Waymo in Dallas • Hacker News Board

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#381

Post by xeromal » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 1:51 AM UTC

hocuspocus wrote: post #336

ChadNauseam wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sarcastic and self-satisfied comments like this are uninteresting IMO. The GP comment is talking about reducing parking requirements for new development, and parking requirements are probably some of the least efficient use of land imaginable. But he shouldn't talk about that because it'd be better if every city all across america suddenly had public transit tomorrow? It's like if a city in europe was talking about s…

Many European countries do install AC actually, poor ones at that, so it'd be a valid point because yes, it's that easy.

Missing the forest for the trees

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#382

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 1:52 AM UTC

jakintosh wrote: post #369

cyberax wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now the average car occupancy during the rush hour is ~1.5 persons per car. By increasing that to 3-4 people, you can easily double the effective road capacity. This will completely resolve the congestion in the majority of metro areas, even with induced traffic. No car platooning, flock routing, car trains, or anything similarly exotic is needed. Just mild carpooling. People are not doing that now because it's…

> By increasing that to 3-4 people, you can easily double the effective road capacity Isn't "sharing a vehicle with a stranger" like, the #1 reason why most people who could use transit for a given trip choose not to? Why, when it's a way less efficient—and probably way more expensive per-rider-mile to the govt paying for it—autonomous car going to change that? The issue with cars, self driving or not, is that they f…

Cars give you point to point access. In Seattle I have to decide today whether to spend $100+ on an Uber that will take 25 minutes to get from SeaTac to Ballard, or spend $3.25 to use light rail plus bus that will take at least one hour and 30 minutes. And to think that Seattle is just one of the better transit cities in the USA.

The sharing the bus with murder hobos argument is only relevant for daily commuters with relevantly decent transit routes that aren’t 3X longer than a car would be. Most people don’t get that far in the argument against transit.

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#383

Post by nxc18 » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 1:54 AM UTC

inigyou wrote: post #200

arjie wrote: post #58

Surprisingly low hype for a company running perhaps the most advanced consumer-interactive robots. I’m quite fond of these machines and will periodically rescue them when someone has misused them (door not closed, most commonly). Hope they do well. Very good road participants.

They're also covered in cameras the police have access to, which have been used to track down legal protestors in the past. That's why there was a spate of people setting them on fire a few months ago. Basically, every Waymo car is a Flock camera.

They also have access to the cameras on buses and trains, typically. Public spaces are public spaces.

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#384

Post by elicash » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 1:55 AM UTC

twoodfin wrote: post #380

jdlyga wrote: post #378

Dallas is a different animal. But after a Waymo pilot program in New York City, it was found to be more hazardous than human drivers https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5e71380706dc865d40a6f...

Sorry, can you point out the section of that document that justifies the “found to be more hazardous” claim?

Interesting, I went to the link they gave and to the safety section and it says:

> As of July 23, 2026, we have temporarily removed our safety analysis from this report, as well as relevant references to the analysis throughout the report (denoted in-text by a reference to this section). We were made aware of data discrepancies between City agency data for New York City for-hire vehicle crashes with serious injuries or deaths, as well as City agency data definitions related to such crashes. We are working to resolve these discrepancies and ensure our findings properly represent the data and the driving records of New York City for-hire vehicle drivers and Waymo vehicles. Other than this section, the remainder of our report remains unchanged.

My guess is jdlyga read this report before it was modified.

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#385

Post by jrflo » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 1:55 AM UTC

amazingamazing wrote: post #221

Zambyte wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want trains.

Too much capex

Realistically it's "too much 'environmental' review", aka NIMBYs killing any project that will actually implement good public transit because it will ruin the view from their kitchen

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#386

Post by preommr » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 1:56 AM UTC

culi wrote: post #154

This urbanist youtuber did a really in-depth video on what the future could look like (both good and ugly effects) if self-driving cars become enough of a success to affect the way we build infrastructure https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=040ejWnFkj0

Of course it's Not Just Bikes.

I used to be frustrated at their poorly thought-out arguments until I realized none of it matters. The videos are made for a certain demographic to jerk off about their special interests. The real world is going to move on and stuff is going to get implemented. These people and their opinions have no real world impact and don't matter outside of their niche little social groups.

Self driving cars will happen, and not because "billionaires and big companies with lots of money", but because it'll provide increased automation. It'll make it easier for people to get from point A to point B, even if it's not using buses that people like NJB and his ilk are for some reason obsessed with.

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#387

Post by panick21_ » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 2:05 AM UTC

eagleinparadise wrote: post #306

panick21_ wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Any public dollar that gets contributed to housing ... in the US > Building housing with no parking is not feasible for 95% of deals. You simply won't get financing Because of completely broken land use, transportation polices, building regulation in the US, they are very feasible in many other parts of the world. > if you could hand to your investors and lender an agreement which provides a car for every 3 units O…

I can't change, nor can a group of politicians change how broken the US land use and transportation policies are. But what can be done is leasing a car that can drive itself with minimal labor for $100k over 5 years that unlocked more housing to get built. You're hilariously wrong on most of your points because just spend 5 minutes researching how CA fails to build rail. Not even worth responding to further.

If all you know about public transit is CA building HIGH SPEED rail then you are not worth talking about.

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#388

Post by jfoster » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 2:06 AM UTC

Philpax wrote: post #106

YKutsev wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Been in a Waymo in SF — impressive tech. But I keep wondering: does the math actually work? Car + all the sensors + maintenance + mapping. Can a single vehicle ever turn a profit?

Are you running your replies through a LLM, or is the LLM producing them entirely?

If he/she was an LLM I don't think it would've forgotten insurance among the costs.

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#389

Post by thundercleeze » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 2:08 AM UTC

hocuspocus wrote: post #336

ChadNauseam wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sarcastic and self-satisfied comments like this are uninteresting IMO. The GP comment is talking about reducing parking requirements for new development, and parking requirements are probably some of the least efficient use of land imaginable. But he shouldn't talk about that because it'd be better if every city all across america suddenly had public transit tomorrow? It's like if a city in europe was talking about s…

Many European countries do install AC actually, poor ones at that, so it'd be a valid point because yes, it's that easy.

You're avoiding the point and wrong in assuming the analogy is incorrect. The US has around 1/5th the heat related deaths that Europe does despite being hotter, more often and mostly of European background. https://maartenboudry.substack.com/p/how-europe-became-the-w...

Re: Waymo in Dallas

#390

Post by thundercleeze » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 2:10 AM UTC

toddmorey wrote: post #367

jdale27 wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo is already working, on roads today, for less time and money than it took to build zero miles of high speed rail in California.

You can’t do inter-city Waymo trips. These are different animals.

You also can't do inter-city train trips in most of the US either. Inter-city autonomous car trips will almost certainly happen before the trains arrive.