Seven Waymo robotaxis blocked traffic moving onto the Potrero Avenue 101 on-ramp in San Francisco on Tuesday at 9:30 p.m., according to video of the incident posted to Reddit and confirmation from Waymo.
California regulators recently approved Waymo to operate its autonomous robotaxi service on San Francisco freeways without a human driver, but the company is still only testing on freeways with a human driver in the front seat.
After hitting the road closure, the first Waymo vehicle in the lineup then pulled over out of the traffic lane that was blocked by cones, followed by six other Waymo robotaxis.
It’s not the first time Waymo vehicles have caused a road blockage, but this is the first documented incident involving a freeway.
In San Francisco, there must be a driver in the car in order to issue a citation.
The driver of a Mustang Mach-E who crashed into a stationary car in Texas in February was using Ford’s hands-free driver assistance system, BlueCruise, according to data obtained by the National Transportation Safety Board.
It’s the first known fatality resulting from a crash involving the use of BlueCruise, which Ford first announced in 2021.
The NTSB’s announcement that BlueCruise was active during the Texas crash comes just one day after the safety board announced it’s probing a second fatal crash near Philadelphia where Ford’s driver assistance system may have been active.
The NTSB released on Thursday what’s known as a preliminary report, and is still investigating the crash.
NHTSA is also probing the Texas crash, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Uber CEO outlines plans for increasing driver EV access, reducing emissions at SXSW Dara Khosrowshahi explains his priorities for Uber now that it's achieved profitabilityUber’s future will be greener, more affordable, and able to challenge Amazon at its own rapid delivery game, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi predicted while on stage this week at SXSW.
To achieve that, Uber has to make it easier and cheaper for drivers to access electric vehicles.
Uber said emissions are calculated based on Uber Green and Uber Comfort Electric rides, and the amount of CO2 emissions avoided compared to UberX or Uber Comfort trips of the same distance.
Riders can go to their account section of the Uber app to access the “estimated CO2 saved” feature, which shows all the emissions saved by taking Uber Green and Uber Comfort electric rides.
Since then Uber has partnered with autonomous sidewalk delivery startups Cartken and Serve Robotics and robotaxi companies Waymo and Motional.
Mapping startup Hivemapper will launch a new dashcam later this year that its co-founder believes will speed up efforts to claw market share away from Google.
The new Hivemapper Bee camera, revealed Wednesday, is part of the company’s years-long push to decentralize mapping and make map data more affordable and accessible.
Late last year the company launched Scout, a “location monitoring tool” that lets customers “mark” a location and receive images every time a Hivemapper driver passes by.
The company says the Bee will create higher-quality map data that is less likely to be rejected upon submission.
Nelson says there are plenty of people who want to buy a Hivemapper camera for other reasons.
Aurora and automotive supplier Continental have wrapped up the first phase of a more than $300 million project to mass produce autonomous vehicle hardware for commercial self-driving trucks.
The two companies said Friday that the design and system architecture of an autonomous vehicle hardware kit is now complete.
Importantly, the hardware system has to be reliable, easy to maintain and produced cheaply.
Initially, these driverless trucks will carry freight between Dallas and Houston, a route the company has been using for testing.
While these first 19 driverless trucks won’t be equipped with the Aurora-Continental hardware kit, they are designed to automotive standards and to operate safely without a driver, according to Aurora spokesperson Rachel Chibidakis.
Why tokenization of assets can be a key driver of growth in cryptoStartups that find product-market fit can do well in any industry, but that’s not enough if you’re a web3 company.
No, you have to go beyond and find real use cases for the emerging technology.
There’s a lot more activity during bull markets as crypto tourists enter the industry in hopes of making it big.
Many protocols and companies have taken the time to be regulated and work on bridging the real world and the world of crypto, Warden said.
“I don’t love that expression ‘real world,’ because I think crypto is part of the real world, but I think we’re seeing more and more engagement there.”Warden thinks one of the biggest avenues for real world use cases is tokenization of assets and areas that aren’t even tradable yet.
Tesla’s fix for its Autopilot recall of more than 2 million vehicles is being called “insufficient” by Consumer Reports, following preliminary tests.
While the testing isn’t comprehensive, it shows questions remain unanswered about Tesla’s approach to driver monitoring — the tech at the heart of the recall.
It focused heavily on the Autosteer feature, which is designed to keep a car centered in a lane on controlled-access highways, even around curves.
But NHTSA said in documents released last week that it viewed those checks as “insufficient to prevent misuse.”Tesla does not restrict the use of Autosteer to controlled-access highways, though.
“None of this is very prescriptive or explicit in terms of what it is they’re going to [change],” Funkhouser says.
The in-car tech used by the likes of Ford and GM to make sure drivers pay attention to the road has come a long way.
NHTSA says it evaluated 331 driver monitoring systems and found none that are commercially available that can properly handle identifying alcohol impairment.
Driver monitoring isn’t the only option NHTSA has at its disposal, though.
Accuracy is key, and according to NHTSA’s findings, blood alcohol detection tech is a more viable near-term answer.
But this tech is considered “active,” meaning the driver has to proactively engage with the tech — which flies in the face of the law’s passive requirement.
Uber has announced that its drivers will soon be able to use the Uber app directly from their car’s dashboard while using Apple’s CarPlay. This is an exciting development as…
