[jacobgold]

If Waymo Premier includes an [EVASIVE MANEUVERS] button on the infotainment screen I'm in.

I had a Uber driver block my Waymo at an intersection in SF some months ago just to be an asshole. Apparently some other people have been attacked and robbed while in a Waymo.

Waymo should treat it like a security flaw that anyone can stop your car and there's nothing you can do about it.

[askar_yu]

I've had a few similar cases, often teenagers on bikes coming dangerously close (e.g. forcing waymo to sudden break) and last one one bicyclist just blocking me for 5-10 minutes in SF (also just to be an asshole), with a street full of cars behind all blocked. I called the "connect to support" button and they could not anything. This is the only negative experience I had with Waymo; and I am hope something is done to be able to swiftly respond to such cases (e.g. remote driver take over, or at least capture their video and work with police to punish them later) in order to deter them in the long term.

[nradov]

You've got to be kidding. SF police and prosecutors barely do anything about real crimes, never mind blocking a road for a few minutes.

[tudelo]

People will reply to you calling you crazy, but SF/bay is the only place I have ever experienced where many people will literally leave their cars unlocked because a broken window isn't worth the hassle. Yes, locking your parked car is a hazard here... and the reason is obvious.

[mathattack]

I couldn’t believe this the first time I heard it. This isn’t new, it goes back to the 90s. Perhaps longer.

[throwworhtthrow]

In the 70s in SF my father had his car window broken by someone who wanted to steal his parking space. He found his car pushed in front of an adjacent driveway, and ticketed.

His doors were unlocked the whole time...

[gs17]

That was a thing when I was growing up just outside Detroit, too, which shows how bad a sign that is.

[viking123]

When I read this kind of stuff I am always happy I live in a normal country/place - Singapore. Absolutely insane lmao. Must be fun sitting in your Waymo hitting some panic button and it gets blocked LMAO

[shafyy]

Singapore is a highly authoritarian place where caning is legal punishment. I would not call this normal, but rather "absolutely insane lmao".

[aprilthird2021]

I live in SF and I absolutely love so much about it, but here and especially in Oakland where I also lived for years, I'd welcome bringing back caning if it meant we could live as safely and securely as in Singapore

[tim333]

As a Brit who has spend time in both Singapore and SF, I'd say Singapore seems more normal currently. The tents of homeless people shitting in the street and dying of overdoses is weird, like something from Dickensian London.

[rsingel]

Actually blocking a road in SF can get you a felony conspiracy count with this DA, especially if they don't like your message

San Francisco’s Case Against Pro-Palestinian Activists Who Blocked Bridge Heads to Jury | KQED https://share.google/4RstsRSYbqY2lEdhn

[freediddy]

They blocked the Golden Gate Bridge which included ambulances, other emergency vehicles and thousands of people trying to get to work. I'm happy that the DA is throwing the book at them, I hope they bankrupt themselves trying to defend themselves and then spend a lot of time in jail.

[trhway]

While politically i'm on the opposite side of those guys, i do think that such severe prosecution is unwarranted and politically motivated (and may be intended to create chilling effect on all future protests no matter the cause) - blocking a road is a well established traditional form of protest which traditionally is expected to end with (if the judge is in a bad mood) something like disorderly conduct citation/fine, not anywhere close to felony.

[crubier]

Absolutely not.

At the VERY least, the road blockers should be fined the cost they caused to society.

Block Golden gate bridge for 1h30min for 10,000 people (Avg salary $50/h)? That will be 1.5 * 10,000 * 50 = $750,000 damage.

[text0404]

Except the defense has shown that the police blocked opening an additional lane even after the protestors specifically requested it for emergency traffic, and in fact blocked more lanes unnecessarily.

> Defense attorneys argued that many of the risks to people stuck in traffic could have been mitigated — including the traffic itself — if the median had been moved to open a fourth lane on the southbound side. They said a protester designated to communicate with the CHP specifically asked for that to happen to allow emergency vehicles to access anyone who needed one.

> Northbound traffic was also stopped by the CHP as a multitude of emergency vehicles responded to the bridge, which defense attorneys pointed out would have created the same type of risks the prosecution said people were experiencing because of the protesters.

https://localnewsmatters.org/2026/05/29/gaza-protesters-gold...

[slim]

can't you get your head out of the window and yell at him ? serious question, not sure if you can even open the window on thes cars

[saghm]

As always, relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1958/

[spprashant]

We do have people with real incentive to not allow self-driving cars to succeed.

