[belltaco]

Looks like the Waymo vehicle was turning after an all-way stop sign?

Is this a good representation with the blue car being the Waymo and the truck being the red car?

https://taylorkinglaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/4-Way-S...

Wonder why it was cutting so close to the large truck's back while accelerating during the turn that it couldn't see the cyclist till it was too late.

Them saying the car braked only after the cyclist was fully visible is additional cause for concern. Those are precious fractions of seconds. Doesn't Waymo use LIDAR? Shouldn't it detect the partial cyclist as a solid obstruction and start braking before the object recognition kicked in and recognized it as a cyclist? What if it was a trailer?

[TaylorAlexander]

Yeah. Seems like good driving means "don't drive in to places you cannot see". If you are just accelerating after a stop sign, there is no reason to have such high speed and urgency when making the turn.

[lokar]

Well, it sounds like the cyclist was doing the same while failing to stop or yield at a stop sign.

[lex-lightning]

Putting aside the debate on whether bicycles have to follow rules designed for cars, shouldn’t we still avoid accidents even if the bicyclist were unambiguously at fault?

But then that’s exactly why cars have stop signs. They trade high speed and carrying capacity against lethality.

[belltaco]

If the description is correct then the cyclist was going into the space that they could see in front of them, unlike the Waymo. Someone else said that stop signs are legally equivalent to yield signs for bicycles in California. They probably couldn't see the Waymo because it was occluded by the truck, so how could they yield to it.

This is why straight going traffic always has the right of way if the roads are similarly sized, and it's on the turning vehicle to stop and wait at the turn.

I would also hope that self driving cars are programmed to drive defensively and conservatively over trying to shave off a second or two of drive time.

[undersuit]

>Someone else said that stop signs are legally equivalent to yield signs for bicycles in California.

California does not have the "Idaho Stop".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho_stop

[shiroiuma]

Presumably, Idaho does have the "Idaho stop", so driverless cars should be designed with that in mind, and operate as conservatively as possible to avoid crashes caused by other drivers or cyclists not perfectly obeying the rules.

[undersuit]

Like how California leads the country on emission standards, you'd think the cars following the elevated CA emission standards across the country would also follow the Idaho standard too. Ignoring it is perilous... if a driver incorporates the Idaho Stop into their driving they will not be confused by bicyclists using the Idaho Stop. They might even be more prepared for other things like people running on the side of the road.

Drivers(Idaho included) by and far embrace the California Stop colloquialism if you ask me. The majority of traffic on roads is cars and the majority of traffic rolls through stop signs.

[TaylorAlexander]

Reading that page, I learned that while California does not de jure have the Idaho Stop, it does de facto have the Idaho Stop. Waymo should account for this.

However I think that is irrelevant, depending on whether the description I heard is correct - it sounds like Waymo turned so quickly after a truck that it could not be certain its path would be clear. That to me seems like the real mistake.

[cozzyd]

Right there can also easily be pedestrians in the crosswalk who are also occluded, though I guess with a bit more stopping distance (but then you may be blocking a lane that would otherwise be able to go).

[Retric]

Are we sure the Waymo was turning instead of the cyclist?

The only description is Waymo entered an intersection after a complete stop. “The cyclist was occluded by the truck and quickly followed behind it, crossing into the Waymo vehicle’s path.”

[pavon]

Yeah the ways I can interpret that are

1) The cyclist entered from a cross street going straight as soon as the truck partially cleared the intersection.

2) The cyclist was following behind the truck and then turned in front of the Waymo.

3) The cyclist was following behind the truck and the Waymo turned into it.

To me "crossing into the Waymo vehicle's path" is a pretty weasel-worded way to say (3), but it is technically true.

[cozzyd]

1) is hard to imagine given that neither of the streets are one-way (a crossing cyclist would not be occluded by the truck on the right and would not be able to go straight when the truck partially cleared the intersection from the left, unless they were traveling in the wrong lane.

2) doesn't make much sense to me... a cyclist with so little sense would have been hit by a car long ago.

Looking at streetview, I see bike lanes so there is also another possibility:

4) The cyclist was parallel to the truck on a bike lane, but the truck overtook the cyclist while in the intersection while the Waymo turned left after the truck cleared. This would be a similar situation as if there were pedestrians in the crosswalk.

edit: according to https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/7/24065063/waymo-driverless-... , the truck was turning? That opens up a number of other possibilities...