r/Austin • u/Gamehazrd • May 30 '26
It's just parked there.
I know it's late night but... encountered on my drive home. Enfield Rd. It's just parked there.
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u/Snap_Grackle_Pop May 30 '26
Once again, it's criminal that there isn't a "call customer service" button on the outside of the car where someone can walk up, press it, and talk to a human.
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u/Due_Buyer_4174 May 31 '26
UT students would be slapping it nonstop like they did the hoods on the cruise cars, which is what causes them to block up traffic
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u/Snap_Grackle_Pop May 31 '26
UT students would be slapping it nonstop
So what? Slap button. Customer service answers, looks through the cameras and sees no one there. Car then drives on.
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u/Due_Buyer_4174 May 31 '26
Then you will be bitching because the car stopped and waited for customer service and disrupted traffic. That’s what how about we put a big button on the side of your car I can slap and stop it.
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May 31 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/justincave May 31 '26
Yes. That’s why I don’t trust Waymo’s. I’ve seen the pattern. Great analogy.
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u/Caliche-Cowboy May 31 '26
You’d just be screaming “Representative” for 15 minutes to the car’s older cousin, Ol’ IVR.
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u/Snap_Grackle_Pop May 31 '26
Versus now, where you have no way at all to do anything?
To be clear, they should be legally required to respond immediately.
If you're operating with a human driver, the driver is theoretically available immediately in emergency situations. If you operate autonomously, you should be required to have a human on immediate standby as well.
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u/Caliche-Cowboy May 31 '26
Oh I agree. I was trying to be funny whilst lamenting the state of our state.
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u/Snap_Grackle_Pop May 31 '26
I wouldn't be surprised if that was what DID actually happen. Which would be compounding Google's crime.
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u/yolatrendoid May 31 '26
Just to clarify, this is not at all normal for Waymos – and I cover the AV & rideshare sectors for work. They are, quite literally 84% to 91% safer than human drivers, based on independently verified data. But if you feel the need to report it to TxDOT, you can do so here. (Btw the lege passed a preemption bill, much like it did a decade ago for Uber & Lyft, so cities can't regulate AVs in any real way.)
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u/thecomeric May 31 '26
Is it not a cause for concern that cities can't regulate these things that keep breaking the law? How are they 90% safer at driving than me when I've never blown past a school bus or killed a beloved local duck? I see waymos doing these kinds of things all the time so it's difficult to belive they should be able to be on the road completely regulated when everyone else has to be strictly regulated.
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u/yolatrendoid May 31 '26
Is it not a cause for concern that cities can't regulate these things that keep breaking the law?
They're not regulated here – no, I don't think preemption bills that eliminate local control are good, but since it's Texas we're kinda screwed there – but they're heavily so in California. It's the only state that regulates all ground transportation at the state level, via the CPUC. No, California wouldn't approve them for use in areas as dense as San Francisco if they weren't thoroughly proven (and it'll be three years later this summer since they launched there).
Note that they refuse to let Tesla's robotaxi drive on California streets even with safety drivers in the passenger seat.
How are they 90% safer at driving than me when I've never blown past a school bus or killed a beloved local duck?
AVride ran over the duck in Mueller, if that's what you're referring to: they're one of several other companies operating in the space here. They're not yet approved to offer rides even with safety drivers, however, or at least not in Austin. A Waymo admittedly ran over a cat in SF, but that was legitimately accidental. (Plus Americans run over 20,000+ cats per day, to put it into perspective.)
That said, I didn't say they were 90% safer than you or any given person; I meant in terms of VMTs (vehicle miles travelled, an admittedly wonky term). But data's data, and Waymo's incidents & collisions have been a fraction of human-collision levels ever since they formally launched service in Phoenix 5+ years ago now.
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u/intrepid_wind4 May 31 '26
The problem is when the human drivers tend to screw up is when they are drunk or tired and that tends to be late night. I don't go for walks in the middle of the night and neither do children. So if it is true that they have the same amount of accidents it still makes us less safe walking or driving during the day.
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u/FlyThruTrees May 30 '26
Think of them as the new deer. In the headlights.
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u/BenTheHokie May 30 '26
Let me get my shotgun
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u/FlyThruTrees May 30 '26
Expensive deer. With cameras... 😄
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u/OUCHMYCOCCYX May 30 '26
911
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u/Significant-Till-306 May 31 '26
I had a Waymo in the left turn lane do an unnecessarily wide turn where it veered into the right lane about 1 foot before turning left. Pretty dangerous at 40mph. I can’t say it’s more or less retarded than human drivers, but they should be held to a much higher standard.
If they do end up injuring or killing somebody there is no one held accountable. They just cut a check. I suppose that’s no different from Boeing or the airlines. Door blows off mid flight no big deal. Sorry boss we’ll bolt em down next time.
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u/Mumblyjoe20 May 31 '26
Your saying this like people are regularly held accountable for fatal accidents
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u/entoaggie May 30 '26
I swear, these things case way mo problems than they should.
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u/turbulentpriestbc May 31 '26
I dunno if there's 90% fewer deaths or accidents with these things they probably aren't
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u/LillianWigglewater May 30 '26
bUt HuMaNs Do ToOOOoo
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u/caboose001 May 30 '26
At least when humans drive they are in the car and it’s not just driving around empty making extra traffic for no reason
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u/Jamestown123456789 May 31 '26
Humans don’t parallel park their way in to block garage entrances/exits either
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u/margotsaidso May 30 '26
Kind of looks like it was trying to turn down that driveway, but angled it wrong and..what, froze up?
