While the race for fully autonomous cars rages on, Waymo, a company owned by Alphabet–YouTube and Google’s parent company– has made several large advances in many tech-centered cities, including Austin. Founded in 2009, Waymo is part of Google’s Self-Driving Car Project, which aims to develop both a rideshare service and an updated car, the Waymo One.
In an announcement made in August 2023, the California-based company stated that the Waymo One would be hitting streets in Austin as well as other large cities, such as Phoenix, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The cars are all-electric Jaguar I-PACE models with Waymo technology attached. Austin is reported by the United Nations Environmental Program to have been prioritizing sustainability, and, accordingly, Waymo One being electric allows both the company and Austin to further this shared goal. The cars are set to partner with Uber starting in early 2025 as a driverless rideshare service that Austinites can request via an app on their phone. Andy McCasland, the CEO of Spring INC, a production agency and management firm in Austin, explained the company’s support for Waymo.
“I trust a company like Google to own Waymo because it takes a company with very deep pockets to fund the kind of research that they’re doing,” McCasland said. “Waymo operates as an independent company, and I haven’t seen anything to make me concerned about the way they’re operating.”
According to Waymo’s website, Waymo cars have accumulated over 20 million miles of total driven through the trials the company has been running on streets across the U.S. Marc Davis, founder of Moment Motor Company, a car preservation company based in Austin, explained the potentially positive impacts that Waymo cars could bring to Austin streets.
“Long term, having our streets filled with more and more of these vehicles could potentially reduce traffic injuries and fatalities as well as potentially alleviate traffic congestion,” Davis said. “The ability for these vehicles to communicate with one another and coordinate could allow for optimized operation in complicated situations.”
In September 2024, Waymo released new statistics of the number of miles driven through the end of June, showing the Waymo Driver had 84% fewer crashes with airbag deployment, 73% fewer injury-causing crashes, and 48% fewer police-reported crashes than a human driver. Although it is important to note the drastically larger amount of human-driven vehicles compared to Waymo cars, these safety features are a positive for many who are hesitant about autonomous driving.
“I feel that well-developed and managed software and hardware can now do a far better job of driving vehicles than many of the distracted and underskilled drivers on our roads today,” Davis said. “I believe that Austin’s reputation as an innovative city that embraces technology makes it a good fit for autonomous vehicle development and testing.”
According to a statement from Waymo, Uber, a ride-hailing service that supplies cars with clients via an app, hopes to utilize the new driverless technology to provide a more personalized approach for each user. Partnering with an established company such as Uber makes these features available to everybody. Dara Khosrowshahi, the CEO of Uber, commented in a public statement on how Uber will build a partnership with Waymo.
“Soon, riders in Austin and Atlanta will be able to experience that same mobility magic, through a new fleet of dedicated autonomous Waymo vehicles, available only on Uber,” Khosrowshahi said.
To drive properly and avoid obstacles, engineers have designed the Waymo car to use powerful light sensors, cameras, and artificial intelligence to determine the best way to move forward, according to Google. The cars also use a LiDAR system, a detection system which allows the car to perceive the area faster and farther ahead. Ben Livingston, an Austinite and local artist, described how the Waymo cars affect his neighborhood.
“It’s like driving with the Invisible Man because there’s [no one], and it’s turning and the gas pedal and brakes are [moving],” Livingston said. “It’s as if there’s somebody driving that car…it’s like the most careful driver in the world is driving you around.”
