San Francisco robotaxis cause traffic 'fiasco' day after expansion approved

On Friday night, up to ten Cruise driverless taxis became paralyzed at the same time in San Francisco's North Beach area, causing streets to back up as the vehicles blocked other cars in what the San Francisco Chronicle called a "fiasco." Cruise responded and confirmed that "a large festival posted wireless bandwidth constraints causing delayed connectivity to our vehicles." SEX IN SAN FRANCISCO ROBOTAXIS IS RUNNING RAMPANT, REPORT FINDS: ‘NO BOUNDARIES’But opponents of using San Francisco as a testing ground for autonomous vehicles pointed to the incident as an example of the risks associated with the expanded use of the unmanned cars — particularly after instances of them of blocking emergency vehicles like ambulances and firetrucks. Both companies have spent billions of dollars developing their technology, and have pointed to unblemished safety records in arguing the driverless vehicles are safer than distracted, intoxicated and bad drivers. But one of the opponents of their expansion was San Francisco Fire Department Chief Jeanine Nicholson, who disputed the company's driver records ahead of last week's vote, citing 55 written reports of robotaxis interfering with emergency response.