so waymo/Munich is in fact the second in the EU; also they are playing it safe
> In the coming weeks, you’ll start to see Waymo vehicles on the streets of Munich where we’ll begin driving manually across the city. We are taking a rigorous, phased approach that starts with high-definition mapping of local street networks and testing with trained autonomous specialists behind the wheel. This validation period will ensure the Waymo Driver adapts seamlessly to Munich’s distinct driving conditions before we aim to open commercial ride-hailing to the public towards the end of 2027.
How? The traffic is the movement of vehicles. Can you save traffic by increasing the volume of trafficked things? How would AI vehicle coordination work with non-AI participants (i.e. meatbags)
I didn't want to discuss it further, and I also don't think this is a priority for Google, but I don't think that humans need as many cars as there are to go places. Key to reducing traffic would be to stop blocking huge parts of dense cities with parked vehicles, and ultimately, drastically reduce the number of personally owned vehicles.
People don't pay for the external costs of their vehicles, so it should be required to use vehicles efficiently.
This is not a technological question, but a political, and Google ain't going to solve it without an incentive.
But autonomous vehicles could in theory transform car traffic by huge amounts in dense areas, without sacrificing mobility. Munich is a metropolitan area.
The biggest hindrance to mobility in large cities are usually cars and car infrastructure themselves, because the incentives from countries and for companies are to waste space and energy, and subsidize that.
Ride sharing with autonomous vehicles could reduce need for private cars enormously. Not that I think it's gonna happen in Munich because of Google now.
The technology could just help with it.
Alas, Sorry, I wrote quite a bit already, but I don't want to expand on this repetitive discussion for my own sanity.
And yeah, when people want to have many cars and money can be made by building many cars, even subsidized by the state, the we will continue to block more space with them and build more.
"Meatbags" want it, since the successful lobbying of automotive industry to subordinate all public space and resources in the first half of the 20th century.
But this is not AI coordination saving traffic. It's 'sharing economy'. And its already here and it sux. All the bicycles which can be borrowed for a few cents per minute didn't replace personal bikes, anywhere, I think. At least in Germany they created many problems for what seems a tourist convenience. Even worse with scooters...
Same with car-sharing. In theory good but in practice I'd rather own my car 100x than finding a car, making photos to record any damage, handling rubbish from others etc.
Oh, I agree that people don't pay for the external costs of their vehicles and that reducing the number of cars is what makes the cities great again.
My gripe with the autonomous cars is that they still need to park _somewhere_. They might park further away, but the company that parks their car closest to the pick up point will have an advantage over competition and thus the incentive would be to have the cars as close to customers as possible (lower cost of pickup, quicker turn around, potentially higher price for faster pickup).
Idk they could lead to significantly _more_ traffic
As driving becomes easier to access due to an influx of vehicles, could lead to a Jevon's paradox situation where there's more driving demand, and more autonomous vehicles on the road, often circling because they know they're likely to get another rider soon, causing more congestion than today
The lobbying done by these companies also clearly favors car traffic over public transit & pedestrian traffic. I'd much rather optimize for better walking and biking traffic than car traffic
In the not-so-distant future, you’ll be able to book a trip from your front door to any other front door in the world in 1 ticket/payment.
Imagine not even having to switch vessels with the vehicle morphing from freeway driving to personal flight even to in-town or scenic driving (or flight) with different routes, handling and displays.
I’d like to float around in a bubble, like Glinda the good witch
I think it will be interesting to see how this plays out for Waymo, as (unlike Uber in Zagreb) they will be competing with a world-class public transport system. A bold move! But perhaps that only goes to show how far ahead of the competition Waymo is, if they are this confident.
Uber is doing fine in Munchen as well, afaik. There are still people who want to pay a premium for them to be picked up where they are and dropped off where they need to be.
It’s really not at all at the same level as other European cities. It’s so bad that basically every year high up officials write a Brandbrief (urgent appeal) to either Deutsche Bahn or Ministry of transport that the situation is unbearable.
Having lives in 3 different German cities, it’s by far the worst and most unreliable.
In contrast to the US, many people exclusively rely upon public transport and eg a drivers license costs north of 4K € (approx 5k USD), in addition to much higher gasoline prices - making a car way less affordable.
I've learned to be wary of these cars in the bay area, they seem to cut it close often, and they get stuck because they're not L5. I hope municipalities know what they're getting.
