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Questions from a month in San Francisco

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This was my first extended trip to the San Francisco Bay Area and I have questions. Some of these have simple answers; others are entire research agendas. I would be interested to talk more about any of these! What are all the different types of self-driving cars in the city? The Waymo cars are most common, and the Amazon Zoox are labeled, but there were at least five other form factors around the city which I didn’t recognize. I looked for a birder’s-guide to self-driving cars and couldn’t find one. What is Waymo’s relationship to the city? How did the negotiations to begin commercial operations go here? Was it easier here than Phoenix or LA? Is there a full-time Waymo employee sitting in the SF MTA offices? How closely do they share data? What does SF (and LA and Phoenix) get from Waymo? Some American cities are using uber data to identify potholes; Waymo data are much richer. I don’t want to give each city hundreds of mobile speed cameras, but increased sensors and visibility into t

Questions from a month in San Francisco January 29, 2025 This was my first extended trip to the San Francisco Bay Area and I have questions. Some of these have simple answers; others are entire research agendas. I would be interested to talk more about any of these! What are all the different types of self-driving cars in the city? The Waymo cars are most common, and the Amazon Zoox are labeled, but there were at least five other form factors around the city which I didn’t recognize. I looked for a birder’s-guide to self-driving cars and couldn’t find one. What is Waymo’s relationship to the c

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