Online exclusive
Standing on the side of Mission St in San Francisco, smartphone in hand, I felt an unusual shiver of nervousness. After all, I was just waiting for a taxi ride.
However, this wasn’t just any ride. I’d summoned my first fully autonomous ride through the Waymo One app. After a 16-minute wait, lengthy compared to a typical inner-city Uber pick-up, a sleek white Jaguar I-PACE electric SUV pulled up beside me. It was covered in boxy equipment, a black spinning contraption mounted to its roof.
But the most striking thing? There was no one in the driver’s seat. I opened the rear door and slid into the plush leather interior. A friendly voice from the car’s speakers welcomed me and instructed me to buckle up and press the “Start Ride” button on the touchscreen between the front seats.
As I did so, the steering wheel began to turn on its own, and we pulled away smoothly from the kerb and into traffic. The experience of riding in a Waymo driverless taxi is equal parts familiar and unsettling. It’s like sitting in the back seat of a Tesla electric car but for one surreal thing - the steering wheel swivels around as though in the clutches of the Invisible Man.
The car smoothly navigated pedestrian crossings, sped up to get through orange traffic lights, and indicated to change lanes. All the time, soothing jazz music played on the car stereo. I glanced out the window at one point and saw another Waymo car a couple of lanes over, another person sitting in the back seat, peering into the empty driver’s seat, a bemused look on his face.
There are hundreds of electric Waymo cars on San Francisco roads. On the way in from the airport, I saw a distant parking lot full of them, all flashing lights and blinking LEDs, as they were charged up at a depot.
Dashboard screens and at the back of the centre console allow everyone in the car to see exactly where they’re going. The display, much like a Tesla’s screen, also shows the cars, vehicles and other potential hazards in real time, a ghost-like version of the world outside the car. Cameras monitor the car’s interior, but microphones are only activated when you connect to Waymo customer service.
In a Waymo, there’s no small talk, no concerns about driver fatigue or distraction, just the quiet hum of an electric motor and the gentle movements of a vehicle navigating city streets with inhuman precision. The driving is assertive, smooth, but cautious. I had no mishaps during the three Waymo trips I took, but they were fairly straightforward routes, two at night and one during the day, in perfect weather.
Another Kiwi visiting San Francisco at the same time had an altogether different and slightly alarming experience in a Waymo. The car came up behind a fire truck parked awkwardly in the road. The woman recounted that the Waymo seemed unsure of what to do and made numerous short adjustments, as though flustered. Then it manoeuvred around the fire truck and came to a stop - on tram lines. All ended well, with the car regaining its composure and carrying on.
But an Uber driver I spoke to had had a similar, disconcerting experience, which involved his Waymo simply coming to an abrupt stop in the middle of a busy street. He got out and called 911. Waymo technicians with a tow truck arrived soon after to retrieve the car. It’s not perfect then, but the world is a complex and chaotic place. Waymo only needs to do better than a human driver, and it seems to be on track to do so.
Sensors galore, AI to the fore
So, how does it all work? At the heart of Waymo’s self-driving system is a suite of sensors that give the vehicle a 360-degree view of its surroundings. This includes LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) sensors. They use lasers to create detailed 3D maps of the environment. Radar, the spinning contraption on the roof and at each corner of the car, detect objects and their speed, and high-resolution cameras interpret visual information like traffic lights and road signs.
All of this sensor data is processed by Waymo’s artificial intelligence software, trained on millions of kilometres of real-world driving data and billions of computer-simulated trips.
The AI can recognise and predict the behaviour of other road users, plan optimal routes, and make split-second decisions to ensure safe operation of the vehicle. One of the most impressive aspects of the system is its ability to handle “edge cases” - unusual or unexpected situations that rarely occur in normal driving.
Waymo, a division of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, has made the most progress on driverless cars. Its vehicles undertake 100,000 paying rides a week in San Francisco and Phoenix, Arizona, according to the company. That number has doubled in just a few months, but Waymo has had a lengthy development period stretching back around a decade.
I remember visiting Google’s Mountain View, California headquarters a few years ago and seeing them roving the streets around the Google campus, but with a technician behind the wheel.
Waymo has a remarkably good safety record with only minor accidents or disruption to traffic so far. That’s clearing the way for their expansion into other US cities and Waymo has partnered with Uber, allowing Waymo rides in some areas to be ordered via the Uber app.
But while Waymo is clearly leading the charge on driverless cars, the economics of the service are less obvious. A Waymo trip costs about the same as an equivalent Uber ride, but the equipment that allows it to function autonomously costs up to US$100,000 per car, according to the New York Times.
While cutting the driver out of the loop will save robot taxi operators money, they still need to have teams of technicians to maintain and service the vehicles. Alphabet has also said it will invest another US$5 billion to bring the technology to more locations. Whether it intends to be a fleet operator long term or license its technology to other providers is still unclear.
NZ debut? Don’t hold your breath
It could be a long wait until we see Waymo’s driverless taxis on the streets of Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch. Waymo’s cautious rollout allows it to thoroughly map and test each new area before offering public rides.
Several pieces would need to fall into place here. First, the regulatory environment would need to allow for the operation of fully driverless vehicles on public roads. Many countries are still grappling with how to regulate this new technology. Our government would likely need to develop a comprehensive framework for testing and compliance to ensure safety and public confidence in the technology.
Second, Waymo would need to see sufficient market potential to justify the significant investment required to map and prepare its system for our unique road conditions and driving culture. With Indian rideshare operator Ola recently exiting New Zealand and Australia after failing to make in-roads against Uber, it would be a tall ask to get Waymo here.
Still, New Zealand has a reputation as a testbed for technologies in the aerospace sector with autonomous plane trials taking place in the South Island. With some massaging of the regulations and government support, maybe we could become a go-to place to develop driverless car technology for open-road trips.
It is conceivable that we could see limited trials of driverless taxis in New Zealand within the next 5-10 years, with wider deployment following successful pilot programmes.
As my trip through the streets of San Francisco came to an end, the Waymo pulled over to the kerb and announced that I’d arrived at my destination. I got out and closed the door. Around 15 seconds later, the car was off again, merging with the traffic in search of its next customer.
One of the most talked-up and over-hyped technologies to come out of Silicon Valley is finally, impressively, a reality. If my experience is anything to go by, it will only take you three rides to forget that there’s no one behind the steering wheel and get back to the smartphone doomscrolling that occupies most of us during a taxi trip.
