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.
@[email protected] There isn’t a problem that could not be solved by legislation here. The police is already able to give tickets to self-driving cars in some states. You can certainly argue that the megacorps aren’t inclined to care when the amount of money involved is tiny but then again that problem exists in most places just as much when it comes to fining rich people. You could always up the amounts if the politicians are willing to do that.
The more consequential thing that can already be done currently is grounding the entire fleet if there’s a good reason for that so it’s not like officials are completely helpless.
I don’t want to sound pessimistic, but consumer protections in the US feel like a far off thing, given its current sociopolitical swing. I cannot trust politicians to do right by me, so I espouse wariness of companies