Some Passengers Riding in Waymo's Driverless Cars Face Uncomfortable Situations (msn.com) 42
Alphabet's Waymo robotaxis are providing "hundreds of thousands of driverless rides each month," reports the Washington Post. But as the robotaxi service expands in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Austin, some passengers "have found that traveling by robotaxi can make riders into sitting ducks for a new form of public harassment."
The Washington Post spoke with four Waymo passengers, three of them women, who said they experienced harassment or what felt like threats to their safety from people who followed, obstructed or attempted to enter a driverless vehicle they were riding in...
Elliot, a tech worker in San Francisco, recalled in a phone interview a "scary" situation during a Waymo ride late one night in October. A pedestrian tried to enter the driverless vehicle as it waited at a red light. "Go away," Elliot yelled at the man as he knocked on the window before briefly flashing what looked like a knife, video of the incident viewed by The Post showed... In the moment, Elliot said, he wished someone could have "slammed on the gas and gotten away from this guy," adding that Waymo should change how its vehicles respond in such situations...
Madelline, a 25-year-old restaurant server in San Francisco, said that during a recent Waymo ride at around 2 a.m., the driverless vehicle had to stop after two drivers ahead began yelling at each other and throwing things out of their cars in what appeared to be a road rage dispute. The two cars blocked an intersection and one person got out of one of the vehicles. "I was definitely panicking a little bit," Madelline said, as her car waited for the road to clear instead of turning off as a human driver might do... She would like to have more control over a robotaxi's route but still prefers Waymo rides to using Uber or Lyft, whose drivers sometimes make her uncomfortable...
In September, Amina V. was on her way to a hair appointment when a man stepped in front of her robotaxi and the car stalled in the middle of the street. She already had been recording herself in the Waymo, so she turned the camera to capture the man hitting on her while her car stood frozen in San Francisco's Soma neighborhood.
And one Saturday night at 10:30 p.m., a tech worker named Stephanie took a driverless Waymo robotaxi with her sister, and reports confronting "several young men close to the robotaxi honking and yelling, 'Hey, ladies — you guys are hot.' If she or another human had been driving, it would have been easy to reroute the car to avoid leading the pursuers to her home. But she was scared and didn't know how to change the robot's path. She called 911, but a dispatcher said they couldn't send a police car to a moving vehicle, Stephanie recalled... [S]he said the other car gave up the chase when the Waymo was a minute from her house. She and her sister arrived home safely, though terrified. Stephanie didn't catch the car's license plate number, which the 911 dispatcher requested after her ride concluded. Waymo vehicles, like other driverless cars in development, use multiple cameras to help make sense of the world around them. But when she later asked the company for the car's video footage, hoping it had captured the license plate, Waymo declined to provide it, she said.
She would like closer coordination between Waymo and first responders and says she is now unsure about self-driving rides after dark. "I would feel safe taking it during the day," Stephanie said. But "at night, maybe I'm safer having someone else in the car just in case something happens."
A Waymo spokesperson told the Washington Post that their support agents will stay on the line with riders who call in about incidents like this, also working with law enforcement as appropriate — but the agents can't change the vehicle's specific route. (The Post adds that Waymo passengers "can tell a vehicle to pull over or change its next stop or destination using the Waymo app, or ask a support agent to make similar changes.")
Elliot, a tech worker in San Francisco, recalled in a phone interview a "scary" situation during a Waymo ride late one night in October. A pedestrian tried to enter the driverless vehicle as it waited at a red light. "Go away," Elliot yelled at the man as he knocked on the window before briefly flashing what looked like a knife, video of the incident viewed by The Post showed... In the moment, Elliot said, he wished someone could have "slammed on the gas and gotten away from this guy," adding that Waymo should change how its vehicles respond in such situations...
Madelline, a 25-year-old restaurant server in San Francisco, said that during a recent Waymo ride at around 2 a.m., the driverless vehicle had to stop after two drivers ahead began yelling at each other and throwing things out of their cars in what appeared to be a road rage dispute. The two cars blocked an intersection and one person got out of one of the vehicles. "I was definitely panicking a little bit," Madelline said, as her car waited for the road to clear instead of turning off as a human driver might do... She would like to have more control over a robotaxi's route but still prefers Waymo rides to using Uber or Lyft, whose drivers sometimes make her uncomfortable...
In September, Amina V. was on her way to a hair appointment when a man stepped in front of her robotaxi and the car stalled in the middle of the street. She already had been recording herself in the Waymo, so she turned the camera to capture the man hitting on her while her car stood frozen in San Francisco's Soma neighborhood.
And one Saturday night at 10:30 p.m., a tech worker named Stephanie took a driverless Waymo robotaxi with her sister, and reports confronting "several young men close to the robotaxi honking and yelling, 'Hey, ladies — you guys are hot.' If she or another human had been driving, it would have been easy to reroute the car to avoid leading the pursuers to her home. But she was scared and didn't know how to change the robot's path. She called 911, but a dispatcher said they couldn't send a police car to a moving vehicle, Stephanie recalled... [S]he said the other car gave up the chase when the Waymo was a minute from her house. She and her sister arrived home safely, though terrified. Stephanie didn't catch the car's license plate number, which the 911 dispatcher requested after her ride concluded. Waymo vehicles, like other driverless cars in development, use multiple cameras to help make sense of the world around them. But when she later asked the company for the car's video footage, hoping it had captured the license plate, Waymo declined to provide it, she said.
