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Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

cnbc.com

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Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#191

Post by ufmace »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #3

It's fascinating seeing all the comments elsewhere anytime Waymo starts testing in another city along the lines of, "ah, but how will they handle X, Y, and Z here?? Checkmate, robots!" despite having already launched service in several other cities. Granted, NYC is the biggest city in the US, so maybe that sort of reaction is more reasonable there than when people in Dallas or Boston do it.

I think the main difference for NYC is that quite a few streets and intersections routinely have 10x to 100x the pedestrian traffic of the busiest such intersections in pretty much any other American city.

That's not to say that I don't think it'll be able to handle it, just that it'll be a new challenge. I wonder if their current program of apparently trying to positively track every single moving object in range will survive that, or whether they'll need to figure out some algorithm to prioritize objects that are more likely to be of concern to it. And there probably are more than a few places where pedestrians are numerous and densely crowded enough that you can't positively track all of them, even with a bunch of LIDAR sensors.

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#192

Post by Scoundreller »

joecool1029 wrote: post #168
0_____0 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Massachusetts, USA, red light cameras were illegal until very recently, due to a 70s era law specifying that a live policeman had to issue a citation for something like that. From well before traffic cameras were common.

We had a pilot program in NJ for them, they were universally hated. People would slam brakes on and be hanging over the edge into intersection and throw their car into reverse panicking to avoid the ticket, ended up causing a ton of new accidents so the program was never continued. In newark people shot at the cameras: https://www.nj.com/news/2012/08/shoot_out_the_red_lights_2_t...

Thankfully sawzalls are cheap and plentiful so people can use much safer practices to disable/remove them:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/parkside-drive-speed-...

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#194

Post by infecto »

testfrequency wrote: post #96
infecto wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue those two areas are very different though. The Bay Area is not as dense or as many aggressive drivers as NYC.

My point wasn’t to say they are the same, more that SF and LA (I would guess) have covered and defeated almost every single challenge and obstacle for an urban environment (sans..weather). LA also has far denser areas than SF, places like DTLA and Koreatown are more dense than most boroughs in NYC (sans Manhattan).

My point was that it will be interesting to see how well it works in NYC where the only way to drive is aggressively in city streets breaking the rules. LA has its share of aggressive driving but as someone who has driven in both, NYC felt like I had to break the rules to go anywhere, LA not so much.

Hard to really compare a tiny piece of LA and say it’s more dense and compare it to borough that is in the same range but also magnitudes larger total pop.

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#195

Post by fsaid »

xyst wrote: post #107
fsaid wrote: post #75

Waymo should add a thin layer of "assertiveness" for actual deadlock that their self-driving architecture could cause. While in Austin, I was in a Waymo that blocked 3 lanes of incoming traffic while attempting to merge into a lane going into the opposite direction. It was a super unorthodox move, but none of the drivers (even while stopped for a red light) would let the Waymo* merge into their lane. Thank God for th…

This is awful. Your ride takes just a bit longer, so you want it to take more risks in decisions? This is how you ruin trust. Take the L dude, sit back and relax. You will get to your restaurant or whatever inane activity you are doing for the day/evening.

[flagged]

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#196

Post by bryanlarsen »

philistine wrote: post #132
bryanlarsen wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The interesting snow & ice problem for me is that humans will drive in winter conditions that are unsafe -- for example white-out blizzards. Robocars won't be able to drive in a white-out blizzard, so they'll likely refuse to do so. Humans should also refuse to drive, but people drive anyways. NYC doesn't generally get white-out blizzards, so refusing to drive in them is quite feasible.

I come from way up top on that globe of ours. I have driven in frankly apocalyptic snowstorms. They're an insidious problem to solve, but I remain optimistic. Back home, they will close specific roads due to snowstorms, but what do you do about the cars already on the road? You can't stay put for 16 hours can you? So you move as slow as possible, sometimes as low as 5 kilometres an hour. Cause that's the thing about…

> You're not risking your life if a dude in skis can go faster than you.

Sure you are. You can still drive off the road and into the ditch where nobody can see you. People then die because they don't clear their tail pipe and get carbon monoxide poisoning or they try and walk for help and freeze to death.

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#197

Post by infecto »

dazc wrote: post #153
infecto wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a question, NYC driving gets by with everyone driving aggressive and breaking road rules. That is something that does not exist as much in other markets. My complaint with Tesla city FSD is that it’s not quick or aggressive enough. It will come to long and complete stops and other things that will not work well in NYC.

I think you'd be surprised how aggressive driving has become normalized throughout the world?

I drive when I travel, though not in NYC these days but being a pedestrian gives you a good enough view. LA from a city driving perspective at least for me is not comparable to most of NYC.

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#199

Post by testfrequency »

rickyhatespeas wrote: post #149
testfrequency wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TIL. LA doesn’t have complex traffic? What sort of traffic do we have in LA then? LA is walkable, it’s lazy (and mostly incorrect) to say LA isn’t walkable. LA County is massive, and depending on where you want to pick a comparison from, you may prove yourself either right or wrong.

Traffic on the sidewalk is a daily occurrence and often necessity in NYC. I'm not sure exactly how every area in LA is but often (as in pretty much constantly every day) in Manhattan or Brooklyn drivers don't obey the lines on the road, don't care to bump objects and cars to fit into a spot, literally threaten to hit other cars to get anywhere. There's a bit of a "do what you have to" mentality with NY traffic that I…

You articulated this very well, thanks.

LA is extremely similar. Often can only make unprotected turns at lights while it’s red and you’re in the box, you have to wait at the top of a hill and have your car sideways while the oncoming car has space to drive up a hill, cars trying to give you space so you can drive through a line of traffic into the adjacent traffic pattern.

The “freezing” issues are very real though (and frustrating), and it’s what most everyone who uses Waymo in any city right now jokes/complains about. Waymo can often get into a weird game of “chicken” when there’s a four way stop with pedestrians, and any slight movement from the intersection can often make the car stop - so the pedestrian stops - the the Waymo finally moves again, but then pedestrian also started moving so the Waymo stops again and the pedestrian stops caring.

All this to say, I really don’t think there’s much that will be different. Go to Hollywood or Santa Monica

Re: Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

#200

Post by jedberg »

bananalychee wrote: post #180
nutjob2 wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a level 2 system, it can't be operated unattended. Your friends are risking thier lives as several people (now dead) have found out.

Wikipedia lists two fatal crashes involving Tesla FSD and one involving Waymo.

They key difference is that the Teslas killed their passengers, the Waymo hit someone outside the car (and it wasn't the Waymo's fault, it was hit by another car).
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