\u201cThere are many ways to get at safer streets. Most of them are proven, and most of them don\u2019t involve cars whatsoever.\u201d \u2014 State Senator Nikil Saval<\/p>\n
Although the company still needs to receive PennDOT approval before it can offer commercial rides, Waymo is barrelling ahead towards a soft launch. \u201cOur next step will be to operate the vehicles fully autonomously for employees only,\u201d Teicher says.<\/p>\n
Philly residents have already been complaining<\/a>, criticizing AVs as untrustworthy and ugly. Waymo cars have a computer system known as the LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) unit affixed to the roof. It\u2019s essential to providing real-time sensory feedback for the vehicles. But the units, which look like spinning baby-bottle nipples, are not the most stylish glimpse into the future.<\/p>\n The company does have one big feather in its cap: a promise to make Philly roads safer. Waymo recently published a journal article analyzing 127 million miles<\/a> of trips taken by fully autonomous robotaxis, comparing those results to human benchmarks. \u201cThe Waymo Driver,\u201d says Teicher, referring to the name of their driverless-car system, \u201cachieved a tenfold reduction in serious injury or worse crashes, and a twelvefold reduction in injury crashes with pedestrians.\u201d<\/p>\n If those statistics are accurate, they offer a tantalizing vision of the future: AI drivers that never text and drive, never get angry or buzzed behind the wheel, and never stop improving \u2014 due to deep-learning tools that file away every roadway interaction for future reference. Driverless cars could be a public health breakthrough<\/a> as much as a technological one. Their rapid implementation in recent years has led some to suggest that Vision Zero, the longstanding goal to eliminate all traffic fatalities, might finally be achievable.<\/p>\n That\u2019s a laudable goal. But at what expense? What is the human toll of replacing drivers with robots in the country\u2019s second-poorest big city \u2014 and are we ready for it?<\/p>\n Are cars even the way to go? <\/p>\n Given a choice of modernity or tradition, Philadelphians will often side with the luddites. Our public sector has at times been notoriously slow to adopt emerging tech<\/a> (even email<\/a>) over the course of decades. We had SEPTA tokens in circulation until two years ago. And who doesn\u2019t look back fondly on the decapitation and dismemberment of HitchBOT?<\/a><\/p>\n There are plenty of techno-optimists in our communities, too, some of whom are intrigued by the idea of Waymo. On the r\/Philadelphia Reddit thread, opinions range from \u201cPhilly drivers are scum\u201d and Waymo should be an \u201corder of magnitude safer\u201d to those who\u2019d prefer if we could bolster SEPTA before we see driverless cars hit the streets. Those mixed reactions are reflected in legislators in Harrisburg.<\/p>\n \u201cIt would be great if it turns out driverless cars are significantly safer than people behind the wheel of vehicles, but we know there are other proven things that make the roads safer,\u201d says State Senator Nikil Saval (D-Philadelphia), who sits on the body\u2019s transportation committee. \u201cIncreased public transit is what we should be devoting ourselves to and orienting our cities around.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI think that all cities will need to have Waymo to be considered a real, 21st century metropolitan space.\u201d \u2014 State Representative Napoleon Nelson<\/p>\n In other words, maybe AVs are a legitimate public-safety innovation, but they\u2019re not the only option. They also invite concerns of their own, including from an environmental standpoint. While Waymo cars are emission-free, they require significant electricity, just like other advanced forms of AI. \u201cThese are like data centers on wheels,\u201d Saval says. \u201cAre we prepared for the massive increase in computing needs?\u201d<\/p>\n Most of all, Saval is thinking about the potential human toll: \u201cWhat are we prepared to do about those Uber drivers?\u201d<\/p>\n About a decade ago, we were collectively asking the same question about taxi drivers at the moment when Uber stormed into Philly. Between 2014 and 2017, the value of a taxi medallion \u2014 the source of family-sustaining wealth for many taxi drivers \u2014 plummeted<\/a>, from a high of more than $500,000 to $10,000. Uber and Lyft eventually grew the total amount of jobs for drivers, but shaped them in the mold of the gig economy.