She would like closer coordination between Waymo and first responders and says she is now unsure about self-driving rides after dark. "I would feel safe taking it during the day," Stephanie said. But "at night, maybe I'm safer having someone else in the car just in case something happens."
A Waymo spokesperson told the Washington Post that their support agents will stay on the line with riders who call in about incidents like this, also working with law enforcement as appropriate — but the agents can't change the vehicle's specific route. (The Post adds that Waymo passengers "can tell a vehicle to pull over or change its next stop or destination using the Waymo app, or ask a support agent to make similar changes.")
Sounds like having a button would be good (Score:5, Interesting)
Hm... sounds like having an emergency button to hit would be good. Like the telephones in elevators, an early adoption of unmanned travel, or something like the onstar button in gm cars.
Then give the agents more power, like switching to a remote driver.
Re: Sounds like having a button would be good (Score:2)
Unless you are in an area with no signal.
The car needs to do better without relying on remote operators.
Re: (Score:2)
Once D2C satellite service is available in earnest, this will no longer be a problem.
Starlink D2C is already operational. Low bandwidth, but this is enough for signaling an emergency.
ASTS will get there in 1-2 years as well.
Re: Sounds like having a button would be good (Score:2)
When would a Waymo ever be in an area without signal? Seriously, at this time,these vehicles have a defined area they are allowed to operate. I'm pretty sure I cannot hail one to drive me to Yosemite.
Re: (Score:2)
There are no driverless taxi services operating in the US without always-on connectivity. Where they exist, it's only within a handful of dense urban areas. If you know differently, please provide links.
Re: (Score:3)
sounds like having an emergency button to hit would be good
There's an emergency button on your phone.
Unfortunately for the hypothetical you, the nearest cops are probably already busy harassing a homeless veteran for sitting two inches past the allowable part of the sidewalk.
Re: (Score:2)
My phone doesn't have an explicit emergency button. The benefits of a button in the car is that it can connect you to a waymo specific operator immediately, and pass them information like who you are, where you are, which car you're in, where you were picked up, where your destination is, etc... They should be able to immediately access information from the car.
If I call 911, they're still going to need to call Waymo.
Basically, it seems much faster to be able to hit the button, go "they're trying to break
Re: (Score:2)
My phone doesn't have an explicit emergency button.
It probably doesn't have a dedicated emergency button, and it may not even have a physical one, but I assure you that unless it is some hacked up Linux jobber with a custom interface it does have one.
It's true that an in-car emergency button would possibly produce a more targeted response, but what is the response supposed to be? If it's something that could get the company which owns the vehicle into legal trouble, they will be hesitant to use it.
I guess nobody reports (Score:2)
the sicko, violent or perv taxi drivers anymore. There aren't many but they exist too, and have existed ever since taxis have been a thing.
The robot taxis come with their own set of new problems. That's why you hear about them.
Re: (Score:3)
I'd suggest that cabbies who have to get police checks are a better bet than uber or lyft drivers who do not
not to mention how ridesharing companies have no local representation and care far less than local cab companies ever did
unethical people get the unethical businesses they deserve
Re: (Score:2)
I'd suggest that cabbies who have to get police checks are a better bet than uber or lyft drivers who do not
not to mention how ridesharing companies have no local representation and care far less than local cab companies ever did
unethical people get the unethical businesses they deserve
I gather that you are deeply confused, as you are suggesting that taxi monopolies are somehow more ethical than rideshares. The taxi business is deeply corrupt, and makes cab rides much more expensive than they have any need to be. There wouldn't even be rideshares if that weren't the case.
I wonder how many millions of dollars it takes to get a New York taxi medallion, these days...
violent or perv robotic taxi drivers (Score:3)
Wait until AI generates sicko, violent or perv robotic taxi drivers
Seriously? (Score:1)
Why all these hit pieces on autonomous vehicles? You guys are ok with humans worldwide murdering 1 million of each other in traffic accidents every year (40,000 in the USA). Worst case, why not let robots in on that too? I mean who cares if it's a human or a robot that runs you over. Personally I rather it be a robot that runs me over. Autonomous vehicles are in early stage and working pretty damn good for something unimaginable a decade or two ago. Allow the tech to advance, especially since they are prova
Re: (Score:3)
The problem is that Google has been very secretive with their data. For example, how often are the cars take over by remote control? That seems like an important thing to answer, but we have no idea. When Google does release data, it's always framed in a positive light (rather than a neutral, investigative tone). For example, the study you cited doesn't compare like to like, so it is not usable for evaluating safety of self driving cars to
Murdering? (Score:4, Informative)
Using emotive hyperbole just renders your argument null and void.
