On Friday morning, a driverless Waymo vehicle, for reasons unknown, rolled into a patch of wet cement on the grounds of Laguna Honda Hospital and sank in. It was, for onlookers, a source of much mirth and cellphone picture-taking.
A witness tells your humble narrator that the wet cement ought to have been better demarcated with barricades — but, also, that a human driver would never, ever have made this mistake.
Two weeks prior, an official with San Francisco International Airport wrote to the Planning Department. “The City and County of San Francisco, by and through the San Francisco Airport Commission, proposes to approve a permit allowing autonomous vehicle companies to map the roads at San Francisco International Airport, ” it read.
“Under the Proposed Project, autonomous vehicle companies would be allowed to deploy up to two autonomous vehicles operated by human drivers to map the publicly accessible roads at the Airport … ”
Planning determined this action would be exempt from the dreaded California Environmental Quality Act. You’re not going to believe this, but there is, presently, not a “Mapping the airport for driverless cars” permit. One will be created and, presumably, issued.
But not without a fight.
San Francisco International Airport is, if not the Holy Grail, certainly a Holy Grail for autonomous vehicle companies. It is a place where they can get rich — or, in the case of Cruise, die tryin’. Every step of autonomous vehicle companies’ sequential Bay Area expansion plans appears poised to capture SFO.
If Waymo had its way, this would be unfolding at a much quicker pace. Last year, we wrote how SFO and Waymo were moving forward with the issuance of a mapping permit, a clear precursor to other “phases” and “timelines” posited by the autonomous vehicle company for service to SFO. But the chipper back and forth abruptly turned cold and SFO quashed all talk of mapping the airport.
But the times, they are a-changing. A recent public records request reveals that Waymo and SFO officials, like Herb Caen and Willie Brown in the days of yore, have a standing meeting: “SFO // Waymo Bi-weekly Connect,” reads one subject line.
Mapping, of course, is not just done for the benefit of future cartographers. Waymo’s “phases” and “timelines” all lead to driverless vehicles picking you up and dropping you off at SFO (but not if you live in Fremont or somewhere they don’t yet go).
Waymo has every intention of rolling into SFO — and sinking in.
At which site will tensions between Waymo, the pugnacious Teamsters union and vestiges of city government take off? Naturally, it’s the airport.
In October, the Teamsters filed an ethics complaint charging Waymo with unregistered lobbying of SFO. Everything obtained in a subsequent records request reveals the company is still doing a great deal of lobbying at SFO — registered lobbying.
The airport is a flashpoint for the larger war between the union representing thousands and thousands of drivers, and the autonomous-vehicle companies that will do away with thousands and thousands of drivers. And the brewing conflict here isn’t so much about the airport itself, but what comes next.
SFO is a Holy Grail for driverless vehicles, but another, even Holier, Grail is commercial logistics delivery like UPS, a source of scads of well-paid teamster jobs. The teamsters are fighting here at the airport not so much about goings on at SFO but to prevent — or, more realistically, hinder — autonomous vehicle companies’ conquest of the airport en route to setting their sights on parcel delivery.
Expect the Teamsters and their allies in government to view the airport mapping permit as a camel’s nose situation — except it’s not a camel coming into the tent, but a fleet of camels. And those camels want to take humans’ union jobs.
Mark Gleason, a retired teamster and a spokesman for Joint Council 7, representing 18 local unions, is clear that he and his brethren view this as an existential battle. The struggle takes on almost Churchillian terms: They shall fight Waymo on the beaches, they shall fight on the landing grounds, they shall fight in the fields and in the streets, they shall fight in the hills; they shall never surrender.
So it’s not unreasonable to expect the Teamsters and their allies in government to pull the parking brake on Waymo’s drive toward SFO. Nor is it unreasonable to expect instances like Friday’s Waymo foray into the wet cement to be brought up again and again regarding the pitfalls facing a fleet of robot drivers handling the Thanksgiving or Christmas airport driving gauntlet.
Next time you’re at SFO and have a minute, try counting the Ubers, Lyfts and other ride-hail vehicles. The airport gets $5.50 for each one. Budget numbers are big at SFO: The better part of $1 million yearly is spent here on toilet paper alone. But $5.50 a pop does add up: It’s a small slice of the airport’s budget, but $50 million is real money.
So, there’s gold in them thar Waymos for SFO. And there’s gold in them thar SFO for Waymo. But if the airport and Waymo are getting the gold mine in this deal, San Mateo County leaders are bemoaning that they’re getting the shaft.
