SAN FRANCISCO – California regulators granted Alphabet's self-driving car division Waymo permission on Friday to expand its robotaxi service to highways in several Bay Area cities and large parts of Los Angeles to have on city streets.
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) decision allows the company to deploy its robotaxis on local streets and highways at speeds of up to 65 miles per hour. But Julia Ilina, a spokeswoman for Waymo, said in a statement that the company wants to take a “cautious and gradual approach to expansion” and has “no immediate plans” to expand its robotaxi service to highways.
The ruling still represents a massive expansion for the company, which has been offering its 24/7 robotaxi service in San Francisco and Phoenix for months. The company tests its cars on highways in California with a safety driver behind the wheel, but in Phoenix the tests don't involve a human driver on highways, Ilina said. The company is currently not transporting passengers on highways.
Friday's decision follows fierce opposition from local officials — particularly in San Mateo and Los Angeles counties — who sought to stop the expansion, arguing that they should have more power over how and whether the technology is used on their streets becomes. In a November letter to the state commission, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said she was concerned about the “adverse impacts” the expansion would have.
“In a city that spans 500 square miles, has a population of about 4 million, and has 7,500 miles of roads, the risk is exponentially greater,” she wrote.
But the CPUC, which regulates the technology for the state, said in its decision that Waymo had “meeted the requirements” and may expand immediately. Despite the opposition, Waymo also received support from a number of groups in California – including the California Chamber of Commerce and the California Bicycle Coalition.
“CalBike sees autonomous driving technology as an opportunity to improve roads across California and the country,” the coalition said in a statement. “Waymo’s technology has the potential to create a safer road environment by eliminating human error and adhering to traffic rules, such as speed limits, that many human drivers do not follow.”
Still, fears of self-driving cars are likely to continue in California, where several incidents last month fueled officials' safety concerns about vehicles coming to their cities. For example, on several days in February, a Waymo vehicle crashed into a closing gate while leaving the University of Southern California campus, and the next day another car collided with a cyclist in San Francisco.
Then, days later, the company announced a voluntary recall of its software for an incident involving a pickup truck in Phoenix.
There were no major injuries in any of the incidents.
Ilina said the company is “grateful to the CPUC for this vote of confidence in our operations.”
“We are incredibly grateful to the drivers and community partners who have supported our service to date – including over 15,000 rides in LA to date – and look forward to bringing the benefits of fully autonomous ride-hailing to even more people,” she said .