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Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

(www.cnbc.com)
597 points achristmascarl | 6 comments | 22 Aug 25 17:02 UTC | HN request time: 0.829s | source | bottom
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vinkelhake ◴[22 Aug 25 17:40 UTC] No.44987373[source]▶
I live in the bay and occasionally ride Waymo in SF and I pretty much always have a good time.

I visited NYC a few weeks ago and was instantly reminded of how much the traffic fucking sucks :) While I was there I actually thought of Waymo and how they'd have to turn up the "aggression" slider up to 11 to get anything done there. I mean, could you imagine the audacity of actually not driving into an intersection when the light is yellow and you know you're going to block the crossing traffic?

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phkahler ◴[22 Aug 25 17:46 UTC] No.44987434[source]▶
>> could you imagine the audacity of actually not driving into an intersection when the light is yellow and you know you're going to block the crossing traffic?

I wonder how many Waymos following the rules would be needed to reduce gridlock.

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1. darth_avocado ◴[22 Aug 25 17:49 UTC] No.44987472[source]▶
Waymo in SF pretty much drives like a human, and that includes doing human things like cutting lanes, stopping wherever it feels like, driving in the bus lane etc. I think it’ll be fine in NYC
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2. kingkawn ◴[22 Aug 25 18:00 UTC] No.44987612[source]▶
SF traffic is but a single speck of nyc
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3. Grazester ◴[22 Aug 25 18:12 UTC] No.44987756[source]▶
Traffic? The issue half the time in NYC is the drivers. I can't compare it to SF since I haven't been there in a while but I still thought it was not as congested to compared to NYC.

NYC has a greater population and also has a greater number of registered cars compare to SF however.

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4. cj ◴[22 Aug 25 18:54 UTC] No.44988373{3}[source]▶
As a comparison, I feel safe riding a motorcycle in SF. I don’t think I would ever ride a motorcycle in NYC.

Riding safely requires predicting what the cars around you are about to do. I find it an order of magnitude harder to predict driver behavior in NYC.

5. kenhwang ◴[22 Aug 25 19:37 UTC] No.44988903[source]▶
Waymo in LA also drives pretty much like a human here would, which includes: not yielding for pedestrian-only crosswalks, running red lights, driving in the oncoming traffic/suicide/bike lane, occupying two lanes, blocking entrances/driveways/intersections, and stopping/parking in no-stop/parking curbs.

They're only really phenomenal at not hitting things; they really aren't good/courteous/predictable drivers under most conventional definitions.

Still, I think rollout in NYC will be fine. NYC generally drives slower and much less aggressively than LA, and slower gives the Waymo plenty of reaction time to not hit things.

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6. esalman ◴[22 Aug 25 19:40 UTC] No.44988932[source]▶
I can attest to that. I live in Orange county and occasionally see Waymos when I go to LA, and they'll do things like merging with very little gap or merging in the middle of interactions.