This is the monthly edition of the Transport Workers Union’s Transportation Technology Newsletter. We aim to inform and educate our members, the labor movement, the public and policymakers about developments in transportation technology – and what the TWU is doing to ensure that new technology doesn’t undermine safety or harm the livelihoods of hard-working blue-collar workers. For suggestions and questions, please email ewytkind@gmail.com or adaugherty@twu.org.
ITEM OF THE MONTH
CHANGING TUNE: San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie, who came into office as a Big Tech booster, recently backed a bill in Congress (also backed by the TWU) that would establish national safety standards for autonomous vehicles. Politico reports that Lurie backed the legislation after a spate of Waymo incidents in San Francisco, notably July 4th traffic jams caused by AVs and malfunctions caused by power outages. He also backed additional state legislation on AVs earlier this summer.
The bill, authored by Rep. Kevin Mullin (D-Calif.) would require the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to establish minimum safety standards and protocols for how operators work with local first responders. It would also require AV companies to provide standardized emergency response protocols and create a 24-hour hotline for public safety officials to communicate with AV companies when their vehicles cause incidents. And it would direct NHTSA to establish a pathway for public officials to issue notices that would digitally fence off certain areas for AVs during emergencies.
“For years, San Francisco has been a testing ground for autonomous vehicles – and the traveling public along with elected officials don’t like what they see,” said TWU Administrative Vice President Curtis Tate. “TWU members who help move San Francisco are dealing with AVs on the job every day, and in some cases being blocked or hindered by vehicles without a human on board. Companies like Waymo have used up their goodwill and politicians who once cheered them on are now trying to rein them in.”
NO ONE TO SAVE YOU: The San Francisco Chronicle reported on a harrowing incident in May where two criminals worked in tandem to attack a Waymo vehicle with a passenger inside. Sherman Watson was riding in a Waymo in the early morning hours of May 9 when a man in a hooded sweatshirt grabbed the front bumper of his Waymo, causing it to stop. Then a second assailant approached and the two began smashing the front windshield and windows. Waymo’s remote assistant called the police, but Watson said Waymo’s support team had no idea when law enforcement would arrive and declined to move the car potentially out of harm’s way, saying it was “obstructed.”
“That’s when I was like, ‘I’m gonna die,’” Watson told the Chronicle. He also called 911 and pleaded with the Waymo intercom voice. The police showed up 10 minutes later, after the assailants left minutes earlier.
“The lack of a human operator is a major safety issue,” said TWU International President John Samuelsen. “The Waymo passenger in San Francisco was a sitting duck, and no amount of ‘tech support’ is going to help someone escape a dangerous situation where they are locked inside a car that will not move.”
Incredibly, Watson, despite suffering cuts during the attack from shattered glass, wasn’t identified as the victim. The police report identified the Waymo vehicle as the victim and Watson as merely a witness to the crime. Watson has also, without success, tried to get video of the incident from Waymo turned over.
ISSUES ON THE EAST COAST: A new study from Hunter College says that robotaxis in New York City would result in more serious crashes than professional for-hire drivers and cause more congestion. The study argues that Waymo’s safety claims of being safer than the “average human driver” aren’t a good comparison because the for-hire drivers who stand to lose out when Waymos exist en masse are 14 times safer than the average human driver in NYC.
“There’s a mantra going around that autonomous vehicles are more than 90% safer than human driven cars. This report delves into the data and makes it clear: There is no solid evidence as of yet to make such a claim compared to the for-hire vehicles already serving this city,” said Sam Schwartz, founder of the Sam Schwartz Transportation Research Program. “We find that NYC taxi and Uber/Lyft drivers may in fact be safer per mile.”
And the study notes that while robotaxis in California spend the majority of their time on the road pulled over and parked while waiting for rides, such behavior in NYC would lead to more traffic and Waymos circling city stress endlessly (think of it as a much worse version of the Waymos in Atlanta that were using a suburban cul-de-sac as their idling area).
ACCESSIBLE? NO: NOTUS and WAMU report that disability advocates in Washington, DC are unhappy with Waymo’s lack of commitment to accessibility. During a hearing earlier this summer regarding potential AV deployment in Washington, DC Waymo said it cannot deploy vehicles that can accommodate wheelchairs.
