The Good, Bad and Annoying as Autonomous Vehicle Services Expand

It’s been almost a year since robotaxi companies Waymo and Cruise expanded their operations to offer fully driverless ride services in San Francisco. Testing human-free vehicles in urban environments has proven challenging, with incidents ranging from gaffs like a driverless car stumped by parade traffic to deep safety concerns that led GM to suspend Cruise’s autonomous operations last fall. After a wave of driverless hype, and criticism – where does the industry stand today? We’ll speak with a research engineer who has been studying the promise of autonomous vehicles for half a century, and an investigative reporter tracking the data and the blindspots of these robots on our roads.

Guests:

Bigad Shaban, senior investigative reporter, NBC Bay Area

Steven Shladover, research engineer, Institute of Transportation Studies, University of California-Berkeley

Philip Reinckens, senior vice president of commercialization and operations, Gatik

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