Autonomous Vehicle News
Despite a flurry of sometimes entertaining news stories about autonomous taxis going wild in San Francisco and other cities, the companies behind the high-tech people haulers are pushing to expand their testing and operations in California. Cruise and Waymo, companies owned by GM (majority owner) and Alphabet, respectively, recently picked up a big win with the approval of their applications to put even more autonomous vehicles (AVs) on the road in the state. The companies now have permission to begin citywide paid taxi service at all hours of the day throughout San Francisco and have said they plan to deploy more cars as a result. They collectively have more than 500 autonomous vehicles already in operation. Some in San Francisco have taken to vandalizing the cars to temporarily disable them, using traffic cones and other items to block sensors, confusing the vehicles.