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Locals Reportedly Are Frustrated With Alphabet's Self-Driving Cars (cnbc.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the road-rage dept.

More than a dozen people who work near Waymo's office in Chandler, Arizona, have complained about the self-driving cars to The Information. "One women said that she almost hit one of the company's minivans because it suddenly stopped while trying to make a right turn, while another man said that he gets so frustrated waiting for the cars to cross the intersection that he has illegally driven around them," reports CNBC. From the report: The anecdotes highlight how challenging it can be for self-driving cars, which are programmed to drive conservatively, to master situations that human drivers can handle with relative ease -- like merging or finding a gap in traffic to make a turn. Waymo has been testing its vehicles in the Phoenix suburbs for little more than a year and is widely seen as the furthest along in the self-driving car space, but its safety drivers have to take control of the vehicles regularly, people with direct knowledge of the issues tell The Information.

A Waymo spokesperson said its cars are "continually learning" and that "safety remains its highest priority" during testing. The spokesperson also said that Waymo is using feedback from its early rider program to improve its technology, though it declined to comment specifically on the intersection complaints mentioned in The Information story. The company has previously said that it plans to launch a commercial self-driving taxi service before the end of the year, but that its service will still include a Waymo employee in each car as a "chaperone."

4 of 277 comments (clear)

  1. Try that in NJ... by slasher999 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Try driving conservatively here in NJ, NYC, or any major city and you'll be an obstacle to be run over. Self driving cars, to be successful, need to adapt to the drivers around them instead of being an outlier when it comes to driving habits.

    1. Re:Try that in NJ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Congrats on linking to 4 reports about people who don't know how to drive properly (most likely too busy paying attention to their phone, or following too close). You should ALWAYS be able to stop safely when the person in front of you stops fast.

      The worst part is, Waymo cars are a fucking eyesore with all of their sensors all over. So either you have no clue what the vehicle is, in which case you should be like "what the fuck is that thing" and the vehicle should have your full attention, and you should be able to react quickly. Or else you DO know what it is, in which case you should be thinking "ok, I've heard all about these....proceed with caution". Either way there's absolutely no excuse for being surprised and rear ending it...the vehicle should have your full attention.

  2. give the technology about 10 more years by schematix · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I was in Tempe about 2 weeks ago and these things were all over the place. Twice i observed them driving erratically. One time it was trying to change lanes, but seemingly couldn't decide what to do. It moved halfway over, before reaching an intersection, then moved back over, applying the brakes unnecessarily, and then trying again. The first attempt it was wide open to make the move, the second one was a little dicey and i had to back off because i thought there was going to be an accident in front of me.

    --
    Scott
  3. Re:Growing pains by RhettLivingston · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Self-driving vehicles operating in a Transportation as a Service (TaaS) scenario will be the mass transit solution in America - both for commercial and personal transportation. TaaS will provide many of the benefits of traditional mass transit, including not having to own vehicles, while not requiring us to completely rebuild virtually every city in our nation in the zoning patterns and concentrations required to support traditional mass transportation.

    Self-driving TaaS will cause overall transportation costs to plummet because vehicles can be designed to last over 500K miles on average, are owned by the manufacturer to provide the incentive to do so, maintenance becomes centralized and performed by the manufacturer in the depots, energy can be generated by depot-owned solar fields, insurance is self-provided by the manufacturer, etc.

    There is no reason to make 500K mile cars to be driven 12500 miles a year on average. 40 years is too long for a car to last for many reasons. But a car being operated in a system that picks someone up immediately after dropping someone off and runs 24/7 could go through 500K miles in just a few years.