As for working pretty damn good - yeah, on wide straight US roads with light controlled 90 degree junctions. Good luck getting them to work in rush hour in for example Rome or Paris or even just on roundabouts or 2 ways streets with only room for 1 vehicle to navigate in a given direction at any time (very common in the UK) and as for the 3rd world with its often unpaved roads and zero discernable traffic rules forget it. The silicon valley based techo shills really have no idea and clearly neither do you.
Re: (Score:3)
Good luck getting them to work in rush hour in for example Rome or Paris or even just on roundabouts or 2 ways streets with only room for 1 vehicle to navigate in a given direction at any time (very common in the UK) and as for the 3rd world with its often unpaved roads and zero discernable traffic rules forget it. The silicon valley based techo shills really have no idea and clearly neither do you.
Yeah, any technology that isn't universally applicable right now is useless.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, any technology that isn't universally applicable right now is useless.
Self-driving cars are billed as an end-to-end transport solution, but they are not that. They are easily confused in a number of common situations where no human driver would have a problem and the secrecy around how they are actually operated is unacceptable for vehicles operating on public roads in a test involving a public which does not have the opportunity to opt out of participation.
Re: (Score:2)
Umm, when Uber's self driving test car hit a pedestrian who illegally crossed a road 7 years ago, they almost went bankrupt. When Cruise self-driving car dragged a pedestrian that a human driver hit and pushed onto it, it almost ended GM. No way you're telling me FSD "gets hacked" and heads wouldn't roll for it. The evidence so far is that the public is on a hair trigger for autonomous vehicle deaths -- even in cases where someone else is at fault.
Re: (Score:2)
I think a lot of problem is the binary view. People see to think we *need* to get to a point where all driving is automated.
Fact is machines are better about doing repetitive tasks correctly than humans. There is a lot of relatively repetitive driving tasks, especially ferrying people around cities. While the unanticipated/imagined event does come up from time to time, it might very well be infrequent enough that some customer service agent might resolve it. Ditto for soccer mom applications, and your com
Police report... and... be armed (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're driving around in a vehicle you don't have any control of, that can stop anywhere at anytime for any pre-programmer reason...
1. Carry a firearm or other defensive weapon. Hope not to have to use it. If you do, be glad you have it.
2. If waymo won't release pictures with license plates or pictures of people WHO CAUSE YOU HARM or THREATEN YOUR LIFE OR SAFETY file a police complaint and let them say "no" to the local prosecutor.
That won't last long.
Any new or quote unquote "disruptive" technology has "disruptions" that occur outside of their stock value to idiot shareholders (Musk - talking to you, moron). They are also disruprive to normal people (which they call "passengers" as if somehow hundreds of millions of us no longer have any rights because we clicked on "I agree" on Waymo's EULA.)
Fuck waymo. Fuck EULAs. Fuck companies that put real people in these scenarios and then refuse to help (useless) law enforcement. And Fuck Musk. Richest moron in the world. Imagine how it would be to have more money than anyone... but to be a moron. Sad. Flowers for Algernon.
Re: (Score:1)
This attitude just radiates from most of these stories. "This thing on this ride made me uncomfortable. But I still prefer this ride to those other rides, because they make me uncomfortable even more often".
Have you considered that your extreme neuroticism is the source of your woes, and not the type of taxi service you're using?
Re: (Score:2)
This attitude just radiates ...
While that is certainly true, it is understandable for women to feel uncomfortable: She's minding her own business and she's harassed. That's not the problem: She's 'out-gunned' and probably out-numbered. If the men decide to escalate the problem, hardened glass, a seat-belt and a cell-phone are no longer sufficient protection. Assuming every arsehole will do the worst thing possible, is claiming victim-hood but everyone in an out-of-control confrontation, is easily traumatized by displays of violence.
Re: (Score:1)
Since you're into the whole "who caused this" analysis, let's do it. Though will such an analysis convince anyone? No. Humans are inherently not rational nor logical, and one of the strongest drives we have is to protect females of our tribe from outsider males. And story is framed very well to present us with just this frame, so the first thing most people will get from it is initial emotional burst to protect the woman from the men she is complaining about. And most people are incapable of resisting this
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
We started to see this go into overdrive in the 1990s. At that point, aside from all the racial tensions that already existed, the powers that be decided that the topic de jour in the media was going to be "sexual harassment." I was in high school at the time, and I have to admit it was all very confusing. Living in the south, it was commonplace for people to show some common courtesy by holding doors open for people, and that kind of thing. But it got bad, because you always had some idiot who would be tri
Re: (Score:2)
I remember 20 years ago, it was "stop abuse of women", with parenting, indirectly being under the spotlight. This year, our leaders claim abuse of women is the problem, again and the messaging is a forceful "it's all men's fault".
Strangely, I rarely see teenagers in mixed groups these holidays, so it's difficult to know when this abuse occurs.
Simple Solution (Score:1)
Legal gray zone (Score:2)
Theoretically, the car could have a "Get me the F out of here!" button that makes it takes immediate evasive/self-protecting action. Probably they could even execute on it, too.
The problem is that the legal standing of a fully-driverless car is still hypothetical and never been tested in court. Even in case of your regular accident, assigning responsibility is not easy, let alone in such a nuanced case.