Waymo is opening up its robotaxi service to anyone who wants to ride in San Francisco. Previously, customers interested in taking a ride in one of the company’s driverless cars needed to sign up for a waitlist which could take weeks or months to open up, The Verge reported.
Waymo began its commercial test service in the city in August 2021 with a rollout to “trusted testers” — reapproved riders, some of whom were asked otherwise sign nondisclosure agreements. In March 2022, Waymo began offering driverless rides for its staff. Since then, its been giving rides to regular people who sign up for its waitlist, which the company says approximately 300,000 people have done since it first launched.
Now, Waymo’s driverless ride hail service will be available to anyone who downloads the app and requests a ride. This is similar to how Waymo operates its robotaxi service in Phoenix, which has been open to the public without a waitlist since 2020. And it comes at a time when Waymo is trying to cement its lead in the robotaxi industry, as some of its competitors are hamstrung by mishaps or a need to keep testing.
Waymo posted on Waypoint – the official Waymo blog:
The wait is over. Starting today, anyone can hail a ride with Waymo in San Francisco. Rain, shine, or Karl the Fog, just download the app, and ride.
We’ve been operating in San Francisco for years now, deliberately scaling our service over time. With tens of thousands of weekly trips, our Waymo One service provides safe, sustainable, and reliable transportation to locals and visitors to the city alike.
Now, it’s available to anyone.
San Franciscans are using Waymo to connect to the city’s social fabric, making fully autonomous rides part of their daily lives.
About 30% of Waymo rides in San Francisco are to local businesses. We’ve provided thousands of rides to and from individual restaurants, live music venues, bars, coffee shops, ice cream parlors, parks and museums, boosting the local economy.
In a recent survey, over half our riders said they used Waymo in the past couple of months to or from medical appointments, highlighting the value of personal space during these trips. Additionally, 36% of our SF riders used Waymo to connect to other forms of transit, like BART or Muni. Some of our San Francisco riders even use Waymo to depart in style from their weddings…
Reuters reported Alphabet’s Waymo said on Tuesday its autonomous ride-hailing service, Waymo One, is now available to everyone in San Francisco, nearly four years after a similar move in Phoenix, Arizona.
Driverless vehicles are expected to drive commercial success for automakers even as regulatory scrutiny remains tight amid concerns of investors about growing investments in the nascent technology.
Waymo had started a test service with its research-focused program in San Francisco in 2021, which included an autonomous specialist on board for all rides at that time, as it looked to commercialize the technology.
In my opinion, it might be a good thing for Waymo to be operating autonomously in San Francisco. Not everyone has a car of their own – and they might need a Waymo ride.