When asked what his region would get out of Waymo’s expansion to the airport, San Mateo County Supervisor David Canepa pauses and says, “Thank you. Thank you for asking that question. Thank you for raising this issue.”
This, clearly, has been bothering him for a while. Then he answers: “Nothing much. But there is shared responsibility, and should be shared funding.” Few people figure to be taking autonomous vehicles to and from SFO to San Mateo. SFO is actually situated in San Mateo County, but there is no airport-related vehicle fee going into San Mateo coffers. Canepa notes that there is a revenue-sharing agreement with his county and the SFO Grand Hyatt. But, in the case of autonomous vehicles rolling into SFO, he worries that all San Mateo County will get is the growing pains of robo-taxis working out the kinks at freeway speed.
Anders Fung, the mayor of Millbrae, adds that “technology is a good thing. But everybody needs to pay their fair share.”
San Mateo County leaders, like Rodney Dangerfield, complain they don’t get no respect. And in this game, you must buy respect.
So, as Waymo continues to roll toward SFO, any number of natural adversaries will be happy to toss up roadblocks. Any number of natural adversaries will be happy to stand athwart history, yelling “stop!”
Whether Waymo’s road is smooth, or more akin to rolling through wet cement, remains to be seen.
Regarding your quote, “that a human driver would never, ever have made this mistake”, humans are capable. A few years ago, someone in my employment drove a car into fresh cement. It can be done. 🙂
Multiple humans drove into buildings just this week just in S.F. Of course humans can do this.
And of course Waymo’s stalled out in traffic blocking streets on inauguration day, which is the only reason anyone noticed it as opposed to any other day. They do it constantly. The yuppies who support robotaxis need public shaming to understand their role.
And a robotaxi hit a delivery robot. “It can’t happen!” Yet, it does.
Why? Because of tech fanboys and deregulated campaign donors taking the role of responsible governance out of the equation.
Drivers at least have personal responsibility when they make mistakes.
Except drivers steering into wet cement aren’t picking ppl up for rides across town.
Touché!
Your article was (unintentionally?) hilarious! Humans drive into wet cement all the time, and repeatedly calling San Bruno “South Bay”?? Good trolling!
Amy —
Thanks for the eyes. If someone drove into wet cement, I wouldn’t ask them for a ride to the airport.
Best,
JE
Joe, what do you think the relative rate of accident between Waymo and human drivers is? Because based on the reinsurer and CPUC data, Waymo is significantly safer than human drivers.
Cruise and Waymo have both been caught lying. Trusting their own internal stats really separates the brainiacs from the fanboys, doesn’t it Exhibit A?
Even factoring in the endless miles driving around in circles at 3 a.m., driverless vehicles have driven a rounding-error fraction of the total human-driven miles in just this one locality since they arrived. Come back when bot cars have approached a reasonable sample size under the varied conditions that account for most accidents (many billions of dollars from now 🤣)
Arguments about Waymo at the airport will likely devolve into whether the technology is “ready.” But that’s not really the point.
We live in a race-to-the-bottom society, where human rights have little to no value. Waymo, Amazon, et al. are working to eliminate humans from their process. That would be great if the gains were distributed throughout society. But no, the proficts will massively enrich a few, while exploding poverty, homelessness and inequality.
They have a plan for that too: further criminalize poverty/homelessness.
That’s a nice soapbox speech, but still leaves this specific policy up for debate. What’s your plan for Waymo at SFO? Do you want them to be banned from dropping riders off?
They should be banned period on all CA streets. There’s no “right” to robotic vehicles with nebulous and opaque corporate “accountability” that isn’t. CA’s stance is anything goes until the company is repeatedly caught lying, and then they get a 6 month time out at most. That’s not good enough and until they put real measures in place to make it feasible, simply kowtowing to corporate disruptors is the failed status quo of mismanagement that made CA what it is today, with SF in particular focus as the “driver” in that fail.
You’re absolutely correct in that legislation, rules and regulations are playing catch up, constantly. And that process is slow, halting and incremental. With that said, the autonomous vehicle industry and its potential are out of the bag already and our politicians haven’t – and likely won’t – catch up. They’re not going to be banned, and the regulations they’re subject to will be minimal.
Until a catalytic incident. wait for it.
fun fact: you’re free to invest in the companies that are making this happen. Then you’d share in that profit, so as to distribute the proficts to more people.
