The very day Elon Musk expanded the boundaries of his three-week-old autonomous ride hailing service in Austin, Joe Tegtmeyer\u2019s Tesla tried to illegally run a railroad crossing just as a locomotive approached.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe robotaxi did not see that, and the safety observer had to stop the vehicle until the train had passed. So there\u2019s a little bit of work that still needs to be polished up with the software, but otherwise it\u2019s been just an amazing opportunity to see how well the expanded service is working,\u201d he said on Monday in a post on X<\/a>. <\/p>\n Taking what might have been a life-threatening situation seemingly in stride, Tegtmeyer then argued in favor of Tesla adding more cars to the 10 or so currently on the roads to cut waiting times that had ballooned to 20 minutes.<\/p>\n None of this comes as a surprise to Elias Martinez. One of the earliest Full Self-Driving beta testers, he says Tesla\u2019s software has \u201ccome a long way\u201d over the past four years. But he argues all available evidence points to the technology being nowhere near robust enough to support the 10,000 cars Musk claimed in May<\/a> were possible in theory on day one.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThese issues prove Tesla should never have launched even with just 10 vehicles,\u201d he tells\u00a0Fortune.\u00a0\u201cYes, it works most of the time, but it blows my mind we\u2019re still seeing issues like FSD running red lights or driving on the wrong side of the road. This shouldn\u2019t be happening on such a regular basis.\u201d<\/p>\n The problem is with each car added, the greater the statistical chance of a collision. Any robotaxi service, Waymo included, needs to be virtually flawless in order to scale the service safely\u2014yet with Tesla there\u2019s no sign of that, according to Martinez.<\/p>\n First 42 minute @robotaxi<\/a> ride complete! Follow along on this ride with me and I\u2019ve got some observations and things to talk about along the way!<\/p>\n This ride was almost perfect but I did have one instance of the safety driver having to intervene at a rail road crossing, which I\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/CQwKuHU8Nx<\/a>\u2014 Joe Tegtmeyer \ud83d\ude80 \ud83e\udd20\ud83d\udef8\ud83d\ude0e (@JoeTegtmeyer) July 14, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n A distraction from declining sales numbers<\/p>\n The former U.S. Marine hosts the crowd-sourced\u00a0FSD Community Tracker<\/a>, the single most sophisticated and reliable form of empirical data collection and analysis on Tesla\u2019s self-driving technology that is publicly available. Car executives like Volkswagen<\/a> Autonomous Mobility CEO Christian Senger<\/a> speak highly of it as a benchmark, and even Musk\u2014who has his own internal data on disengagements that he refuses to share\u2014singled it out as proof the company is making progress.<\/p>\n Developed with the help of a Canadian Tesla driver, his tracker is simple and easy to use: during a trip, FSD beta testers like Martinez catalog in real time problems that arise directly into the vehicle\u2019s onboard infotainment system, where it\u2019s stored until it can be uploaded to the internet. Drivers are incentivized through weekly recognition of the top contributors, turning it into something of a friendly competition.<\/p>\n Currently,\u00a0its data shows<\/a>\u00a0even the latest FSD version from Tesla results in a critical disengagement roughly every 340 miles between both city and highway at present. Called 13.2.9, it rolled out in May just weeks before the Austin service launched. \u201cYou sometimes hear Elon saying, \u2018we\u2019re having a hard time finding disengagements.\u2019 That is\u00a0such\u00a0BS,\u201d Martinez adds.<\/p>\n Although the Austin robotaxi fleet is believed to be using a newer iteration, in Martinez\u2019s estimation it closely approximates the performance of the version released to the public since they reveal similar shortcomings, such as driving in the wrong lane.<\/p>\n He believes Tesla has been more focused on meeting Musk\u2019s June launch timetable come hell or high water than on perfecting the actual underlying technology. Since demand for his EVs dropped sharply in the first half of the year and his Cybertruck has proven to be a commercial flop, the CEO needs something to keep investors happy.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis feels like a distraction from the declining sales numbers,\u201d he said, adding \u201cElon is gambling.\u201d<\/p>\n In the meantime, the last major update Tesla owners received, v13.2.1, launched to the public\u00a0seven months ago<\/a>. <\/p>\n The company did not respond to a request to comment on this or any other point related to its FSD self-driving technology.<\/p>\n Musk stakes future on game-changing technology<\/p>\n When Tesla hosts its second-quarter earnings call after the close of markets on Wednesday, Musk will face a barrage of questions around the roadmap of his robotaxi pilot. At press time, the\u00a0top-ranked issue<\/a>\u00a0is the performance he\u2019s seen so far in Austin and how soon the service can scale in terms of new cities and more vehicles.