<\/p>\n Today, 74% of the roughly 29,000 Uber ride-share drivers<\/a> in Philly work part-time or less than 30 hours per week. After expenses, they make an estimated $21.29 per hour. Mamadu Barry feels fortunate that it\u2019s not his primary salary. \u201cI have friends whose lifestyle and family income is going to be very challenged,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n First, taxi drivers got supplanted by contract workers; now those contract workers are being threatened by robots. Saval thinks there\u2019s a lesson to be learned from that progression. \u201cWe can\u2019t rely on the big technology companies, because they have shown that they don\u2019t care for their workers up to this point,\u201d says the state senator.<\/p>\n According to Waymo, the company employs local workers in the 10 cities where it\u2019s currently operating at scale. Though spokesperson Ethan Teicher declined to provide a specific number of jobs, he listed some of the positions that regularly need to be filled: operations partners with expertise in vehicle maintenance, construction and skilled trades, fleet management, and more \u2014 all told, \u201chundreds of people to support our service.\u201d<\/p>\n Waymo also employs dozens of \u201cremote assistance agents<\/a>\u201d in the Philippines. Wired recently wrote about these workers as \u201chuman babysitters\u201d for robotaxis, which has led some conspiracy theorists to suspect that fully autonomous cars are currently a ruse \u2014 with a person manning the joysticks abroad. Even if that\u2019s a stretch, the outsourcing to the Philippines is indicative of what can be reasonably expected of a Big Tech company\u2019s relationship to employment in a city like Philly.<\/p>\n Workforce concerns are one reason that members of City Council, including At-Large Councilmember Jim Harrity, recently called for hearings to study the wide-ranging impact of self-driving cars. Those hearings haven\u2019t been scheduled yet, but among the topics that are likely to be discussed are job displacement and consumer costs. In a city like San Francisco, where Waymo has eclipsed 10 percent of the ride-hailing market share<\/a>, the average fare<\/a> remains 12 percent higher than Uber and 17 percent higher than Lyft.<\/p>\n And then there\u2019s the central issue that defines the Waymo debate: safety. The most fervent boosters of driverless cars have gone as far as to suggest that politicians who block Waymo will have blood on their hands, especially in a place like Philly, where traffic deaths are higher than in most cities.<\/p>\n An opportunity \u2026 if we\u2019ll take it <\/p>\n Of course, the question of whether Philly should or should not allow Waymo onto our streets may be moot. It\u2019s up to the state \u2014 not City Council<\/a> \u2014 to allow Google to operate its robotaxis here (or not). Robots are expected to replace millions of driving jobs across the country over the next several decades. Why would it be any different here?<\/p>\n Instead, this moment presents an opportunity to determine how this technology is deployed here \u2014 and who will benefit from it.<\/p>\n State Representative Napoleon Nelson (D-Montgomery County) fears that without embracing autonomous vehicles, Philly could slide backwards in more ways than one. \u201cI think that all cities will need to have Waymo to be considered a real, 21st century metropolitan space,\u201d Nelson says.<\/p>\n Nelson is a Mt. Airy native and MIT graduate who believes that the benefits of driverless vehicles can go far beyond one commercial company like Waymo \u2014 assuming that legislators don\u2019t muck things up. Last year, Nelson sponsored a bill<\/a> that would clarify and expand state laws around the regulation of self-driving passenger cars (that is, vehicles for everyday people). As the laws stand today, autonomous vehicles \u2014 including 18-wheelers \u2014 are allowed on roads in limited conditions.<\/p>\n Before robotaxis are swarming our streets, Nelson would like all taxpayers to have access to the same technologies first. He worries that the fears over Waymo have overshadowed some of the uses which the average citizen might embrace, such as creating newfound mobility for seniors and individuals with disabilities who could own a car without needing to drive it.<\/p>\n \u201cI want us to not only hold on to thinking about how we regulate the AV [autonomous vehicles] industry currently, but also hold onto the promise of what they mean for our society,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
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