Took a Waymo (driverless car) this week

[Palmpilot]

I think driving around the congested parts of San Francisco would be more difficult that driving on a mountain road (I have done both). Many more unpredictable events in the City; double-parked vehicles and clueless or agressive pedestrians, bicyclists, motorcyclists (lane splitting is legal here), and drivers, to name a few. Waymo seems to have done ok. Not perfect, but OK.

Not all mountain roads are created equal.

Human drivers are far from perfect.

All I'm asking for is comparative data that cover the full range of conditions that will be encountered.

 

[tspear]

There was an interview a few years ago with some executive of one of the driverless car companies.
He was asked why Pheonix to start. His answer, the weather is almost always clear, reduces complexity significantly, the weather is too hot for many people so there are very limited number of pedestrians compared to other large metro areas, and the drivers there are much more homogeneous and predictable.
The worst city based on their studies in the USA is Boston. Unpredictable weather, often with borderline freezing temps, pedestrians never follow the rules, drivers fail to follow all sorts of common rules of the roads...

Tim

 

[GaryM]

The worst city based on their studies in the USA is Boston. Unpredictable weather, often with borderline freezing temps, pedestrians never follow the rules, drivers fail to follow all sorts of common rules of the roads...

Tim

I don't think the problem of driving safely in Boston will EVER be solved. Not by autonomous vehicles, not by driver-assist technologies, and certainly not by Bostonians behind the wheel.