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Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

sfchronicle.com

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Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#311

Post by dageshi »

darby_nine wrote: post #290
tanvach wrote: post #7

We recently started using Waymo more often: - Quality of Lyft and Uber rides have gone down significantly. - Consistently spacious, clean and quiet cars. You know what you'll get. - AC always works and not up to the whim of the driver. - No chatty driver to disturb our sleeping baby. Negatives: - Rides have usually 10% mark up over Lyft and Uber. - Pick up and drop off tend to be a small walk from requested locations…

Wait how do they justify having an even more expensive ride with fewer people to pay? The whole point of cutting the driver out is to save on cost, without that the entire project is no better than uber or lyft (which already overcharges by an arm and a leg)

If they priced below human labour they might have their testing licenses revoked due to political pressure. Right now they're still in the testing phase, there's no need to rock the boat by pricing below uber and lyft yet.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#312

Post by josephg »

lolinder wrote: post #306
darby_nine wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To some extent this is true, but most of the automation I've witnessed in my lifetime led with direct cost savings. My main conclusion is that waymo's customers are more likely to be scared by other humans than they are to be price sensitive.

> most of the automation I've witnessed in my lifetime led with direct cost savings Direct cost savings to the business or to the customer? Waymo has been operating at an incredible loss for a very long time. They now have a product that people are willing to pay for and, in fact, find to be more comfortable—from OP's description it's basically a luxury Uber. Further, they expect to not be the only autonomous taxi sy…

Yep. They also probably don’t have that many waymo cars yet. I’m sure eventually they hope to blanket the city but for now, I assume they price rides such that supply = demand. If it was so cheap that everyone ordered them, you’d never get a car. That would be a really bad experience for customers and they would bounce. It’s incredibly hard to get someone to try your service a second time if their first experience was negative.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#313

Post by ericyd »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #285
quectophoton wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anecdotally they can be 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic I don't know anything about USA, but my understanding of other humans tells me that "Waymo is 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic" actually means "Waymo drives at the legal speed limit for that location, without surpassing it".

So it's a bad driver then, because matching flow of traffic is more important and safer than stubbornly following the exact speed limit

Here in Texas I'd love for more people to stubbornly obey the speed limit to slow down the flow of traffic.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#314

Post by Jcampuzano2 »

darby_nine wrote: post #292
bluefirebrand wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So it's a bad driver then, because matching flow of traffic is more important and safer than stubbornly following the exact speed limit

Uh that's just not true and I would not trust any driver who says this.

If its not true then why do many cars with self-driving build it in as a feature to allow breaking the speed limit (up to a limit, in my car it still won't go above 15mph above the limit) in order to more closely match the flow of traffic.

I think theres a bit of nuance. If the flow of traffic was all being crazy lunatics then yes I'd say so. But I would feel safer without other cars flying past me/around me because I decide to go 70mph when everyone else around you is going 80-85.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#315

Post by octopoc »

diggan wrote: post #289
bluefirebrand wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So it's a bad driver then, because matching flow of traffic is more important and safer than stubbornly following the exact speed limit

It's a bad driver for adhering to the speed limits? I'm having a hard time understanding how that makes sense. I understand that matching the flow of traffic is important, but more important than the speed limit? They're there for a reason. If the speed limit is 30km/h and everyone is driving in 50km/h, you're saying you'll opt for driving at 50km/h? Besides, if there is multiple lanes, you take the right lane and fo…

driving 50 in a 30 is a 66% increase, not a 10%-25% increase like gp was suggesting. When speeding is more extreme it probably crosses a threshold where it's safer to drive the speed limit than to drive with the traffic. But when the difference is 10%-25% (which is accurate IME in the US) then you only have to experience it a few times to know it's less safe to drive the speed limit.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#316

Post by Jcampuzano2 »

throwaway7ahgb wrote: post #303
tomp wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is approximately 0% chance that the speed limit decreed by faceless bureaucrats is the optimal speed for the current circumstances on a given road.

Visit Texas where there are 85mph posted limits and people casually do 95.

