Waymo might be expanding its autonomous taxi services to northern cities like Minneapolis and Detroit, but back in Santa Monica, the company’s strained relationship with local residents has reached a breaking point.
According to the Santa Monica Daily Press, the city council has issued a formal demand that Waymo end overnight operations at two charging facilities there. City counselors unanimously approved the measure, which doesn’t mention Waymo by name, but instead orders two lots the company uses to charge and dispatch vehicles to cease nighttime operations.
The problem isn’t that nobody is able to be punished, its that the punishment isn’t anywhere near severe enough to incentivize fixing the issues that caused grandma to get hit.
When negligence is a small fine and a finger wag of “make sure this doesn’t happen again”, they aren’t going to do more than lip service claiming they will fix the issue, maybe fire someone at the bottom of the ladder to prove their sincerity.