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Waymo Premier

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Re: Waymo Premier

#471

Post by f_allwein »

csa wrote: post #238
smy20011 wrote: post #15

It will pay for itself if you spend >300$ per month. I personally wish Waymo have a 399$ per month subscription that give 2 free ride per day so I don't need to own a car just for work.

> I personally wish Waymo have a 399$ per month subscription that give 2 free ride per day Assuming $20 for a typical paid trip, I’m guessing $800 would be closer to what they would charge for 2 free rides a day within SF. $400 might be were it ends up when it’s widely adopted and a mature product — probably in the “budget” category of a segmented market.

Realistic costs of owning a car are around 1.000€ per month - see https://assets.adac.de/Autodatenbank/Autokosten/autokostenue... (pdf, German, look for Gesamtkosten (total cost))

Wherever I tell this to people here in Germany, they are good at pointing out why their car is the exception.

Re: Waymo Premier

#472

Post by TylerE »

borski wrote: post #462
TylerE wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this goes against the HN groupthink, but a lot of those accidents are not the car or the drivers fault. I live in a small college town. We have huge problems with students just walking right off the curb, especially when drunk.

The pedestrian is not the one driving the weapon. It is your fault if you hit a pedestrian, even if they walk right off the curb, even if they’re drunk. Unless they intentionally jump in front of your car in an attempt to commit suicide, it is always on you to ensure you can stop and respond to an emergency, and a pedestrian is such a thing, imho.

No, if the pedestrian walks out in the known-dangerour street without so much as a glance, not a crosswalk, that is categorically not the cars fault. Idiots are gonna idiots. Just like all the cyclists that get hit around here for not obeying stop signs.

ALL users of the road are responsible for following the rules. Not being in a car isn't a "I can do whatever I want, whenever I want, whyever I want" pass.

Re: Waymo Premier

#473

Post by laurencerowe »

dotcoma wrote: post #446
laurencerowe wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Robocars most certainly exist. They’re probably about 5% of car traffic in San Francisco. I’ve not taken one yet (taxis/ubers/Waymos are mostly impractical with a young kid in the US as you must use a car seat unlike in most European countries) but as a pedestrian they seem mostly a safer than other drivers. As a driver I expect they will eventually induce gridlock but the city can always create more bus lanes.

How old is your kid? In which European countries do you think the law does not mandate child seats ?

My kid is 2. New York City and most EU countries (including Spain, Portugal, UK, France) allow children to ride in taxis without a car seat.

This makes it far more practical for people to live without a car - hard to imagine in most of the US I know. As most such trips are low speed around town (e.g. getting to and from a train station or airport) it seems a reasonable trade off.

You of course need a car seat in a private car.

Re: Waymo Premier

#474

Post by laurencerowe »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #414
laurencerowe wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Robocars most certainly exist. They’re probably about 5% of car traffic in San Francisco. I’ve not taken one yet (taxis/ubers/Waymos are mostly impractical with a young kid in the US as you must use a car seat unlike in most European countries) but as a pedestrian they seem mostly a safer than other drivers. As a driver I expect they will eventually induce gridlock but the city can always create more bus lanes.

Portable booster seats are pretty small. I can’t see it working if you have a kid younger than the booster seat min though. Only a few states have strict rules here, Washington and California being a couple, although I think California has a taxi exemption.

Living in San Francisco I've not seen the taxi exemption for California anywhere. New York City taxis are exempt like most of Europe.

My kid is too young for a booster city. It's pretty impractical to take a child seat or booster with you unless you plan to hire a car the other end. When I travel back to see my family in Europe I take the train from the airport. So we bus and Bart to the airport even though it would be much easier with luggage to take a taxi.

Re: Waymo Premier

#475

Post by agumonkey »

Melatonic wrote: post #135
agumonkey wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you know before hand this would be the case ? cause even when choosing a model that was deemed well made and long-lasting, we hit an unfortunate engine belt timing failure (100k cars were concerned, we got one..) and had to replace the whole thing.

