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Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

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Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#381

Post by zamadatix »

smrtinsert wrote: post #355
smugma wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Failed pretty badly but no reported injuries or even accidents so not that badly. And if you’re Waymo, it’s a short-term reputation hit but great experience to learn from and improve.

Triggering some sort of extreme safety mode is considered failing now?

Anything other than "normalish" tends to be a failure in driving. I.e. stopping and throwing your hazards on when you're in the intersection isn't success just because there were even worse options to have picked. It's nice they were able to pull the fleet back and get the cars out of the roads during the problem though.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#382

Post by rsynnott »

rcxdude wrote: post #170
Zambyte wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry if you're playing in to the joke, I can't tell. Streetcars / trams were widely deployed before they were ripped out for the car, driven by lobbyists interested in selling cars. Wondering why no one has bothered with that is starting from a false premise, because people have bothered with that.

I'm well aware that there are multiple options for public transport, but none of them are actually as flexible or as far reaching as cars/taxis. To me this 'but why not trains' on every article about self-driving cars is a tired meme that fails to address that these are not equivalent options. I might as well say "Well, why don't we get rid of these expensive rails and fixed timetables and just lay down some cheap co…

The key issue is that cars have _vastly_ lower capacity per meter than mass transit. For most large cities, there is simply not enough road for that to work, nevermind parking.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#383

Post by anticensor »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #358
anticensor wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lights out should be treated as all way red, including pedestrians.

Not all way red, that leads to exactly the problem in the story of blocking traffic. Lights out needs to be a stop sign.

Yes, it does lead to blocking the traffic but that is the only safe action to do in such an intersection; if an intersection has traffic lights, there's enough traffic that stop&give way is not a viable operation.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#384

Post by lokar »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #318
lokar wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much to move once you decide things have gone off the rails is a hard question, but I’d assume they have put some thought into it.

Then they shouldn't be on the road. What happens if there's an earthquake? The Waymos are going to be blocking everyone else.

I think it’s a big issue. I wish the state would suspend their operations while they come up with a detailed, public plan for this stuff

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#385

Post by ssl-3 »

lazystar wrote: post #351
pinkmuffinere wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waymo has been quite good about responsibly learning and improving imo. I do hope and think they’ll learn from this.

Have they implemented a cat-friendly update since the incident a few months ago?

I mean: I haven't implemented a cat-friendly update to my own driving, and it isn't clear to me how I would ever begin to attempt to do so.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#386

Post by ssl-3 »

amonroe805-2 wrote: post #335
cjsplat wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is the same law in California, but so many people drift through stop signs that the guidance is close to meaningless. In addition, there are 4-way stop signs all over SF and tourists regularly comment on how they work here. The law is clear - yield to the right, but that is a pretty slow system in congested roads. The local custom in SF is that someone is usually obviously first, rightmost, or just most agg…

Is this not how four way stops work everywhere? I live in Kansas and have previously lived in Chicago, and I feel like both places follow this custom. Only thing that’s different is the laws are followed slightly more rigorously in low traffic areas, but the customary rules are definitely still in play.

That's how any relatively busy 4-way stop works in Ohio, too. The law says to do it one way (first to arrive, yield-to-the-right, wait for intersection to clear before entering).

But in practice what happens is an unscripted ballet where other things happen instead, like: Like, 4 cars can turn right simultaneously, and this works fine.

People know it's "wrong," but they also know it works. It's normal, expected, and a bit weird.

The weird part is something I've only ever really observed when I've driven cop cars around the block and had to traverse a 4-way stop. Other drivers stop the ballet immediately and get all timid and stuff -- like they're waiting for me (just someone being a lowly radio tech today, not a cop at all) to give them direction or something. It's bizarre.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#387

Post by psunavy03 »

ssl-3 wrote: post #386
amonroe805-2 wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this not how four way stops work everywhere? I live in Kansas and have previously lived in Chicago, and I feel like both places follow this custom. Only thing that’s different is the laws are followed slightly more rigorously in low traffic areas, but the customary rules are definitely still in play.

That's how any relatively busy 4-way stop works in Ohio, too. The law says to do it one way (first to arrive, yield-to-the-right, wait for intersection to clear before entering). But in practice what happens is an unscripted ballet where other things happen instead, like: Like, 4 cars can turn right simultaneously, and this works fine. People know it's "wrong," but they also know it works . It's normal, expected, and…

I had a classmate in the military whose old car got t-boned and so he went and bought a used white Ford Crown Victoria (for the non-US folks, used to be the most common US police car ~10-15 years ago).

He had funny stories about people slowing down to the speed limit and pulling over to the right lane on the freeway.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#388

Post by potato3732842 »

cjsplat wrote: post #193

I was driving across the east side of SF and hit a patch of lights that were out. The Waymo's were just going really slow through the intersection. It seemed that the "light is out means 4-way stop" dynamic caused them to go into ultra-timid mode. And of course the human drivers did the typical slow and roll, with decent interleaving. The result was that each Waymo took about 4x as long to get through the intersectio…

>It would be interesting to see the internal post mortem.

What post mortem? The whole fleet reverted to it's "baseline" of acting like a hysterical teenager on day 1 of driver's ed. Obviously there's serious collateral damage to overall system performance when you just create thousands of those people out of thin air but that's "other people's problem" as far as waymo is concerned.

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#389

Post by potato3732842 »

smugma wrote: post #268
cjsplat wrote: post #193

I was driving across the east side of SF and hit a patch of lights that were out. The Waymo's were just going really slow through the intersection. It seemed that the "light is out means 4-way stop" dynamic caused them to go into ultra-timid mode. And of course the human drivers did the typical slow and roll, with decent interleaving. The result was that each Waymo took about 4x as long to get through the intersectio…

Failed pretty badly but no reported injuries or even accidents so not that badly. And if you’re Waymo, it’s a short-term reputation hit but great experience to learn from and improve.

>Failed pretty badly but no reported injuries or even accidents so not that badly.

Just because no integer lives were wasted doesn't mean we can't sum the man hours and get a number greater than 1

Re: Waymo halts service during S.F. blackout after causing traffic jams

#390

Post by potato3732842 »

cjsplat wrote: post #287
markus_zhang wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m curious what’s the regulation in this scenario? In Canada I think light off means 4-way stop signs so everyone obeys that, or at least most of everyone. What’s the situation in SF?

Yes, that is the same law in California, but so many people drift through stop signs that the guidance is close to meaningless. In addition, there are 4-way stop signs all over SF and tourists regularly comment on how they work here. The law is clear - yield to the right, but that is a pretty slow system in congested roads. The local custom in SF is that someone is usually obviously first, rightmost, or just most agg…

>The local custom in SF is that someone is usually obviously first, rightmost, or just most aggressive, and opposing pairs of cars go simultaneously, while being wary about left turns.

This is how it works in most of north america.

Those confused tourists are just making up excuses for being poor drivers.

Yes, I feel the same way about driving in NYC thanks for asking.

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