if the waymo solution is very vehicle specific or if it could be easily applied to say, a 10~12 person van that could accommodate a wheelchair? It would be interesting to design a transit system around 4~5 times as many vehicles with higher interval or more responsive pathing with something like pick up kiosks.
Many cities are already upgrading their transit systems to implement "rapid ride" where they run buses on a 10min schedule through popular routes.
This eliminates the need for planning routes - go the nearest stop, wait 10-15min (sometimes buses get bunched up so it's not really every 10min), and get on the next bus.
Buses already have drivers, wheelchair (and bicycle!) support, etc. and the stops usually have live tracking of the next arriving buses.
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#23The article does not actually list the 10 cities. Nor does it link to a source or say the source.
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#24I wonder if the waymo solution is very vehicle specific or if it could be easily applied to say, a 10~12 person van that could accommodate a wheelchair? It would be interesting to design a transit system around 4~5 times as many vehicles with higher interval or more responsive pathing with something like pick up kiosks.
Self-driving makes the most economic sense when fewer people are in a vehicle. With a large van or bus, the cost of the human driver is split between more passengers. Also van or bus service is less compelling to individuals, as it makes them beholden to bus stop locations and schedules instead of picking them up and dropping them off when and where they want. Adding support for wheelchairs introduces new failure mod…
> Also van or bus service is less compelling to individuals, as it makes them beholden to bus stop locations and schedules instead of picking them up and dropping them off when and where they want.
Exactly this. The attraction of self-driving transit is the support for individual planning. Everyone gets a direct route to their destination, no delays stopping or detouring for other people.
There's also increased safety in having a personal ride. You're not being hassled, stalked, or threatened by random people.
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#25I hate ADS tech in cities so much. The pedestrian/pet detection is god awful. Doesn’t matter if you cross at designated crosswalks or just crossing the street. Many close calls. Cruise _was_ the king in this aspect and avoided them completely but Waymo is getting up there. Side note: GOOG and other tech conglomerates are clearly monopolizing the tech industry - from ADS to AI/AGI/LLM. It’s no wonder these companies h…
> The pedestrian/pet detection is god awful
When I walk in front of a Waymo it stops and gives me space and doesn't come anywhere near hitting me. That doesn't qualify as "god awful" to me. do you have a different experience?
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#26I'm convinced that Waymo will quietly continue to roll out self driving taxi's to ever increasing areas in "beta" until one day they're covering a significant percentage of the most profitable areas to be a taxi in. Instead of trying for universal self driving, they're going to prioritise being self driving taxi's for the most profitable areas.
yeah, that's exactly what they are going to do. It's how Uber worked as well.
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
In 2024 it had $365 million in revenue but $1.13 billion expenses.
I love that you included numbers, but that is for all of Alphabet's "other bets" which includes Waymo, so it's not entirely Waymo. It still helps give ballpark figures though.
isn't waymo the majority of alphabets other bets?
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#28I've been poking at Uber forums and other places, and I'm noticing that a _lot_ of people are underestimating this. Waymo is growing by >100%/year at the moment and this is a significant part of that growth.
It'll make a huge dent in demand for Uber/Lyft over the next five years.
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#29Tokyo is one of the new cities, interesting. Is this the first non-US city waymo has tested in?
It's the first non-US city that they've done public testing in. They've been doing test track work in Europe for awhile now, and Cruise did some Japanese/middle eastern testing before they folded.
Re: Waymo to test its autonomous driving technology in over 10 new cities
#30I'm convinced that Waymo will quietly continue to roll out self driving taxi's to ever increasing areas in "beta" until one day they're covering a significant percentage of the most profitable areas to be a taxi in. Instead of trying for universal self driving, they're going to prioritise being self driving taxi's for the most profitable areas.
Are they even profitable in SF or LA? I don't disagree with you, but if being profitable means charging more than Uber/Lyft and having slower trips on average than a human, thats not gonna work out too well. And these are the highest CoL cities in the us, meaning that if its not profitable there, might not be profitable anywhere.