A Waymo spokesperson said: ‘We sincerely apologise for any disruption caused by this validation driver,who was driving the vehicle manually. We take this matter seriously and are working with our operations partner to ensure appropriate actions are taken.’
Waymo,owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet,introduced the robotaxis on London roads late last year as part of the first phase of testing,with the aim of launching passenger services later this year but pending government approval.
Until last week,the cars were controlled by the safety driver.
But Waymo has since started testing with AI largely controlling the drive,although each car will always have a human inside as a requirement.
London has become a battleground for robotaxi firms,with tech companies eyeing up the market that is set to open up if the UK government gives the go-ahead for them with new regulations.
However,critics have voiced concern over self-driving vehicles in London.
Robotaxis have been previously tested in more grid-like cities in China and the US,raising concern how they can adapt to London’s complex layout and traffic.
Waymo sparked outrage last year when a popular San Francisco neighbourhood cat named KitKat was ran over and killed.
@zonjy.media Driverless taxi waymo driver almost hit someone and drove straigh into crime scene tape almost hit a police officer obviously driverless taxi software seems like are not trained to avoid crime scene,crime scene tape,police car blue lights or ambulance blue lights in case of an accident. i think in my opinion this driverless taxi waymo are more risk than the public thinks. do you think this is safe enough to be in the streets of london. it puts police officers and emergency service people at risk last night.
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