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Investors have a lot of money riding on FSD, and will want answers as to how soon 10 cars in Austin can grow to thousands across the country. Only then will they get a feeling for how long it will take Tesla to leapfrog Waymo, going from zero unsupervised miles currently to the 100 million just recorded by its archrival.<\/p>\n The technology could prove a game changer, especially for marginalized communities like the handicapped.\u00a0Jessie Wolinsky, a legally blind millennial who\u00a0video blogs<\/a>\u00a0about her experience slowly losing her eyesight, told California regulators she was grateful for being part of Waymo\u2019s trusted rider program.<\/p>\n \u201cIt has provided me with a feeling of safety that I\u2019ve never had before.,\u201d she said at an August 2023 hearing shortly before the state voted to greenlight the technology. \u201cI get into a Waymo vehicle, not only am I able to get to where I need to be on my own terms, which is huge, but I am able to do so without the fear of being harassed, groped, assaulted, attacked or potentially worse.\u201d<\/p>\n Musk staked the company\u2019s fortune on the robotaxi service, which now must generate the profits needed to fund his Optimus robot program currently under development.\u00a0<\/p>\n If you want trust, you need full transparency <\/p>\n But\u00a0autonomous driving at its heart is a technology steeped in statistical eventualities. How many cars are operating at the same time and how many miles do they collectively log before the first accident occurs\u2014thousands? Millions? More?\u00a0<\/p>\n Flying may seem like a dangerous endeavor to some, but there is no form of mass transportation safer since 99.9999% of flights land without incident. Companies like Tesla and Waymo now need to demonstrate a similar level of reliability despite variables far exceeding a plane flying through a relatively less crowded sky.\u00a0<\/p>\n For that you need extensive, detailed data \u2014 the kind that Martinez collects with the help of the Tesla community. If you ask the company for answers, though, you\u2019ll get none \u2014 just the opposite in fact. Instead of attempting to gain public trust through transparency, Musk\u2019s company is currently pressing federal regulators to\u00a0bury its robotaxi safety record<\/a>, claiming the data must remain confidential for business reasons.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis shouldn\u2019t be proprietary. You\u2019re driving on public roads so the data needs to be made available,\u201d he said. \u201cThe fact that they\u2019re hiding data should tell you everything you need to know. If you really want trust, you have to have full transparency.\u201d<\/p>\n Instead, Musk only releases a quarterly crash statistic for his FSD beta program, now called FSD Supervised: for the\u00a0first three months<\/a>\u00a0of this year Teslas drove 7.44 million miles before an accident. While this is a sterling result compared to the 700,000 miles for the average American driver, these are not robotaxi miles\u2014they rely on drivers intervening before a collision ensues.\u00a0<\/p>\n And even these figures, Martinez argues, should be vetted independently by regulators before being taken as credible: \u201cIf you leave it to a company, they will filter it to fit their narrative.\u201d<\/p>\n Not ready to scale safely<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Tesla\u2019s response seems to laugh it all off. On Monday, Musk thought it would be funny to expand the area covered by its three-week-old Austin robotaxi service to resemble a giant penis when seen on a map.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHarder, better, faster, stronger,\u201d the $1 trillion company wrote on Monday, a double entendre referencing the synth pop track of the same name by Daft Punk, a duo appropriately known for performing as robots. Musk approvingly reposted the phallus-shaped service map, adding the fare would now be hiked to $6.90 per ride from $4.20 previously, both numbers the 54-year old often employs for comical effect.<\/p>\n In short, the geographic expansion seemed more like a PR stunt more than anything else. The number of cars collecting fares has not appeared to change; Tesla continues to limit the number of people that can use the service; and human safety monitors still sit in the vehicle. <\/p>\n On the prediction site Polymarket, speculators have put the probability Tesla will have a fully functioning robotaxi service anywhere in the country at anytime during the rest of this year at\u00a0just 42%<\/a>, down from a high of 86% one month ago.<\/p>\n \u201cIt shows they\u2019re not ready to scale, and if they did try to prematurely scale, they\u2019re going to run into problems,\u201d Martinez says. \u201cThen you\u2019re putting people at risk. Yes, maybe it\u2019s a lower risk compared to a drunk driver, but it\u2019s still a risk.\u201d\n<\/p>\n