Skip to main content

Cruise says it’s nearing approval for mass production of futuristic robotaxi

Interior of Cruise's Origin vehicle.
Cruise

Robotaxi company Cruise is “just days away” from getting regulatory approval that would pave the way for mass production of its purpose-built driverless vehicle, CEO Kyle Vogt said on Thursday in comments reported by the Detroit Free Press.

General Motors-backed Cruise unveiled the vehicle — called Origin — in early 2020, presenting the kind of driverless car that we all dreamed of when R&D in the sector kicked off years ago; a vehicle without a steering wheel and without pedals. A vehicle with passenger seats only.

Recommended Videos

Cruise’s current robotaxis, which operate in cities such as San Francisco and Phoenix, are modified vehicles and therefore come with a steering wheel, though companies in the sector are obviously looking to do away with it.

Cruise envisions thousands of the driverless Origin vehicles providing ridesharing services in cities across the U.S. But as the Origin has no steering wheel or other means of manual control found in regular automobiles, there is still a regulatory obstacle course to be navigated, including getting an all-important exemption from federal safety standards, which Vogt believes could be coming this month.

Critics of the current robotaxi services operated by Cruise and another major player — Waymo — fear that having vehicles like the Origin on the road could be a step too far at the current time, pointing to a string of incidents involving autonomous cars that have caused problems on the streets of San Francisco.

Just last month Cruise was ordered by regulators to halve its robotaxi fleet in San Francisco following a crash with a fire truck in which the driverless car’s passenger suffered minor injuries. The decision came just days after California’s Public Utilities Commission made a landmark decision when it voted to allow Cruise and Waymo to expand their paid ridesharing services in the city to all hours of the day instead of just quieter periods.

Vogt has voiced concerns that excessive resistance by critics could hinder the development of an autonomous technology that should ultimately make roads much safer.

Waymo has also shared a design for a vehicle similar to Cruise’s Origin. It’s the result of a partnership with Chinese automaker Geely and is based on its Zeekr minivan. Waymo said riders traveling inside the autonomous vehicle will experience “an interior without steering wheel and pedals, and with plenty of headroom, legroom and reclining seats, screens and chargers within arm’s reach, and an easy to configure and comfortable vehicle cabin.”

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Self-driving vehicle rules set to loosen under Trump, report says
self driving looser rules trump screenshot 2024 10 at 54 56 pm 6708947b14810

Tesla “has been very clear the future is autonomous,” CEO Elon Musk said in October, shortly after unveiling the Cybercab, Tesla’s self-driving robotaxi.

It now seems that Musk, who was recently nominated to lead a newly-created "Department of Government Efficiency," is sharing his crystal ball with the incoming Trump administration.

Read more
Waymo, Nexar present AI-based study to protect ‘vulnerable’ road users
waymo data vulnerable road users ml still  1 ea18c3

Robotaxi operator Waymo says its partnership with Nexar, a machine-learning tech firm dedicated to improving road safety, has yielded the largest dataset of its kind in the U.S., which will help inform the driving of its own automated vehicles.

As part of its latest research with Nexar, Waymo has reconstructed hundreds of crashes involving what it calls ‘vulnerable road users’ (VRUs), such as pedestrians walking through crosswalks, biyclists in city streets, or high-speed motorcycle riders on highways.

Read more
Tesla posts exaggerate self-driving capacity, safety regulators say
Beta of Tesla's FSD in a car.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is concerned that Tesla’s use of social media and its website makes false promises about the automaker’s full-self driving (FSD) software.
The warning dates back from May, but was made public in an email to Tesla released on November 8.
The NHTSA opened an investigation in October into 2.4 million Tesla vehicles equipped with the FSD software, following three reported collisions and a fatal crash. The investigation centers on FSD’s ability to perform in “relatively common” reduced visibility conditions, such as sun glare, fog, and airborne dust.
In these instances, it appears that “the driver may not be aware that he or she is responsible” to make appropriate operational selections, or “fully understand” the nuances of the system, NHTSA said.
Meanwhile, “Tesla’s X (Twitter) account has reposted or endorsed postings that exhibit disengaged driver behavior,” Gregory Magno, the NHTSA’s vehicle defects chief investigator, wrote to Tesla in an email.
The postings, which included reposted YouTube videos, may encourage viewers to see FSD-supervised as a “Robotaxi” instead of a partially automated, driver-assist system that requires “persistent attention and intermittent intervention by the driver,” Magno said.
In one of a number of Tesla posts on X, the social media platform owned by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, a driver was seen using FSD to reach a hospital while undergoing a heart attack. In another post, a driver said he had used FSD for a 50-minute ride home. Meanwhile, third-party comments on the posts promoted the advantages of using FSD while under the influence of alcohol or when tired, NHTSA said.
Tesla’s official website also promotes conflicting messaging on the capabilities of the FSD software, the regulator said.
NHTSA has requested that Tesla revisit its communications to ensure its messaging remains consistent with FSD’s approved instructions, namely that the software provides only a driver assist/support system requiring drivers to remain vigilant and maintain constant readiness to intervene in driving.
Tesla last month unveiled the Cybercab, an autonomous-driving EV with no steering wheel or pedals. The vehicle has been promoted as a robotaxi, a self-driving vehicle operated as part of a ride-paying service, such as the one already offered by Alphabet-owned Waymo.
But Tesla’s self-driving technology has remained under the scrutiny of regulators. FSD relies on multiple onboard cameras to feed machine-learning models that, in turn, help the car make decisions based on what it sees.
Meanwhile, Waymo’s technology relies on premapped roads, sensors, cameras, radar, and lidar (a laser-light radar), which might be very costly, but has met the approval of safety regulators.

Read more