San Mateo and Millbrae are in the peninsula, not South Bay. The South Bay is like 40 min away from those places.
Hey, fair enough.
Thanks for the eyes,
JE
Not true. Human drivers have driven into fresh cement in the past:
https://youtu.be/ySUu5vXdkW0?feature=shared
The fresh cement is for a new short-cut robot-only route to … everywhere.
To be fair, I did see an Uber driver do the same thing a few years back on Webster at Geary. At least for the nobody car nobody was embarrassed.
“lobbying”: Let’s call it what it is: “corruption”. This will come down to who has the most ability to influence elections.
If every single city resident had to the money to hire a team to constantly pester city representatives for their personal agenda, maybe it could be seen as legitimate. But that’s not the case: The unspoken reality of lobbying is that the same individuals with the pockets to pay for lobbyists, also have the money to fund political campaigns.
Driverless cars are becoming the norm in SF, as well as in parts of LA, Austin, and Phoenix. Driverless trucks will be here in a few years. I think this is going to happen whether you, me, or the Teamsters like it or not. It’s going to enable a lot of people to travel safely, which is great. And it’s going to put a lot of people out of work, which is terrible. As a society, we need to plan for a transition so people don’t get steamrolled.
On other words, surrender now? F— that!
I don’t really care what the Teamsters think. Nobody should.
Will a Waymo car be able to pick up and drop off people at the airport the way human drivers do? Aren’t they programmed to obey all traffic laws? During busy times, cars stop everywhere in those lanes to drop off, especially. No choice, unless you want to go into the garage.
They’ve got Uber and Lyft going up to the top level of the garage in a very stage managed way. I imagine that would work better for the autonomous cars.
Plus, ya know, if someone lights one on fire it won’t burn up the whole garage.
You have no idea how flammable EV’s are apparently. Clue in.
I was thinking the same thing. Due to unpredictability of the circumstances, drop-off at SFO is already confusing for human drivers. I agree with another comment here that the tech might not be ready. I usually take BART to SFO and avoid that anxiety.
@Bob, No they are not programmed to obey all traffic laws. Hence regularly seeing them fail to yield to oncoming traffic while left-turning, rolling over the limit lines at stop lights, stopping in bike lanes to pick up or drop off, etc. If Waymos WERE programmed to obey all traffic laws, I would not oppose them so much. But as they are, either the programming is faulty OR (the cynic in me believes,) they are programmed with the bottom line as the priority and with public safety somewhere further down the list.
As someone who works at the airport and quite literally drives around all day (Arrivals and departures) even one less lost driver, driver staring at their cellphone instead of the road, driver parked in a no parking area, driver speeding, driver not stopping at stop signs, driver not stopping for pedestrians, etc. IS A WIN
Give Waymo the same fee as Lyft/Uber and limit them to the top of domestic garage for pickups just like lyft and uber.
Or make them pick up by long term parking like how uber and lyft were originally planned. (Still with the airport fee)
lyft and uber and taxi drivers have all terrified me by speeding, running stop signs, changing lanes dangerously. waymo has never done those things, and with a history of car trauma, i value this immensely. i don’t want an anxiety attack on the way to the airport because my driver decides to speed and cut someone off on the freeway.
” running stop signs, changing lanes dangerously ” Waymo has definitely, definitely done both of those many many many times. I’ve seen them drive into oncoming traffic lanes to go around a non-hazard in their lane. Multiple times in fact personally. Now maybe they fixed that recently who knows, but there’s no accountability and an army of fanboyish liars pretending they never make mistakes. Wrong. Lies.
I can’t even begin to fathom how Waymo will work at SFO. The craziness there, as at most airports, is off the charts, with drivers double and triple parking. I’d also think there would have to be some kind of validation method designed to ensure the right person got into each vehicle, both because of poachers stealing another person’s ride and just to make sure if I’m going to SOMA, I don’t end up in a car that takes me to the Zoo.
Never fear: human behavior will be forceably modified in order to facilitate the adoption of this grift.
The progression of Waymo and other autonomous robotaxis are regressing the job opportunity many bread winners who depend on the human driven transport services.
I hate the expansion of robotaxis
The long term goal of waymo is not to do a cheaper taxi service, but that they become so cheap you don’t need to have car at all. The average occupancy of cars, even giant SUVs and pickups is 1.3 people. It is spectacularly inefficient to use a 2 tonne vehicle to move that small a load.
