The debate over the merits of self-driving taxis in the United States is in danger of being reignited after a Cruise vehicle prevented emergency services from working after a shooting.
The self-driving car company Cruise offers to transport passengers in several American cities. Despite all the progress made in autonomous driving, this technology has many detractors. And when a autonomous taxi prevents emergency workers from accessing the scene of a shooting, that supports their arguments. That’s what happened last Friday, when a shooting broke out in San Francisco’s oldest neighborhood, the Mission District.
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In a video posted to Twitter, an officer is heard saying of Cruise’s vehicle that he ” blocks medical emergencies and firefighters. We need to move it right away.” Many critics claim that the unpredictable reactions of robotaxis in exceptional situations make them dangerous for passengers, but also for people outside.
Self-driving cars have already caused hundreds of incidents in San Francisco
According to Cruise, his vehicle has nothing to be ashamed of. He was in the process of making a U-turn to avoid the place of the shooting. According The Guardian yet, “the city of San Francisco has evidence of tens or even hundreds or thousands of incidents in which self-driving cars blocked traffic, drove erratically, or interfered with emergency responders.” This kind of publicity is really unwelcome, because a important vote for the future of Waymo and Cruise is to be held at the end of the month, and it is not certain that they will win their case.
The subject is very delicate, and consensus is difficult to reach. When local elected officials say that self-driving cars will benefit the elderly or people with disabilities, others argue that the behavior of these cars remains unpredictable. For these last ones, ” self-driving cars need to prove they can work under the most demanding circumstances without compromising the safety, fairness, accessibility and capacity of the streets before being approved by the greatest number”.