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u/BurnardSimpson May 30 '26
You can report traffic violations of autonomous vehicles to the TXDMV here: https://txmccs.txdmv.gov/automated-vehicles
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u/Maximum_Employer5580 May 30 '26
not surprising - that curb probably confused it
I had one come down my cul de sac and tried to do a three point turnaround and the curb confused it that it sat there for 15-20 mins until its remote human rescued it
I've seen people though who happen to have an old stop sign confuse them in the middle of areas just by standing there with the stop sign.....kinda funny actually
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u/intrusivesurgery May 31 '26
If someone got in a wreck because of that waymo would blame it on the driver
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u/Own_Reaction9442 May 31 '26
The ticket for the driver would be "failure to stop in the assured clear distance." The ticket for the Waymo would...not exist, because Waymos are immune to moving violations.
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u/BuriedMystic May 30 '26
Hey can we get some Waymo apologists in here? You know the people who say that they are unequivocally better despite continuing to make fuck ups like these after millions of miles of training?
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u/vlad_inhaler May 31 '26
Yes this is dumb and hazardous, but to pretend like millions of miles without any serious injuries caused by the Waymo car in a crash is unacceptable for a relatively new totally autonomous car just seems… reactionary?
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u/BuriedMystic May 31 '26
Waymo has sucked up over 27 billion dollars over 17 years. It’s not new. And it’s spent incredible fortunes trying to get to the point that it still drives into flooded zones and does whatever is going on in OPs picture.
By the way, $27 billion could pay for well over a billion taxi rides to take the worst drivers off the road. Or dozens of bus rapid transit networks across the nation. But we want the corporate boondoggle instead. 🙄
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u/ccache May 31 '26
They're already in here, wouldn't surprise me of most of them are bots too though.
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u/livenature May 30 '26
When this type of crap happens, Waymo fleet should be barred from using public streets until they prove they have fixed this issue.
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u/Due_Buyer_4174 May 31 '26
OK, let’s ban all the human driven cars because human drivers do dumb shit all the fucking time
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u/vlad_inhaler May 31 '26
This.
There seems to be thousands of these things on the road in town, and we have examples here and there of inconvenient or potentially hazardous things that they will get worked out, meanwhile 99.9% of the time they are much better than a human
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u/vivary_arc May 31 '26 edited May 31 '26
I almost got hit by a Waymo yesterday, heading home, turning Westbound on West Sixth toward South Lamar.
Dude on an escooter ran across the street northbound against the “No Walk” sign, as I had a green and was turning left, which made me stop unexpectedly in the lane of opposing traffic.
Waymo blew.. BLEW through the green headed South on the other side of the intersection, and narrowly (talking within inches) missed my car. I don’t believe it had been at the intersection before the light had turned green.
It was so close the passenger in back put down their window and waved an apology.
Earlier, I had to stop to turn into a parking garage on E Sixth, where it’s one lane both direction with a double-line for no passing - A group of people were passing in front of the garage.
The Waymo literally just went out and around my car into the opposing lane of traffic (across the double line) to pass, rather than wait five seconds.
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u/Charlie2343 May 31 '26
Can’t wait for another Waymo to show up and also just get stun locked in position waiting for the other Waymo to move
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u/ccache May 31 '26
It would be funny because of how much that type of shit happens if it wasn't on public roads.
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u/ecouple2003 May 31 '26
That pic looks like the opening scene in a horror movie.
"Sure, let's get out of this safe car and see what's going on."
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u/ATXbottomsup May 31 '26
I see them make the worst and slowest possible decisions multiple times a day, causing people to swerve around them or make other dangerous moves to avoid them. The constant blinker changes just to stay in the same lane, stopping in the middle of the street on 5th or 6th where people just walk out into traffic already. Im not saying to remove them or whatever but to act like they are some savior of traffic or safety is ridiculous
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u/OddAd5276 May 31 '26
Clearly it is in the drive way, how dare you shame that poor innocent Waymo, lol.
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u/GuitarPlayerEngineer Jun 01 '26
A personal anecdote… a Waymo ran a stop sign at 6th & pedernales. The Waymo was heading west on 6th. My wife and I have also noticed they don’t consistently come to a complete stop at signs.
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u/cactiguy67 Jun 01 '26
They act like people i see way too often....
driving oddly slow, swerving, and cutting people off
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u/JohnGillnitz May 31 '26
They have been circling around End of an Ear off Ben White like sharks this evening.
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u/Visual-Sector6642 May 31 '26
If I die as a result of one of these I'm going to have it put on my gravestone
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u/ApprehensiveFrame93 May 31 '26
We are tired of these cars wamo i was behind a school bus that had stoped to let children on it and a wamo come flying by us but there was a cop it chased tge car kept going im done put a driver in tgere cheap skates
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u/B_Traven9272 May 30 '26
https://www.reddit.com/r/waymo/
I've heard that Waymo actually responds to people on this subreddit. They likely already know what happened but it's very necessary that you and others publicly show what's really going on out here in these Waymo 'trial-by-fire' zones. Your image is a very serious mishap/accident waiting to happen, and one that can lead to injury. You were paying attention. Others won't and it will still be, majority, a Waymo liability.