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Waymo granted permit to begin testing in New York City

(www.cnbc.com)
597 points achristmascarl | 3 comments | 22 Aug 25 17:02 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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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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QuantumSeed ◴[22 Aug 25 17:56 UTC] No.44987566[source]▶
I was in a Waymo in SF last weekend riding from the Richmond district to SOMA, and the car actually surprised me by accelerating through two yellow lights. It was exactly what I would have done. So it seems the cars are able to dial up the assertiveness when appropriate.
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1. Zigurd ◴[22 Aug 25 18:09 UTC] No.44987711[source]▶
An autonomous vehicle's hivemind knows the exact duration of all yellow lights, even ones that vary based on traffic flow.
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2. astrange ◴[22 Aug 25 18:33 UTC] No.44988065[source]▶
Not if they change the timing.
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3. cellis ◴[22 Aug 25 19:46 UTC] No.44988987[source]▶
I'm sure "timing of yellow" is only a few parameters in its network at this point. And it's continuously training, it can probably one-shot the timing changes ( one taxi ride through maybe 3 lights ).