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US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

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Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#171

Post by brainwad »

jofzar wrote: post #170
anitil wrote: post #91

I have a question about the rules of school busses (I'm not American). It seems like the expectation is that _all_ traffic is required to stop if a bus is stopped, is that correct? If so, why? Here (Australia) the bus just pulls over and you get off on to the sidewalk, even children, why is it not the case in the US?

I'm an Australian also, this is the video that blew my mind. https://youtu.be/lShDhGn5e5s It's a long video but the tldr is that Americans don't have foot paths. You would think they would but nope, it's not like Australia where everywhere you walk has a path and down paths to the road. Even directly around schools no footpaths, and it's all because it's no one's responsibility other then the home owner.

Plenty of Australian suburbs have no footpaths either. The footpath appearing and disappearing thing also happens.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#172

Post by ninalanyon »

MindSpunk wrote: post #87
themafia wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we can develop a fix and roll it out on all of them. You have to know what you're fixing first. You're going to write a lot of code in blood this way. It's not that people are particularly bad at driving it's that the road is exceptionally dynamic with many different users and use cases all trying to operate in a synchronized fashion with a dash of strong regulation sprinkled in.

> You have to know what you're fixing first. You're going to write a lot of code in blood this way. This is exactly how the aviation industry works, and it's one of the safest ways to travel in the world. Autonomous driving enables 'identify problem -> widely deployed and followed solutions' in a way human drivers just can't. Things won't be perfect at first but there's an upper limit on safety with human drivers tha…

But other countries have far fewer accidents than the US so it isn't quite so black and white. The gain from autonomous vehicles will be much less in the UK for instance.

If you really want to reduce accident rates you need to improve road design and encourage more use of public transport and cycling. This requires no new vehicles, no new software, no driver training, and doesn't need autonomous vehicles at all.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#173

Post by ninalanyon »

jmpman wrote: post #10

I’m also curious about school zones. The one near my house has a sign, “School” “Speed Limit 35” “7:00AM to 4:00PM School Days” Now, how does a robotaxi comply with that? Does it go to the district website and look up the current school year calendar? Or does it work like a human, and simply observe the patterns of the school traffic, and assume the general school calendar? I suspect it continues in Mad Max mode.

It can just read the sign surely? My ancient Tesla S can read simple speed limit signs and in France distinguishes between those that apply to it and those that apply only to lorries because of the notice below the speed limit sign.

Then it really would be as simple as looking up the calendar or simply erring on the safe side that all weekdays are schooldays.

Waymo only operates on fully mapped roads anyway so I think that Waymo could be reasonably expected to include such abilities.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#174

Post by ninalanyon »

slavik81 wrote: post #26
izacus wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, how does that work? Every person in your city needs to know the exact calendar of that school?

Yes, that's how it works in Alberta. It's particularly confusing because not all schools have the same academic calendar (e.g., most schools have a summer break, but a few have summer classes). Unlike the sibling comment, there are no lights or indications of when school is in session. You must memorize the academic calendar of every school you drive past in order to know the speed limit. In practice, this means bein…

Is it really such an imposition to simply drive at the posted limit at all times when passing a school? It only takes a few seconds even if you slow to a crawl.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#175

Post by ninalanyon »

platevoltage wrote: post #136
Avi-D-coder wrote: post #119

At some point self driving cars will need their own loser driving laws. Perhaps allowing them to drive around school buses is not a good idea, although personally I have felt far safer biking or walking in front of a Waymo than a human. But rules few humans follow, like rolling stops, and allowing them to go 5 over seems like a no-brainer. We have a real opportunity here to br more sensible with road rules; let’s not…

What do we have to gain by allowing self driving vehicles to roll through stop signs?

We, the general public, gain nothing.

Corporations gain control of public spaces by allowing corporations to cast other road users as incompetent. Much the same as GM, etc., did with jay walking laws in the US.

Distinguishing between human and robot drivers in this way benefits only corporations and the politicians they pay.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#176

Post by jofzar »

brainwad wrote: post #171
jofzar wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm an Australian also, this is the video that blew my mind. https://youtu.be/lShDhGn5e5s It's a long video but the tldr is that Americans don't have foot paths. You would think they would but nope, it's not like Australia where everywhere you walk has a path and down paths to the road. Even directly around schools no footpaths, and it's all because it's no one's responsibility other then the home owner.

Plenty of Australian suburbs have no footpaths either. The footpath appearing and disappearing thing also happens.

Yes but not like America has it.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#177

Post by terminalshort »

whimsicalism wrote: post #30
trollbridge wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

… assuming the GiantCorp running the robotaxis cares about complying with the law, and doesn’t just pay a fine that means nothing to them.

the discourse around “corporations” has gotten absolutely ridiculous at this point, especially on this website.

It really has turned into a bitter losers bitch fest in here

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#178

Post by blub »

atleastoptimal wrote: post #125

On net, Waymos are safer than human drivers. Really all that matters is deaths per passenger mile, and weighted far less, injury/crash per passenger mile. Waymos exceed human drivers on both metrics, thus it is reasonable to say that Waymos have reduced crashes compared to the equivalent average human driver covering the same distance. Mistakes like this are very rare, and when they do happen, they can be audited, an…

Actually, your assumptions that human drivers cannot be improved are wrong. Modern cars have a lot of safety features to help avoid accidents:

* lane keeping with optional steering

* pedestrian and obstacle detection at the front

* pedestrian and obstacle detection when reversing with automatic braking

* assisted driving with lane keeping and full stop / driving on in case of traffic jam

Waymos are just fancy taxis. And taxis haven’t replaced all human drivers or solved traffic accidents.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#179

Post by javagram »

ErroneousBosh wrote: post #159
atleastoptimal wrote: post #125

On net, Waymos are safer than human drivers. Really all that matters is deaths per passenger mile, and weighted far less, injury/crash per passenger mile. Waymos exceed human drivers on both metrics, thus it is reasonable to say that Waymos have reduced crashes compared to the equivalent average human driver covering the same distance. Mistakes like this are very rare, and when they do happen, they can be audited, an…

> Approximately 1/100 deaths in the US are due to car fatalities. Every year autonomous drivers aren't rapidly deployed is just unnecessary deaths. You could improve driver training. American drivers are absolutely terrifying.

“Could” is doing a lot of work there I think.

I suspect most problematic American drivers already know they aren’t supposed to text, drink, or watch or record TikToks while they drive, but simply do it anyway because they are aware these laws are under-enforced.

Re: US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety

#180

Post by ozgrakkurt »

atleastoptimal wrote: post #125

On net, Waymos are safer than human drivers. Really all that matters is deaths per passenger mile, and weighted far less, injury/crash per passenger mile. Waymos exceed human drivers on both metrics, thus it is reasonable to say that Waymos have reduced crashes compared to the equivalent average human driver covering the same distance. Mistakes like this are very rare, and when they do happen, they can be audited, an…

Taxi drivers or bus drivers are also much safer than regular people if you interpret it like that
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