California DMV Gives Cruise and Waymo OK To Charge For Rides (arstechnica.com) 24
On Thursday, the California DMV issued autonomous deployment permits to Cruise and Waymo, "which is a necessary step if the robotaxis are to charge passengers for their rides," reports The Verge. From the report: San Franciscans might have to be night owls to catch a Cruise; the DMV's authorization gives Cruise permission to operate on surface streets within a geofenced area of San Francisco between the hours of 10 pm and 6 am. Cruise's autonomous vehicles are allowed to operate in light rain and light fog, but they aren't allowed to exceed 30 mph (48 km/h). Waymo is allowed to operate over a wider area; the DMV's authorization is "within parts of San Francisco and San Mateo counties." These robotaxis are also trusted to cope with light rain and light fog and are approved for speeds of up to 65 mph (105 km/h).
Both AV developers have had permission to test (as opposed to commercially deploy) their vehicles on Californian roads. Waymo was allowed to begin road tests in 2014, and to conduct them without a safety driver from 2018. Meanwhile, Cruise got permission to begin road testing with safety drivers in 2015 and driverless testing in 2020. However, there are still Is to be dotted and Ts to be crossed before either Waymo or Cruise can actually properly begin operating real commercial robotaxi services. Approval from the DMV is necessary, but not sufficient, as the California Public Utilities Commission must also approve such a service.
Both AV developers have had permission to test (as opposed to commercially deploy) their vehicles on Californian roads. Waymo was allowed to begin road tests in 2014, and to conduct them without a safety driver from 2018. Meanwhile, Cruise got permission to begin road testing with safety drivers in 2015 and driverless testing in 2020. However, there are still Is to be dotted and Ts to be crossed before either Waymo or Cruise can actually properly begin operating real commercial robotaxi services. Approval from the DMV is necessary, but not sufficient, as the California Public Utilities Commission must also approve such a service.
First Domino (Score:2)
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It still matters whether it is the kind of accident a human could have prevented, or not. It's not all about the overall safety statistics.
It does. it also matters whether or not this kind of near miss could've been avoided by a human driver who was (almost) completely unable to communicate with the other vehicles around him.
The real test for the robotic piloting of humans in terrestrial vehicles will come when it has to decide between killing the driver they represent or the two random cyclists in the wrong lane.
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Tesla Autopilot has already killed eleven people.
We have already passed that milestone.
SDC deaths are barely newsworthy anymore. Nobody cares.
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Difference being that Teslas are not self driving. They have driving aids that require a qualified driver to be attentive and ready to take over in a fraction of a second. As such it's hard to pin liability on Tesla as they will always blame the driver for not preventing the accident.
Nevertheless they are currently under investigation because their system has a nasty habit of ramming emergency vehicles at high speed, but the point is that I don't think the legal issues surrounding self driving vehicles have
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Difference being that Teslas are not self-driving.
The eleven people were killed when Autopilot was engaged, and the computer was in control. Yet none of these stories stayed in the headlines more than one day.
The only story that had "legs" was when Uber killed the homeless woman in Phoenix. That accident was 99% the result of human screwups by both management and the safety driver. It was the "human angle" that made the story interesting.
When full SDCs start killing people, the first few times will make headlines and fade by the next day. Soon after th
With the amount of money involved (Score:3)
There's millions of professional drivers in this world. The amount of money that can be made eliminating those jobs, or making them zero skill by making it so it's just a few guys in the back to lug packages, is staggering.
California DMV (Score:3, Funny)
I'm impressed those companies had the patience to either go in person and waste 6 hours of their life or book an appointment online and wait months.
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There's lots of super-clogged DMVs in California. A big part of the problem is that our computer system dates back literally to the 70s. There have been two modernization attempts which both failed. Another part is that most DMV employees seem to be dumb as stumps. Usually any given DMV has one person who knows what's going on, one person who kinda knows what's going on, and a bunch of people who lean on those people constantly.
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People love to complain about DMV, yet never want to pay more taxes/fees to improve them. GIGO.
Re: My daily experiences with the modern Internet: (Score:2)
Web browser, VPN, downloader oops out of time Tonight we're online like it's 1999
"between 10 pm and 6 am." (Score:1)
who or what cleans the puke out of them?
I can't drive 65! (Score:2)
I can't drive 65!
Light rain! (Score:2)
Well I don't know about California but in London it can go from sunny to heavy rain in a very short space of time and sometimes it'll pour down whilst being sunny. And you're not allowed to park on large percentages of road, so effectively you don't stop unless your car breaks down or you've reached a destination where you can park.
So what happens if you're on a highway or a road with no parking spots available and it starts raining torrentially? Or d
Another valiant effort (Score:2)
Another valiant effort to reduce the population of San Francisco.