I live in Texas and I would unironically feel safer driving the normal ~10-15mph above the speed limit that traffic is normally going than go exactly the speed limit, because I don't want everyone else flying around me recklessly because they all know that nobody goes exactly the legal limit here.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#317

Post by josephg »

diggan wrote: post #289
bluefirebrand wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So it's a bad driver then, because matching flow of traffic is more important and safer than stubbornly following the exact speed limit

It's a bad driver for adhering to the speed limits? I'm having a hard time understanding how that makes sense. I understand that matching the flow of traffic is important, but more important than the speed limit? They're there for a reason. If the speed limit is 30km/h and everyone is driving in 50km/h, you're saying you'll opt for driving at 50km/h? Besides, if there is multiple lanes, you take the right lane and fo…

I’ve heard a lot of debate about this point here in Australia. In the state of NSW, people on their learner permit are restricted to driving no more than 90km/h (55 miles per hour). Arguably, this is safer because learner drivers haven’t learned to control their cars well yet.

Here in Vic (the next state over), people think that law is stupid because it’s apparently less safe having everyone on a freeway driving at different speeds. It makes changing lanes much more difficult and dangerous. Here learner drivers are expected and encouraged to match the speed of traffic (obviously obeying speed signs too).

I suspect vic is right on this one. It probably is more dangerous having different drivers driving at different speeds. At least, more dangerous to human drivers. But what do you expect Google to do about it? Make their entire fleet break the road rules? Their licence to drive their cars on the roads at all is on a trial basis. They’re being closely watched by everyone. Even if it’s potentially unsafe for other drivers who are speeding, sticking to the letter of the law is really the only choice they have here. Maybe in time all traffic will flow at the posted speed. And officials will finally feel comfortable raising the speed limit to match the speed everyone actually comfortably drives at on the roads.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#318

Post by concordDance »

tomp wrote: post #268
worik wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Waymo is 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic" actually means "Waymo drives at the legal speed limit for that location... Probably 100% safer too Speed is the most dangerous aspect of motor vehicles

There is approximately 0% chance that the speed limit decreed by faceless bureaucrats is the optimal speed for the current circumstances on a given road.

Laws are necessarily very blunt things. The actual optimal speed limit will vary with car, driver, traffic, weather, time of day etc, would vary hugely along the road and wouldn't be in neat 5mph increments.

But making such dynamic limits would be an extremely expensive endeavour.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#319

Post by Ygg2 »

worik wrote: post #128
quectophoton wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anecdotally they can be 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic I don't know anything about USA, but my understanding of other humans tells me that "Waymo is 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic" actually means "Waymo drives at the legal speed limit for that location, without surpassing it".

> "Waymo is 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic" actually means "Waymo drives at the legal speed limit for that location... Probably 100% safer too Speed is the most dangerous aspect of motor vehicles

> Probably 100% safer too

Not really. Because speed works in relative. I.e. if everyone drives at 200mph it is much safer than if half drive 100mph and other half drives 200mph. Granted you can't have things appearing at 200mph.

Speed is not the problem deceleration is. Which happens more often when some percent of people drives slower than others.

Decreasing speed limits has the counterintuitive effect of increasing vehicle to vehicle accidents, and intuitive effect of increasing ticket fees. Pedestrian safety isn't that imprcted since a portion of drivers drives above limit anyway.

Re: Self-driving Waymos secure final clearance for expansion beyond S.F

#320

Post by josephg »

aprilthird2021 wrote: post #214
quectophoton wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anecdotally they can be 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic I don't know anything about USA, but my understanding of other humans tells me that "Waymo is 10-25% slower than the rest of traffic" actually means "Waymo drives at the legal speed limit for that location, without surpassing it".

You're definitely right. In most of the US there's a speed limit and there's an understood amount over the speed limit you can still drive and cops won't bother you.

Same in Australia - though that amount varies by state! In NSW, everyone goes 10-15% over the limit. Just like California. In Vic, they have speed cameras everywhere and they’re crazy strict about it. People joke about speeding fines being part of their taxes for the year.

Apparently they even have entry and exit cameras on some freeways - and they take photos of everyone to check your average speed. Even if they don’t catch you in the act of speeding, if your average speed is over the limit they’ll still send you a fine.

The moral of the story: Don’t speed in Melbourne. It’s a meme that everyone who visits the state gets done at least once. Everyone in Sydney has a friend who’ll tell you the harrowing tale of their vacation speeding fines.

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