Waymo is the future of Ride-Sharing! Took my first ride in Scottsdale, AZ in 2023

While visiting Scottsdale, Arizona on a recent business trip on October 18, 2023, I was sitting out front of my hotel waiting for an Uber to pick me up when I noticed a Waymo driverless car sitting out front. The car had its hazard lights on, and you could not help but notice the spinning LIDAR sensors on the roof and all around each corner of the Electric, Jaguar I-Pace.
I was intrigued to see one of these cars up close and was studying the car over when two guys walked out of the hotel lobby, used an app to unlock the doors, hopped in it, and sped off in the driverless car! It was amazing to watch, and I quickly had to figure out how to do this myself. With little time that morning, my Uber picked me up and proceeded to my destination. The next morning however, I had the time to prepare for my own ride. I downloaded the Waymo app and summoned a car. The app idincated I would have to wait about 25 minutes for it to pick me up, but I was okay with that. I summoned the car while I was packing my bags to leave the hotel, and the app recognized my hotel as a pickup, and I pressed go. Unfortunately, I did not notice the app dropped a pin closer to my room rather than picking the hotel lobby front door, and I was surprised when the car passed my entrance as I watched.
With that being the only hiccup, it was an amazing experience. If you have the opportunity, I highly encourage you to take a ride in what will cleary become the future of ride-sharing!

[@beezer370]

Do you prefer Waymo or Uber?

[@ParkerSmithIII]

Uber typically. When this tech is available in more cities and more tested, I would prefer Waymo. It will be a while.

[@ab8817]

lol a bunch of these have been in terrible accidents

[@1997nick]

No they haven't. Maybe you're thinking of Cruise.

[@ab8817]

@@1997nick "The data, which was reported to the NHTSA beginning in July 2021, showed that Waymo vehicles had the highest number of crashes, 150, among vehicles equipped with automated driving systems."

[@1997nick]

@@ab8817 yeah, almost exclusively fender benders and nearly all due to human driver error. "Terrible" is what you described, which is not what those were

[@ab8817]

@@1997nick do you know that for sure?

[@agildehaus]

​@@ab8817 Waymo has never injured a pedestrian or been in anything I would consider a true collision. It's had a some minor road debris events (running over something that damaged the vehicle) which they are required to report, a couple low speed contacts with other vehicles during dropoff/pickup where it's completely unclear from the reports who's fault it was, and numerous rear collisions from moron human drivers. There was one dog fatality -- looks like it ran out from behind another vehicle and the incident was unavoidable.
All of that goes into the 150 number you cite. Media just likes to call them crashes.