[sterlind]

I hope they succeed, for the sake of my mom who's legally blind and has dreamed about them for decades. but I'd be significantly more excited about self-driving if you could buy level-4 AVs that you can actually own.

[paulryanrogers]

Are cars really the best option? Could other public transit serve the same purpose?

(I was once legally blind, still not a fan of cars myself. Though I understand the appeal when externalities are out of the picture.)

[michaelt]

Cars aren't the best option, but you can drop self-driving cars into an existing car-centric society one car at a time, with the car buyers paying for themselves.

Making a car-centric society meaningfully less car-centric requires the enthusiastic support of that society, along with competent political leadership, and probably a fair chunk of taxpayer cash too. Suburbs with huge lots make for long walks to the transit stop - but densifying those suburbs is not easy.

I don't own a car; I travel everywhere by bicycle and public transport - but the public transport I use was all built in the 1850s. Some time between then and now my society reorganised into a form that has a lot of difficulty delivering public transport projects.

[runarberg]

This is a false alternative, because robocars do not exist, while public transit does exist but simply hasn’t been adequately implemented everywhere.

Politicians (and grifters alike) like to point to a future technology to solve an existing problem only to delay existing solutions which they don’t want to implement, most often for political reasons.

[seanmcdirmid]

In the USA where transit in most cities sucks? Seattle is supposedly one of the best but you can’t get to work downtown most days without being harassed by a fent zombie.

[gs17]

Seattle's is only one of the best if both ends of your trip are on the light rail.

The drug addicts are also much less of an issue than a lot of media makes them seem. I'm not sure what would happen if I tried to shove my way through the crowd at 12th and Jackson, but mostly those "zombies" aren't paying much attention to passersby.

[nearlyepic]

I really don’t know who told you that Seattle has one of the best transit infrastructures in the country, lol. It’s not even close to New York or Chicago, nor any of the forward thrust cities (DC, Atlanta). Hell, the light rail isn’t even as good as Portland.

[drdaeman]

Surely, not until public transit networks covering literally everywhere regular roads can get you.

Public transit is better, but building it outside of dense metro areas to the extent it becomes competitive is probably even more difficult than building a self-driving car.

[f6v]

> Could other public transit serve the same purpose?

Population density plays a big part. People think of Europe as a public transportation paradise, but a car makes your life easier outside Berlin, Paris, and other major cities. I live on the edge of Copenhagen and public transportation sucks the further you go from the downtown since the major city turn into a giant suburb really fast. Yes, people bike, but many do drive a car.

[ojgjoe]

Paul Ryan Rogers, You are still clearly blind to reality.

Much of the world requires a car. Maybe someday it won't, but today it absolutely does.

[paulryanrogers]

Do you think personal attacks will convince others of your argument?

[viking123]

In America the public transport is used by "youths" so normal people are forced to use cars.

[crubier]

Does the Subway arrive at my door?

[dotcoma]

Probably not. If you need to walk a mile, that’s a feature, not a bug. Of course, if you need to walk multiple miles, that’s a different story.

[runarberg]

Can I ask why you prefer that some future technology will solve her problem when actual solutions (such as access vans; public transit; etc.) already exist?

And before anyone points this out, if your local government does not offer these solutions that is a political choice of your local politicians. Plenty of local governments all over the world (even in dictatorships) are able to provide these, and changing the policy of your local government should in theory be easier then to roll out technology that does not exist.

[ctoth]

I'm blind. I wish to hop in a robocar and drive from Denver to go visit my folks back home in Florida. Is the Denver Access-A-Ride going to take me? Which public transit is available?

[runarberg]

I preemptively addressed this. Not providing access is a political choice. The airports/train stations/bus stations in both Denver and Florida should have assistants ready to guide you to your flight/train/bus and the Colorado government could have an agreement with Florida to share services with residents of either state. If they don‘t, there was a political choice not to, which can be changed. If there is no public transit available... well... neither are robocars, but only the former is a political choice.

[handoflixue]

Because technological freedom has, historically, vastly outperformed political choice?

I can buy a robotic car, once they're available. I am nowhere near rich enough to afford even one politician, much less enough to get public transit to happen in California.

Political choices also take time. You have to get people to vote on a budget, you have to actually build the infrastructure, etc. - even busses require bus stops and drivers and maintenance facilities.