Curious how different the safety outcomes will be to the US. A Waymo is safer than an American driver, but so is a European driver. A driver from Norway is even safer than a Waymo.
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[ 0.23 ms ] story [ 12.7 ms ] threadalso, uber (in partnership with pony.ai and verne, a Croatian startup) launched robotaxis in Zagreb a week ago https://www.reuters.com/technology/uber-launches-autonomous-...
so waymo/Munich is in fact the second in the EU; also they are playing it safe
> In the coming weeks, you’ll start to see Waymo vehicles on the streets of Munich where we’ll begin driving manually across the city. We are taking a rigorous, phased approach that starts with high-definition mapping of local street networks and testing with trained autonomous specialists behind the wheel. This validation period will ensure the Waymo Driver adapts seamlessly to Munich’s distinct driving conditions before we aim to open commercial ride-hailing to the public towards the end of 2027.
People don't pay for the external costs of their vehicles, so it should be required to use vehicles efficiently.
This is not a technological question, but a political, and Google ain't going to solve it without an incentive.
But autonomous vehicles could in theory transform car traffic by huge amounts in dense areas, without sacrificing mobility. Munich is a metropolitan area.
The biggest hindrance to mobility in large cities are usually cars and car infrastructure themselves, because the incentives from countries and for companies are to waste space and energy, and subsidize that.
Ride sharing with autonomous vehicles could reduce need for private cars enormously. Not that I think it's gonna happen in Munich because of Google now.
The technology could just help with it.
Alas, Sorry, I wrote quite a bit already, but I don't want to expand on this repetitive discussion for my own sanity.
And yeah, when people want to have many cars and money can be made by building many cars, even subsidized by the state, the we will continue to block more space with them and build more.
"Meatbags" want it, since the successful lobbying of automotive industry to subordinate all public space and resources in the first half of the 20th century.
Same with car-sharing. In theory good but in practice I'd rather own my car 100x than finding a car, making photos to record any damage, handling rubbish from others etc.
My gripe with the autonomous cars is that they still need to park _somewhere_. They might park further away, but the company that parks their car closest to the pick up point will have an advantage over competition and thus the incentive would be to have the cars as close to customers as possible (lower cost of pickup, quicker turn around, potentially higher price for faster pickup).
As driving becomes easier to access due to an influx of vehicles, could lead to a Jevon's paradox situation where there's more driving demand, and more autonomous vehicles on the road, often circling because they know they're likely to get another rider soon, causing more congestion than today
The lobbying done by these companies also clearly favors car traffic over public transit & pedestrian traffic. I'd much rather optimize for better walking and biking traffic than car traffic
Imagine not even having to switch vessels with the vehicle morphing from freeway driving to personal flight even to in-town or scenic driving (or flight) with different routes, handling and displays.
I’d like to float around in a bubble, like Glinda the good witch
It’s really not at all at the same level as other European cities. It’s so bad that basically every year high up officials write a Brandbrief (urgent appeal) to either Deutsche Bahn or Ministry of transport that the situation is unbearable. Having lives in 3 different German cities, it’s by far the worst and most unreliable.
In contrast to the US, many people exclusively rely upon public transport and eg a drivers license costs north of 4K € (approx 5k USD), in addition to much higher gasoline prices - making a car way less affordable.
# 1. State Minister Bernreiter's Brandbrief to DB InfraGO (2026) https://www.bayern.de/kritik-an-langsamfahrstellen/
# 2. Pullach Municipal Brandbrief on the S7 (2025) https://www.pullach.de/buergerbrief-uns-reicht-es-jetzt-geme...
# 3. MVV & Stakeholders Brandbrief to Deutsche Bahn (2022) https://www.abendzeitung-muenchen.de/muenchen/s-bahn-muss-zu...
# 4. Mayors' Joint Transit Funding Brandbrief (2025) https://www.bild.de/politik/friedrich-merz-neuer-brandbrief-...
# 5. Landräte Transit Cuts Warning Brandbrief (2024) https://in-motion.me/articles/2024-12-22_es-drohen-kuerzunge...
# 6. Pro Bahn Munich Analysis & Brandbrief (2024) https://www.pro-bahn.de/oberbayern/pbp/pbp202401.pdf
Get out the traffic cones.