Using a fleet of robocars you can match the size of the vehicle to the size of the load, having only a few larger vehicles and mainly 2 seaters not much bigger than a motorcycle.
There’s a long way to go before that future, but the scope of the change is way way bigger than just a taxi service without drivers.
Wrong. Waymo isn’t in the altruism business. The long-term goal of waymo is to attain monopoly pricing power over livery services.
From my personal experience seeing Waymos stuck at instersections with traffic directing officers the technology needs to learn to respond properly to hand signals and verbal instructions from officers. I’d never let them into SFO without that being vetted.
Here’re 2 things I’ve noticed about Waymos from my experiences on the street as a bicycle messenger.
1. When encountering a pedestrian they ALWAYS swerve toward oncoming traffic. The incident earlier this year with the motorized unicycles is just one example. I saw it happen again this morning. I saw it last week when a Waymo almost collided with another Waymo. In both and other cases, the pedestrian(s)
was (were) quick enough to back away and the Waymo returned to its proper lane. But in none of the cases did the Waymo stop even when not being tailgated. Between stopping (which is risking a rear end collision by a tailgating car) or swerving (which is risking a collision with a vehicle that has the right of way), the Waymo makes a decision most of us would know better than to make, namely swerving into the oncoming lane.
2. When turning right from a one way street onto another one way street, Waymos usually do NOT turn into the near lane as required by traffic guidelines. Yes, I know lots of humans do that too but obviously the Waymo algorithm isn’t running on all cylinders.
It’s sad to see so many votes for robocars in this comments section. Here in our Great Liberal And Progressive one party democracy of SF, these commenters favor robots (capital) over humans (labor). Not exactly progressive. Not exactly democratic.
Last but not least, Kudos to 2 Beers for pointing out that “the human brain … thinks analogously, intuitively, non-linearly, with … experience and concepts it can generalize to new situations, while all computers can do is pattern matching that is only a simulacra of actual intelligence. ”
I think those 2 examples I listed are examples of that.
Driverless cars are not allowed on the freeways in LA for a reason. They do not work on multiple levels of roads. They are on an X Y axis. They get confused on overpasses. See this video of a confused Waymo: Waymo meltdowns on Potrero Hill: Video shot around November 15th – on the 3rd and 20th (overpass). Lost signals and stop the traffic.
https://votersrevenge.wordpress.com/media/
Hilarious! Introducing the z-axis baffles the rolling financial cesspools. I’m sure that’s an easy problem to fix!
The waymo defenders are unintentionally hilarious and possibly even innumerate. Let’s see, out of, what, a couple hundred (?) waymos in SF (that only drive on previously mapped out roads), there’s already at least one wet cement incident. Meanwhile, out of millions of biological drivers in the US, there’s an occasional, extremely rare, wet cement incident? Could it be that the human brain, the processing power of which dwarfs even the largest CPU, thinks analogously, intuitively, non-linearly, with a “data base” of actual experience and concepts it can generalize to new situations, while all computers can do is impressive and massive mathematical pattern matching that is only a simulacra of actual intelligence?
Driverless cars are a multi-billion dollar grift that will never be profitable apart from DARPA subsidies (because apart from the class war of putting human drivers out of work, the main use-case of driverless tech is on the battlefield). Driverless taxis will be even less profitable than Uber and Lyft, so the US taxpayer will pay off the Goog via the Pentagon.
Waymo does over 100k trips per week luddite.
I’m not a fan of Waymo or driverless cars in general. But if th3 technology proves successful (meaning safe and reliable), Uber, Lyft, Waymo and others allowed to get into the market are going to rake money in hand over fist. Th3 portion of the fare you pay Uber that currently goes to the driver will go straight to Uber’s pocket.
The massive ongoing capital outlay in vehicles, maintenance, repair, upgrades, insurance, fuel, computers, software, radar, lidar, cameras, storage, networks, energy, staff, facilities, offices, coders, analysts, lawyers, accountants, management, et al, needs to be amortized over each vehicle (previously supplied, along with insurance, maintenance, repair, and fuel by very low-wage humans) before the expected payout per share ever gets to investors.
The only way this DARPA boondoggle with countless billions already sunk into it will ever be profitable is by taxpayer subsidies directly or indirectly from the Penatagon, spy agencies, NASA, Dept of Energy, Dept of Transportation, etc.
It’s a just another billionaire con, another oligarchy grift, another upwards transfer of wealth on the backs of the working class.