Given that robotic cars already exist today, and are planning to expand, basically every reasonable expectation says that robotic cars will happen before politicians change tack on public transit (especially in the USA, where Trump is currently our president - he does not seem gung-ho on public transit)

[runarberg]

Like I said, dictatorships manage to do this. Claiming that America is different is just another form of American exceptionalism.

And no, robotic cars do not exist. A very limited version of robotaxis do, but they are nowhere near ready for public rollout on all public roads for the consumer market.

[SpicyLemonZest]

The policy of my local government is subject to a number of constraints beyond my personal desire for transit between points that are relevant to me and my lifestyle. I live in a place with pretty good public transit, but I still routinely drive to a place 3 miles away from me, because all the bus routes that take me there are indirect and would add an hour to my round trip.

[cogogo]

Me too but this feels like a step in a progression to being able to rent/share them.

[saghm]

At the cost of a traffic violation though?

[dzonga]

that xkcd is always funny - but there's a white lie in it e.g on motorcycles in areas where you are allowed to ride median. there's instances of drivers actively tryin' to kill you by swerving onto the median when they see you comin'.

[SyzygyRhythm]

Numerous times now, using Tesla FSD, I've found the car seemingly drifting from the center of the lane, only to have motorcycles buzz by at high speed on the opposite side. It's very polite toward motorcyclists.

[nsvd2]

It surprises me that any municipality would make that legal, seems dangerous.

[ang_cire]

I started riding in AZ, which does not allow splitting.

I now live in CA, which does.

The actual justification for it is valid, but mostly outdated:

Older and less powerful motorcycles often have air-cooled engines, and if you sit idling in them in e.g. a traffic jam, they will absolutely overheat and die (at best).

Newer and more powerful bikes are liquid-cooled, and do not have this issue (though the driver overheating is another very real issue).

My personal take is that most riders who use bikes to commute are too reckless, and lane split at speed rather than doing so more safely.

25 mph or below, in fully-stopped traffic, is relatively safe. Ditto for <=35 in a 10-20 mph flow. Each of those gives you a relative stopping distance of about 50 feet, which is 3 or fewer car lengths, which is easy to account for.

60 in a 25mph flow OTOH isn't lane splitting, it's just weaving through traffic recklessly, hoping to God that no one in the next 20 cars lengths merges or drifts at all.

[adgjlsfhk1]

The good rule that most of Europe uses is that motorcycles can "lane filter" (i.e. go in between lanes but only for cars that are basically stopped and only at low speed). Going between lanes is suicidal at high speed, but if cars are <5mph and the motorcycle is ~10mph it's actually safer for the motorcycle because it removes the chance of them being rear-ended. (It also makes motorcycles faster than cars which is helpful for discouraging cars in cities)

[morsch]

Officially allowed in France, Belgium, the Netherlands and UK, from what I can tell. Interesting though, I'd have assumed it's permitted nowhere in the EU.

[HNisCIS]

It's actually safer-ish. First: terms. Filtering is good, involves moving slowly through stopped traffic between the cars, usually under 20mph differential.

Splitting is less good, that involves weaving between cars at speed and is actually dangerous.

Some of the worst accidents are rear endings where drivers (not paying attention) just run you over while stopped in traffic.

This is offset by accidents where people do the stuff you're worried about but when it's practiced correctly that's not as big of a risk and generally leads to less catastrophic accidents than rear endings.

It's also just kinda dumb to force a class of vehicle that can get out of traffic jams to instead sit in them

[culi]

Waymo was a target during the anti-ICE protests because of Google's collaboration with ICE. In addition, Waymo is seen as a symbol of the gentrification problem.

Agree or disagree with it, my point is that that xkcd doesn't take into account political motivations

[seanmcdirmid]

Protesters block human cars as well as the only difference is that the Waymo driver doesn’t get frustrated and are pretty patient. So protesters need to physically damage the car to make their point, which is a tricky proposition with all the cameras it has (but face masks are common on both sides these days).

[culi]

Except in this case, damaging cars belonging to Google—a collaborator with ICE—is the point. It's more comparable to people who were damaging Tesla vehicles or the Tyre Extinguishers in the UK than the very common tactic of halting traffic/economic activity to threaten "business as usual"

[seanmcdirmid]

Property damage is just hooliganism, thugs make an excuse for it no matter if that’s what they feel like doing.

The eventual result of America falling into chaos will be countries like China having nice stuff like self driving cars (because they don’t tolerate thugs) while the us doesnt.

