California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws • Hacker News Board

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#361

Post by FireBeyond » Mon, May 04, 2026, 3:01 AM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #146

mlyle wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She gets her license back. That's wild. In 3 years, at age 83, if she wanted to... she could try and take the driving test again and become licensed. This is just not going to happen :P In the end, the court can only prohibit her from driving while she is on probation. Would it be great if this time she could be banned forever? Sure. But there's reasons why we don't just let judges make up arbitrary penalties and p…

> she could try and take the driving test again and become licensed. This is just not going to happen Why? More importantly, why is it on the table? > the court can only prohibit her from driving while she is on probation This seems incorrect. Lau was placed on probation for 2 years and had her license revoked for 3 [1]. > Would it be great if this time she could be banned forever? Sure. But there's reasons why we do…

> I'd bet at least a few families would weigh the cost of confronting a relative against the risk that they have to see them behind bars.

See my comment just above, where I reply to someone who replied to you. "Confronting a relative"? Shit, I'd be happy if a few less relatives actively enabled people, "That doctor doesn't know what he's talking about, you're fine, mom, besides, it's kind of a pain for us to drive 10 minutes over to your house to help with an errand and then 10 minutes home. Just drive, no-one's going to pull you over."

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#362

Post by watwut » Mon, May 04, 2026, 9:10 AM UTC

lancebeet wrote: post #307

AlecSchueler wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It seems obvious that it should cause lots of fatalities That's not obvious at all to me, what would the reasoning be?

Maybe I expressed myself poorly. Generally, higher speed is associated with higher fatality rates, all else being equal. So, one would assume a highway without speed limits would cause lots of fatalities. Most people would probably be surprised to learn that this is not the case.

If there is anything remotely potentially dangerous, unlimited speed ends and the road gets well defined and enforced speed limit. If the traffic on that segment of the road gets high, they put in speed limit sign too.

Moreover, there is a question of liability for the insurance purpose. If you go above 130, you are assumed to be caused of the accident. So, most Germans go roughly 130 in those segments anyway.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#363

Post by Semaphor » Mon, May 04, 2026, 9:41 AM UTC

culopatin wrote: post #358

aziaziazi wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let’s say person A drive their car through a green light (or any right of way) while person B pass at red with their truck and kills person A. Should we blame A to missed they eye contact with B?

This is a false equivalence. Im not talking about blaming a victim. I don’t know who the victim is when someone stopped, looked started driving and out of nowhere a runner with noise cancelling headphones ran in front of them anyway. I’m talking about you want to be safe? Don’t just run into the street without looking. It’s the best optimization for the state of affairs in the streets. People are not perfect, pillars…

I like to assume there aren’t that many deranged murderers around for it to matter. The state of affairs all my life has been that drivers are as careful as they have to around crosswalks.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#364

Post by xphos » Tue, May 05, 2026, 4:22 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #198

xphos wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like this trivializises all software development. It happens but 99% of development is done to follow the spec or law in this case. The failures or bugs are usually not intentional. You basically saying if 1 car in the fleet breaks the law shut them down? If thats a strawman im sorry but even in software algorithm have unintentional bugs and make mistakes. The same is true for human drivers but we dont revoke…

Re-read my root comment. I specifically outlined having thresholds for unintentional violations.

I feel like your unintentional thresholds are just what ticketing is but in more complex way. Also your points about being easier on AV companies tickets are very aggressive against repeat offenders. It works mechanically the same as setting threshold x# of tickets.

Ticketing gets weird because it varries by state I cannot speak to Califorina because I don't live there but in the northeast many states have points and if you get 10 points you lose your license. Not every ticket gives points i.e parking tickets. But speeding X miles over is 4 points. Drunk driving is 10 points generally speaking. Their are others like drag racing on public roads etc. But Those systems would be very harsh on a self-driving vechicals which all have the same "driver". You might need to be more permissive on the number of points because the "driver" is clocking 1000x-10000x what an ordinary driver does but tickets solves all the practical problems your bring up. The only grounds to debate feel like the number of points or threshold which besides stating I don't feel like you stake a position on where the threshold is (doing sound seems really hard without data on how often violations can be). Intentionality is also ignored because it doesn't matter in driving since you could always say you didn't know X law i.e unintentional but its not an excuse because you are opt in to using public roads you have to know the laws.

I am not trying to be dismissive but I am really unsure what other system and thresholds you are describing while you are being compared to an extremely concrete and effective systems (effective at punishing drivers :) from actually dangerous behavior). Usually the only hard part is observing offense but I think that makes ticketing acceptable because generally speaking the penalty for getting a ticket is very harsh on low income earners (increases compliance)

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#365

Post by squibonpig » Tue, May 05, 2026, 9:36 PM UTC

jeffrallen wrote: post #349

squibonpig wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They want to make money from the tickets

That's fine, the stupid companies are privatizing profit by abusing the public commons... Let them pay.

