I attended a conference last spring in San Francisco. It’s one of America’s unique cities in part because the entire range of American transportation technology is seemingly on display. Visitors can ride everything from cable cars (!) to streetcars from different eras to ferries to a late 20th century subway (with an unusually wide track width). For an urbanist, it’s like a living museum.

And of course there are the Waymos, automated driverless taxis milling about the city at all hours of the day. To sate my curiosity I tried one of those, too, using a new rider discount to cross town one night. The experience was uncanny: The Jaguar’s steering wheel turned by itself, I had nobody to talk to and no way to tell them to stop and let me out early. 

In the end, the ride was pleasant and uneventful, though for some reason the car released me two blocks short of my Market Street hotel. I did come away impressed by the actually-existing automated vehicle (AV) technology, something about which I’ve long been skeptical. 

The on-the-ground performance matters because Minneapolis officials are currently debating regulations aimed at kneecapping Waymo vehicles within city limits, floating a policy requiring a human being to sit behind the wheel of the self-driving vehicle, just in case. 

Related: Waymo is on the roads, but some Minneapolitans are hoping to hit the brakes

The ordinance aims at safeguarding hard-won wage increases for drivers, passed during the 2024 legislative session. And I sympathize with gig workers who are struggling under the current system, driving for TNCs (transportation network companies) like Uber and Lyft. These workers deserve a fair wage and the security that comes from benefits, health insurance and the like. 

But if the technology for AVs exists, mandating a human body in the front seat is fighting for a lost cause, and one that seems certain to become a political target. In the short-term this might make sense, but in the long run, we need to think about this situation differently. There are more fundamental reasons to be skeptical about the effects of AVs.

‘The best of a bad bunch’

Even by the lax standards of the United States, where automobile companies go for decades with minimum government guardrails, the automated vehicle industry has been a brazen example of the dangers of libertarian capitalism. 

While the technology has a lot of promise, that potential depends on whether or not AVs are regulated to move our transportation system toward safer and less polluting outcomes. At present, that’s not happening. AVs skirt the law and exploit both public infrastructure and public safety. 

As far as I can tell, Waymo is the best of a bad bunch. Tesla is far worse, wildly flouting the law with false promises about so-called “autopilot” – rebranded after legal pressure to “Full Self-Driving (Supervised)” – and even offering a “Mad Max mode.” When I hear drivers talk about the wonder of Teslas that can safely drive themselves, I despair for common sense. Many people have died because of Tesla’s dangerous promises, and somehow they’ve skated through the years without consequence. 

Waymo is a better tech company because they provide some transparency, for example making total mileage and fatality data available. And both their LiDAR technology and track record are better than Tesla, though the bar is low to clear. 

But even with Waymo, the jury is out. National transportation journalist David Zipper’s recent piece in Bloomberg made a convincing case that Waymo’s track record remains inconclusive, writing:

We don’t yet know whether a robotaxi trip is more or less likely to result in a crash than an equivalent one driven by a human. The answer likely depends on the trip and the autonomous vehicle company, and it might change in the future.

There are two main problems with AV ride sharing as currently practiced in the US. The first is that AV companies like Waymo often exacerbate existing traffic problems instead of reducing them. According to research published this year, Waymo’s taxis drive around roughly half the time without anyone inside, leading to increased traffic on city streets. Similarly, the inscrutable way they are routed can cause absurd logjams, as has happened repeatedly in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Atlanta.

Related: Fare compliance is real, but the bigger goal is to change the transit vibe

City or state regulators should force AV companies to be transparent not only with mileage and safety, but with their ride and deployment data, capping the percentage of deadhead trips where empty cars drive around the city, wearing down roads while making traffic worse. They should also require AV companies to operate in ways that help rather than hinder existing transit, limiting how they can operate and requiring data on the use of “teleoperators” (remote drivers). 

The second big problem involves regular flouting of existing road regulations, a problem shared, to be sure, by human-driven TNC companies. For example, currently Waymos are programmed to allow cars to drop off customers in bike lanes, blocking these spaces for vulnerable cyclists. (They cite the need to compete with TNC drivers as a justification.) 

This should not be allowed, nor should it be permitted for AVs to exceed posted speed limits. At the very least, city and state governments should insist on speed limiters and safe parking practices.

Choosing the right battles

Local officials deserve plaudits for standing up to the TNC companies when it comes to fair compensation for drivers, but that doesn’t eliminate problems around induced demand for vehicle trips and breaking road rules. Forcing Waymo and other AV companies to pay someone to sit idly in the driver’s seat while their vehicles make traffic worse and stop in bike lanes is not going to solve these more fundamental issues.

Meanwhile, the argument that jobs will be lost is true, but not necessarily a convincing reason to change course. You see the same logic, for example, when transit unions fight the prospect of automated trains in places like New York City. Automated trains have been running for years in other countries, offering superior, safer transit at lower cost. Theoretically, anyway, the same thing is possible for shared automobiles. 

There is an outcome where AV technology makes Minneapolis more walkable, equitable and less automobile dependent, and I’d like to see policy makers shift their attention toward these longer-term goals. Though the current proposal requiring a body behind the wheel might keep Waymo out of Minneapolis for a few years, it doesn’t address larger problems or opportunities around AV technology. I’m skeptical that this approach has legs. 

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