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Driverless taxis are about to hit Los Angeles. How will Waymo's impact affect the city's changing streetscape?

2022-10-25T13:55:00-04:00

The company has been mapping Los Angeles using human drivers since 2019. Next, a spokesman said, trained drivers will test out Waymo’s robot taxi service on L.A.-area highways and neighborhood thoroughfares, with runs downtown, along the Miracle Mile and in Koreatown, Santa Monica and West Hollywood.

Waymo has already eked out footholds in Phoenix and San Francisco and will need a permit from the California Public Utilities Commission to expand its West Coast operations into what it says is a now $2 billion market.

The Public Utilities hurdle and technically complicated mapping process aside, Waymo’s eventually-expanded commercial fleet could arrive in line with a host of other transportation changes that LA is enacting ahead of the 2028 Olympics, especially near Downtown. The question of whether potentially adding thousands of EVs to its clogged roads and freeways remains the ever-larger existential factor, and opponents argue their presence undermines efforts at pedestrianization and funding for micromobility alternatives central to state and city plans despite demographic factors that are also in the company's favor.

Earlier on Archinect: What it means to add 20,000 Waymo self-driving robot taxis to America's roads

"If we want to change the car culture in Los Angeles, we need ...

Autonomous vehicles in urgent need of regulation, says urban research group

2022-10-11T11:50:00-04:00

The Urban Institute has warned that the proliferation of autonomous vehicles in the United States needs to be met by regulations at the federal, state, and local level to ensure equity and environmental sustainability. The non-profit group, which describes its role as inspiring “effective decisions that advance fairness and enhance the well-being of people and places,” set out their position in a 78-page report published this week.

“The mobility system in the United States is unsafe, inequitable, and environmentally destructive,” the report says. “Autonomous vehicles (AVs) — self-driving cars that can travel along publicly accessible streets some or all of the time without human involvement — could help mitigate these problems, if they are implemented in a thoughtful, well-regulated manner.”

Archinect Feature: Smog City: The Fight Against Urban Air Pollution

According to the group, fully autonomous vehicles would “in theory” offer a positive step for the future of transportation, poi...

Waymo partners with Chinese automaker Geely to develop fleet of autonomous, electric taxis

2021-12-30T09:00:00-05:00

Alphabet’s self-driving car company Waymo is partnering with Chinese automaker Geely to create a fleet of all-electric, self-driving robotaxis.

The cars will be designed in Sweden, where Geely owns Swedish car manufacturer Volvo. Waymo will integrate the Waymo Driver, their autonomous driving technology, into Geely's electric, transportation-as-a-service (Taas)-optimized Zeekr vehicle. Waymo plans to deploy the vehicles in the US within their existing fleet of autonomous taxis "in the years to come."

Waymo's self-driving cars have started 3D-mapping Los Angeles

2019-10-17T06:00:00-04:00

Currently, Waymo has started undertaking an extensive mapping activity of having a few of their specially outfitted data-collecting vehicles crisscross the Los Angeles area. These vehicles contain a state-of-the-art barrage of sensory equipment, the idea is to first map out the area and then use those maps to get the self-driving cars ready for hitting our streets.

"The conventional mapping did not go as in-depth as does this specially performed new mapping," writes AI and Autonomous Vehicles expert Lance Eliot for Forbes. "Tons of added data of a 3D nature and including subtle but significant aspects like where the curbs are, and the locations of intersection traffic signals are considered a savvy aspect to have in-hand for their driverless car efforts."

Waymo, the Mountain View-based Google sister company, hasn't unveiled yet if and when it will launch its fleet of driverless robotaxis in LA, but the current mapping efforts signal a strong intent to win early market dominance in the nation's second largest, and likely most sprawling car-centric, metro area.

This garbage can drives itself to your curb

2019-10-02T19:00:00-04:00

...the SmartCan is one of those rare home-focused robots that could...actually deliver some genuinely useful functionality...Using a companion app, the SmartCan will follow a pre-programmed schedule and automatically drive itself to a curbside drop off point on garbage pickup days, and then autonomously return to wherever you keep them parked the rest of the week

While the SmartCan may prove a pragmatic solution for some homeowners, there are still questions of price, which have yet to be revealed, and maintenance, such as charging, risked damage, and owners remembering to keep paths clear, reports Gizmodo.