[viccis]

The US could avoid this by making sure that the social contract here is still in place. People destroy and protest self driving cars because they aren't liberatory automation; they're just another taxi billing us except that they also put humans driving rideshares out of a job. Does China have a problem with their people being forced to do rideshare gigs to get enough food to eat and competing with self driving cars?

[culi]

A riot is the voice of the unheard

[viking123]

If I had to choose I rather take free internet where I don't have to play with some VPN every time I want to do something or play a game in steam. Self driving cars are nice toys though but I don't mind having a driver.

I say this as someone who has lived in China, the system is just too closed and dumb.

[defrost]

Perhaps sometimes a simplistic take like this is true - people destroying just for the sake of destruction and indifferent to the target.

However when destruction is targeted toward specific brands or toward infrastructure being used for specific purposes such takes can no longer be true.

[wahnfrieden]

When under attack, Waymo responds by stopping the car.

[KptMarchewa]

This is an US problem, not a Waymo problem.

[tjoff]

I kind of assumed the car would be locked (from the outside)?

Like most regular cars have the option to.

[qingcharles]

The Waymo I saw the other day, one guy stopped the car, the other broke the window and snatched all the goodies from the occupants.

[mns]

I find it somehow like a dystopia that things like these happen. This isn't about kids dying in some foreign country on some distant continent and we're investing in fancy robot taxis. This is actually that some people have the privilege of living in a bubble and using this technology that these huge corporations put money in (for the profit of their shareholders) while in the same time ignoring the core issues of the society that lead to such acts happening (stealing in broad daylight stuff from a car while people are inside it). I know people will say that this isn't for Google to fix (yeah, they only fix and lobby for laws that help them make more money) or for the tech people working for these companies and browsing these forums to fix, but I do find it a bit disgusting.

[postalrat]

Do you think sitting inside you will be protected if someone has a gun?

[smlacy]

So you're implying that someone in a locked Waymo was assaulted at gunpoint from outside the vehicle? These are rolling surveillance machines (in a good way?) and virtually every aspect of this would be caught on probably a dozen cameras. I'd be surprised if this hypothetical scenario has ever happened, and if it has, I'd love to see the evidence.

[lokar]

I think people vastly overestimate the extent to which would be criminals think ahead to the likelihood of being caught and the severity of the punishment.

[jfoster]

They might not, but there is a further defence against their lack of consideration about consequences.

It's called incarceration.

[lokar]

Not really related to my reply

[freediddy]

You mean like this?

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/17/technology/trapped-inside...

[BoorishBears]

You're laying on enough qualifiers that even a recent robbery of a Waymo is precluded, because (if we really want to victim blame) their window was down which is asking for it.

But overall, not sure why the tone of these replies: then Venn diagram of "wants to rob people" and "cares Google's AV will record it" doesn't include as much overlap as you're implying.

A Waymo has even been used as a getaway vehicle a few times now, once even successfully

[vamos_davai]

Cameras aren't going to stop a crime in progress.

[jfoster]

But they might stop it from happening again if the perpetrators are imprisoned as a result of the footage.

[ethbr1]

> virtually every aspect of this would be caught on probably a dozen cameras

If only there were a widely available technology to conceal ones face...

[nradov]

Obviously the Waymo Premier service should also include a nice handgun with the car.

[hoppyhoppy2]

Why should I have to wield a gun myself? A self-driving car should be able to shoot at threats autonomously!

[gs17]

We need the service Delamain sells in Cyberpunk:

> Clients can also upgrade to the Excelsior package, which includes the standard service package plus complete health coverage, active passenger medical scanning, combat mode, and free corpse disposal in the event of the client's death.

[Jblx2]

Something classy like a Beretta 92 series?

https://www.beretta.com/en-us/product/92x-performance-defens...

...or something more retro-futuristic like an FN-90 to match the vibe of a self-driving EV?

https://fnamerica.com/products/rifles/fn-ps90-standard/

...plus you get the advantages of a carbine.

[CamperBob2]

Waymo should treat it like a security flaw that anyone can stop your car and there's nothing you can do about it.

What are they supposed to do? Go full Mad Max? That doesn't go over well on Reddit.

Seriously, what can they do besides stop the car?

[themafia]

> Waymo should treat it like a security flaw that anyone can stop your car and there's nothing you can do about it.

And accept liability for obvious and potentially devistating problems? I wouldn't hold my breath.