Well, the consumers will be the ones paying. I don't disagree with the premise though.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#366

Post by tengwar2 » Tue, May 05, 2026, 11:09 PM UTC

Semaphor wrote: post #347

culopatin wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But are pedestrians considerate and make a contract with the driver eye to eye to signal “hey, I see you, i see you see me, thanks for stopping, I will be crossing”. Or they are looking at their phones standing on the wheelchair ramp or chatting with someone, kinda going in, maybe, maybe not, and when it looks like they’ll be crossing the street parallel to yours and you start going they change their minds and cross…

Somehow that works very well in Germany without it resulting in some kind of chaos. There’s no need to make eye contact. Crosswalks (or Zebras) are the ultimate "pedestrian has all the rights" element.

I've found that in Italy (at least Milan and Turin), not making eye contact is key.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#367

Post by Natsu » Wed, May 06, 2026, 8:32 PM UTC

gsnedders wrote: post #354

scoofy wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A “call for help” button is customer service. The ability to say “this is the police, drop everything and attend to this car” button would be helpful.

At least in SF, there’s both a phone number and a QR code on a sticker on the driver-side window, and per what’s linked from https://waymo.com/firstresponders/ it seems like that’s a dedicated phone line. I wonder quite what the priority matrix looks like for support requests; I’d expect something like: 1. First responders 2. Human-initiated in-vehicle 3. Autonomous-initiated vehicle But I of course don’t know. Butto…

Interesting, I can't say I've seen that sticker, but I've never looked for one there, either, as you're not supposed to use the driver's seat and it's always buckled up.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#368

Post by thisisidiotic » Thu, May 07, 2026, 6:11 PM UTC

sandworm101 wrote: post #289

jcranmer wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The dominant cause of pedestrian fatalities is not "pedestrian steps right in front of a moving car," but things like "driver didn't see pedestrian in middle of crosswalk" (usually because, e.g., looking instead for vehicle traffic to make a right turn on red). Sure, it's possible for a pedestrian to be at fault, but even if they step out from behind an occluded object, if a driver is fast enough to kill them, then t…

The dominant cause of pedestrian deaths is the same as drivers: alcohol. But unlike drivers, pedestrian are allowed to walk around drunk. So we dont even talk about it. We pretend it doesnt happen. It does. It happens all the time. The drunk pedestrian being hit by a car is the norm . >>2008, nearly 40 per cent of pedestrians killed on Canadian roads were impaired, with two-thirds of them having a blood alcohol conce…

I saw this happen. Went drinking with a friend in my early 20s. Him a well seasoned alcoholic, us both hammered waiting for a crosswalk signal. The signal never came. Traffic had a break. He finished a statement he was making, and that internal loop closure was enough to tell his mind that the traffic had stopped, and crossing was safe. It was not safe. A lifted truck came flying through the town square at around 50pmh in a 30mph zone. The lights were green obviously, but my friend had already stepped out right as the truck was crossing through. I screamed and tried to grab him back but could not safely grab him. He got nailed full speed, went flying about 20 feet up in the air before smacking the ground. He did live, was permanently disfigured (jaw surgeries and stuff) I'm glad I was there to make a emergency services call immediately, but at the same time, I will never ever forget that image in my mind. This was the worst time I saw someone hit with a car. The second worse was an attempted murder, and the third time was just some absent minded autistic woman bumping an old lady over in a cross walk. She was unharmed. I don't like people, alcohol, or cars anymore.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#369

Post by loeg » Sat, May 09, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

mlyle wrote: post #81

loeg wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a representative example. (When you're disputing my evidenced claim, it behooves you to bring your own facts, rather than just asserting.)

I think it's not too surprising that the law treats people with diminished capacity differently. It's not a bug, it's a feature, even though it may feel upsetting. There's no winning solution in a case like that.

I disagree that it is a feature.

Re: California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

#370

Post by mlyle » Sat, May 09, 2026, 6:28 PM UTC

loeg wrote: post #369

mlyle wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's not too surprising that the law treats people with diminished capacity differently. It's not a bug, it's a feature, even though it may feel upsetting. There's no winning solution in a case like that.

I disagree that it is a feature.

You'd prefer to throw people with dementia and children in jail? Most of us agree that those outcomes are messed up, and the ability to form intent and/or understand the consequences of one's actions is important information to be considered in formulating whether to punish.

Someone got old and hadn't figured out they were unsafe to drive. It's not the same thing as me choosing to drive 100MPH in a city, operate a vehicle drunk, or keeping going after receiving clear evidence that I'm unsafe behind the wheel.