Autonomous Cars

California has green-lit 24/7 service expansion of the vehicles in San Francisco, enabling Waymo and Cruise the freedom to operate during daytime hours. Robotaxis are the subject of traffic jam chaos, and one was involved in a crash with an emergency vehicle last week. And they’re expanding to more cities.

The autonomous shuttles offer free rides along a fixed, seven-stop route in the artificial island’s center from August 2023 to April 2024 (via AP News).

Prompted by a collision Thursday between one of Cruise’s robotaxis and a fire truck, Cruise has agreed to reduce its fleet after being asked to by the California Department of Motor Vehicles, writes The New York Times.

When two people die in very similar crashes years apart, the reason seems obvious. Autopilot, Tesla’s driver assist system, can’t recognize trucks crossing the road. They knew it couldn’t, and they didn’t fix it. And now we have testimony from their engineers admitting this.

The California Public Utilities Commission will hold a hearing at 11AM PT on whether robotaxi companies like Cruise and Waymo will be allowed to charge for their rides and operate their service 24/7. Some San Francisco officials are urging the panel to vote no, citing blocked roads and traffic caused by robotaxis.

The companies are forming a joint venture that will provide Toyota-branded EVs to the autonomous vehicle company Pony.ai. The Level 4 vehicles can operate without a human at the wheel and will join the PonyPilot+ robotaxi network offered in China.

Teslas, like most cars, aren’t supposed to work without someone in the front seat. But as YouTuber AI Addict proves, all you need is a stuffed animal, or even a dang balloon, to trick the Full Self-Driving system into thinking there’s someone behind the wheel. (Full disclosure: these guys did these tests at the behest of Dan O’Dowd, a rich software developer who’s made it his life’s mission to debunk Elon Musk’s automated driving claims.)

Car critics in San Francisco are placing orange traffic cones on the hoods of Waymo and Cruise robotaxis in protest of an upcoming vote to allow the autonomous vehicles to operate at all hours. The cones cause the vehicles to stall in the middle of the road — which is a weird thing to do if janky robot cars blocking emergency vehicles is something you want to avoid.

Well that’s a terrible headline! An autonomous Waymo vehicle struck and killed a small dog in San Francisco last month, according to an incident report spotted by TechCrunch. Waymo says the accident was unavoidable, and of course over a million pets are mowed down by human drivers every year. Still, this incident will be an interesting test of my theory about AVs, which is that while we have an extremely high tolerance for death caused by human drivers, we have an extremely low tolerance for robot-caused deaths. My guess is that extends to furry friends too.

Jeep owner Stellantis is working on a system that adds autonomy to its iconic SUV — and we’re not talking about highway driving... this is for 4x4 adventures.

The British automaker issued a recall for 6,400 electric I-PACE vehicles due to fire risks from an over-heated battery. Included in that recall is an undisclosed number of driverless Waymo vehicles. A spokesperson for the company said it was working with Jaguar on a software update that should fix the issue.