China tests driverless bus guided by sensor tracks in the road

2017-11-07T17:33:00-05:00

The Hunan city of Zhuzhou is currently testing out an unmanned train that doesn't run on rails. You know, like a bus. The Autonomous Rail Rapid Transit (ART) is being dubbed by Chinese state media the "world's first smart rapid rail bus," whatever that means. The train/bus (trus?) was first shown off in June this year. It uses sensors to determine the dimensions of the road and make a virtual track for itself to ride along.

At first glance, Zhuzhou's Autonomous Rail Rapid Transit system that's currently being tested promises to enjoy a brighter future (and less ridicule) than the Traffic Elevated "car-eating" Bus that the City of Qinhuangdao announced to much fanfare last summer — only to find it stalled and eventually discontinued just a few months later.

Where cars learn how to drive like people

2017-08-28T15:02:00-04:00

Even within the polygon abstraction of the simulation the AI uses to know the world, there are traces of human dreams, fragments of recollections, feelings of drivers. And these components are not mistakes or a human stain to be scrubbed off, but necessary pieces of the system that could revolutionize transportation, cities, and damn near everything else.

Waymo is Google's self-driving technology company that was launched in 2009. Since developing 'world’s first and only fully self-driving ride on public roads' in 2015, they've introduced fully autonomous Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivans and started an early rider program which invites residents in Phoenix, AZ to join a public trial of self-driving vehicles that shapes the cars' evolution.

The Atlantic got to tour the company's training campus, Carcraft, reporting on the complex system behind the smart cars' learning environment where the digitization of the real-world driving takes place. There, single driving maneuvers and scenarios—like one car cutting off the other on a roundabout—are amplified into thousands of simulated scenarios that probe the edges of the cars' capabilities, forming Waymo's AI simulation apparatus.

The cars are training in both—the virtual and the real world, driving over 8 million miles per day through the fully modeled, digital versions of Austin, Mountain...

Flying cars take to the air in Dubai

2017-02-16T16:59:00-05:00

Hot on the heels of announcing a new initiative to build a miniature city on Mars, the Dubai government has unveiled the first successfully-tested Autonomous Aerial Vehicle (AAV)—aka a flying car. Apparently, they will begin operations as early as July.

Manufactured by the Chinese company EHANG, the vehicle measures 3.9 m in length, 4.02 m in width, and 1.6 m in height. It’s a one-seater that can carry a load of up to 100kgs. The “flying car” can fly for a maximum of 30 minutes at a crushing speed of 160 kph. The maximum cruising height is 3000 feet.

According to Khaleej Times, the vehicles have no key ignition, but rather a touch screen where the rider puts in their destination. While the vehicle is auto-piloted, the trip is monitored via a command center.

Watch a video of it in action here:

U.S. Transportation Secretary Foxx on the future of transportation: "We had to do something different."

2016-10-28T13:49:00-04:00

Car and Driver caught up with Foxx in Pittsburgh. The DOT chief, previously mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, reflected on the promise of autonomous and connected cars, the recent Smart City Challenge, the massive increase in traffic deaths, the potential of the shared vehicles unfolding right outside the window, and more. What follows is a transcript of our conversation, lightly edited for grammar and brevity.

A look at the history and future of the American commute

2016-05-02T17:34:00-04:00

"The idea that you can replace the 10 trips with one autonomous car and travel less distance, that’s the biggest misconception," says Fagnant. "You can get rid of vehicles, but not vehicle miles traveled. Without ridesharing, there's an 8 to 10 percent increase in vehicle miles traveled based on simulations we've run in Austin. You’re not replacing trips [..] the vehicle has to bounce between locations, and relocate to where it’s needed. Those in-between miles will create a lot of extra travel."

Google, Uber, Lyft, Ford and Volvo join forces to lobby for autonomous vehicles

2016-04-28T12:51:00-04:00

Self-Driving Coalition for Safer Streets, a lobbying group with the express purpose of advocating autonomous driving. [...] "Self-driving vehicle technology will make America's roadways safer and less congested," [David Strickland, a former administrator of the NHTSA] said [...] "The best path for this innovation is to have one clear set of federal standards, and the Coalition will work with policymakers to find the right solutions that will facilitate the deployment of self-driving vehicles."

Lyft has also been in talks with General Motors (which is not a part of the Self-Driving Coalition) to put out its own group of autonomous for-hire vehicles. Models for Google's vehicles include both bespoke prototypes and Lexus SUVs, and Uber is developing its own testing grounds for self-driving cars in Pittsburgh.

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