“The autonomous vehicle industry, the operators…have used us as a talking point,” said CT Tyson, government affairs liaison for the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund. “They have not wanted to make a true, fully accessible vehicle.” Tyson noted that promises from private companies to provide accessible transportation have largely gone unfilled unless the government requires it.
“Big Tech companies have used riders with mobility limitations as a talking point, but just like with safety it is merely lip service,” Tate said. “These companies want to maximize profits by replacing rideshare drivers, yet they come nowhere close to the essential role of Bus Operators and Paratransit Drivers for riders with wheelchairs.”
WHAT ELSE IS COOKING
AUTONOMOUS TRUCKING LAWSUIT: The California Teamsters are suing several state agencies, including the Department of Motor Vehicles, arguing that Gov. Gavin Newsom improperly rolled out regulations that pave the way for self-driving large trucks on state roads. In April, state regulators adopted new rules for autonomous trucks that would eventually allow vehicles weighing 10,001 pounds or more to operate on public roads.
“The DMV irresponsibly, carelessly, and unlawfully kept the public in the dark about the true economic and human costs of the amended Autonomous Vehicle regulations,” said Julie Gutman Dickinson, an attorney with labor law firm Bush Gottlieb representing the Teamsters, in a statement. “The only way to protect the public’s right to properly scrutinize regulations that will transform transportation in California is for the Court to order the DMV to immediately rescind the illegally enacted regulations.”
TESLA ROBOTAXIS COME TO FLORIDA: As Tesla faces a federal probe into a tragic incident where a 76-year-old woman was killed in her home by a Tesla Model 3 apparently using the automated driving feature, the company nonetheless is expanding robotaxi service – this time into Florida cities including Miami where TWU members work at Miami-Dade Transit.
The expansion in Florida follows the launch of robotaxi service in Texas and California, in the wake of wildly optimistic predictions of expansion by Tesla CEO Elon Musk. “I think we’ll probably have autonomous ride hailing in probably half the population of the U.S. by the end of [2025],” Musk boasted, after previously declaring that Tesla would “have over a million robotaxis on the road” that same year. There are about 50 Tesla robotaxis on US roads although that number is expected to rise as service expands.
Despite significant scrutiny of its now scrapped “Autopilot” feature in favor of a subscription program, set at $99 a month, Tesla will charge for access to its so-called “full self-driving” (FSD) technology. Musk tweeted early last year: “I should also mention that the $99/month for supervised FSD will rise as FSD’s capabilities improve. The massive value jump is when you can be on your phone or sleeping for the entire ride (unsupervised FSD).”
“On a daily basis these technologies are proving they are not ready to operate safely on our roads – we are seeing severe safety incidents such as robotaxis driving onto flooded roads, blocking transit buses, and speeding by school buses,” said TWU International President John Samuelsen. “And now we are going to permit carmakers and technology companies to claim it’s okay for drivers to sleep while they drive using this flawed technology? It’s time for federal regulators to step up and put a stop to this before more people get hurt or die.”
NO WHEEL TO TURN: At a time when Amazon’s Zoox and other robotaxi operators face mounting safety scrutiny as their vehicles go rogue such as failing to detect smoke and driving into a fire scene – Zoox has inexplicably secured federal clearance from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to run robotaxis revenue service without human controls in its vehicles such as a steering wheel. Zoox also serves Las Vegas and San Francisco. Oddly, the same regulator that approved the federal exemption required for Zoox to operate, recently issued a warning to robotaxi companies to fix “a clear pattern of driverless AVs interfering with law enforcement and other first responders.”
“It seems to us that NHTSA should not reward this flawed technology that it has called out as unsafe around emergency response scenes by giving out exemptions from federal safety requirements,” Tate said. “Federal and state regulators are allowing too much dangerous experimentation on our roads.”
WHAT WE’RE READING:
Waymo Eyes Expansion Into Pinellas County. Tampa Bay Times.
NFL Head Coach in Serious Accident Using Tesla Autopilot electrek