Waymo’s driverless cars continue to crash less often than people
The Verge Andrew J. Hawkins
Waymo says its driverless cars are still crashing less than people. That helps its case with regulators, but critics say crashes aren’t the whole story.
Based on reporting by The Verge, Andrew J. Hawkins — read the original for the full story.
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Waymo’s newest self-reported safety numbers are meant to do one thing: keep pushing the idea that its robotaxis are safer than human drivers. So far, that message is holding up in the company’s own data. But the argument around driverless cars is getting bigger than just crashes, and that’s where the fight gets messier.
The company says it looked at 271 million driverless miles through the end of June, across five cities. That’s 50 million more miles than it reported in its last safety update. The report covers miles driven in places including Atlanta, Austin, Phoenix and Los Angeles, though the source doesn’t spell out the full list.
Waymo’s timing is no accident. Policymakers are still weighing both the safety and the economic impact of autonomous vehicles, and Waymo clearly wants its numbers in that debate. The company is betting that a large pile of miles and a low crash rate can win over more supporters.
But not everyone is convinced that crash data tells the whole story. Some experts say these reports miss the everyday traffic weirdness that robotaxis can create without actually hitting anything. That’s the awkward part for Waymo: even if the cars are crashing less often, the case for them still has to survive the rest of the road.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is the usual self-driving car trick: point at the crash rate and hope nobody asks about the rest of traffic. Safety matters, obviously, but so does whether a robotaxi turns the street into a slow-motion obstacle course. The industry keeps selling a cleaner future while measuring only the bits that make it look clean.
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