How many times did you replace the timing belt (and probably water pump) before the failure ? Curious what vehicle this is

It was a nissan micra k12, and I used the wrong term, it's not a belt it's a timing chain (metallic) allegedly designed for longer longevity, but there was an industry issue (bad alloy or something) that made them stretch and lose sync with the timing chain counter circuit. The ECU would trip and rapidly the engine would just stop (quite dangerous depending on which road your on). Car mechanics had to swap the whole engine.. we sold it not long after that.

Re: Waymo Premier

#476

Post by kingstnap »

aetherspawn wrote: post #443

Hm, don’t like the offering. It seems standoffish. If you want to make Waymo into a SaaS and get people really using it, then it’s easy: $100 per month - Unlimited rides $200 per month - Unlimited priority rides Build enough trust in that and people might even get rid of their cars. But in my opinion the problem is the feeling of spending money. People want to avoid that feeling at all costs, or at least want to feel…

Your pricing is ridiculously cheap. Cars are expensive.

But aside from that you really can't offer unlimited usage. You would need to offer quota.

Maybe something like 30 km / day that rolls over into a limit of 300 km.

Re: Waymo Premier

#477

Post by kortilla »

trhway wrote: post #377
crubier wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely not. At the VERY least, the road blockers should be fined the cost they caused to society. Block Golden gate bridge for 1h30min for 10,000 people (Avg salary $50/h)? That will be 1.5 * 10,000 * 50 = $750,000 damage.

Well, if they caused you any specific loss nothing prevents you from suing them in civil court like in any other situation when somebody causes you a specific loss. That though is a completely different thing from criminal prosecution.

And if someone died in ambulance that couldn’t get to a hospital in time?

Re: Waymo Premier

#478

Post by debugnik »

handoflixue wrote: post #391
runarberg wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a false alternative, because robocars do not exist, while public transit does exist but simply hasn’t been adequately implemented everywhere. Politicians (and grifters alike) like to point to a future technology to solve an existing problem only to delay existing solutions which they don’t want to implement, most often for political reasons.

> robocars do not exist How do you manage to discover Hacker News and not know Waymos are real? I'm truly fascinated by this new level of ignorance.

They mean consumer robocars as opposed to robotaxis. The latter exist, the former don't. And the latter are remotely controlled by operators when hard situations arise, but a blind consumer would presumably be on their own or would have to pay an additional subscription for that service.

Re: Waymo Premier

#479

Post by kortilla »

runarberg wrote: post #411
ctoth wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flight? I want to drive. I want to bring my cat and bring some stuff back from my dad's house. My parents just drove up here to visit me, I would like to do the same. Not take a train. Not take a plane. I want to hop in a robocar and drive to Florida. The same thing that every other person with a car can do whenever they want to. Freedom.

I have a hard time imagining how driving a car is freedom but hopping on a bus is not. In my mind a car is a liability in ways the bus is not. You have to insure your car, find parking, get a license, you cannot drive drunk, your license plate is tracked, etc. etc. vs. a bus which you can just hop in (as drunk as you want) fall a sleep or whatever and when you arrive the bus just drives away and you don’t have to thi…

>I have a hard time imagining how driving a car is freedom but hopping on a bus is not.

Try telling the bus driver to make a stop at a particular restaurant along the way.

Re: Waymo Premier

#480

Post by 0xffff2 »

AnssiH wrote: post #268
defen wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much liability coverage are you getting for ~ $100/month? In other words if you injure or kill someone with your vehicle how much of that cost will be covered by your insurance company? With Waymo the answer is "not my problem".

Hmm, for my €209/year (~$20/mo) liability insurance I get unlimited coverage for personal injuries and €5M coverage for property damage (both mandated by Finnish law). It sounds like you pay much more. Any idea why?

One major reason is probably that most of the liability portion is going to be covering medical bills in the US. I only did a quick skim of the Wikipedia summary but it looks like Finland, like (almost?) all of Europe wouldn't have that particular liability?

Another reason might be that insurance costs vary widely in the US. I recently had a reason to get an insurance quote in Utah, and it was literally one third the price that I currently pay in California.

All that said, you do seem to enjoy remarkably cheap insurance over there from my perspective. I hardly think those two factors are enough to cover such a large difference.

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