How to Sign up For the First Self-Driving Taxi Service in California
Cruise around downtown SF, driven by a robot
Earlier this week, General Motors’ Cruise division announced that it was opening up its self-driving taxi service to the public in San Francisco. For years now, Cruise has been testing its self-driving cars on the streets of San Francisco. The cars have racked up over 2 million miles of driving in the city. During that time, they’ve been constantly scanning their surroundings, monitoring traffic patterns, and otherwise learning about the city.
Previously, the cars were supervised by human safety drivers, who sat behind the wheel and were ready to jump in if something went wrong. Over the last few months, though, Cruise began testing its cars without safety drivers, operating as an autonomous taxi service. Who were the passengers? Cruise employees.
That’s apparently gone well, as Cruise announced this week that the service would open to the general public. Cruise has obtained a license from the state of California to launch the service. Initially, it will be free (Cruises’ license only allows free rides), but down the line, they’ll likely charge, just like Uber or Lyft, but with robots behind the wheel.