Self-driving cars from GM’s Cruise block San Francisco intersection in latest problem for autonomous vehicles

FutureBoy

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Self-driving cars from GM’s Cruise block San Francisco intersection in latest problem for autonomous vehicles
PUBLISHED FRI, JUL 1 20223:31 PM EDT

KEY POINTS
  • At least seven Cruise vehicles blocked traffic by clustering in an intersection in San Francisco starting late Tuesday night, blocking traffic.
  • Photos and a description of the Cruise robotaxis blocking several lanes of traffic in San Francisco were shared Wednesday on Reddit and Twitter.
  • The incident is another example of the difficulty of deploying fleets of self-driving vehicles.
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A robot car of the General Motors subsidiary Cruise is on a test drive.
Andrej Sokolow | picture alliance | Getty Images

Automotive and tech executives have long promised that autonomous vehicles would drive better than humans, but that wasn’t the case for a fleet of Cruise cars in San Francisco this week.

The company, a majority-owned subsidiary of General Motors, confirmed it had an “issue earlier this week that caused some of our vehicles to cluster together.” A company spokesman said the problem was “resolved and no passengers were impacted,” but declined to give further details.

Photos and a description of the Cruise robotaxis blocking several lanes of traffic in San Francisco were shared on Reddit and Twitter. At least seven Cruise vehicles can be seen clustering in the intersection of Gough and Fulton streets in the city’s Civic Center neighborhood late Tuesday night, potentially blocking traffic both ways on one of the streets.

It’s unclear how long the cars were blocking traffic or what caused the situation with the vehicles that now provide a service to paying customers on some San Francisco streets.




The incident is another example of how difficult it is to develop and deploy self-driving vehicle fleets. Commercializing autonomous vehicles has been far more challenging than many predicted even a few years ago. The challenges have led to a consolidation in the autonomous vehicle sector after years of enthusiasm touting the technology as the next multitrillion-dollar market for transportation companies.

The San Francisco Department of Emergency Management was notified and contacted Cruise about the problem, San Francisco Police Department public information officer Kathryn Winters told CNBC. She said no officers were dispatched to the scene.

The incident occurred roughly a week after Cruise became the first company to offer unmanned fared rides to the public in a major city. The vehicles operate between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. on designated streets in San Francisco.

Alphabet-backed Waymo has reportedly had similar problems involving the clustering of its autonomous vehicles in the city. KPIX-TV, a CBS affiliate in San Francisco, reported in October that Waymo vehicles were getting stuck down a dead end street.

Cruise’s problem also comes months after an online video revealed a Cruise autonomous vehicle getting pulled over by police. In the video posted on April 1, the Cruise car initially pulled over to the side of the road and stopped as the officer approached the driver’s side before it sped across an intersection and went further down the road.
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FutureBoy

FutureBoy

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The San Francisco Department of Emergency Management was notified and contacted Cruise about the problem, San Francisco Police Department public information officer Kathryn Winters told CNBC. She said no officers were dispatched to the scene.
Interesting that GM didn't seem to know about the incident till after the the San Francisco Emergency Management team.

I'd think that the Cruise fleet would be well monitored and have all sorts of alerts for things like this. Seems like during these early times, every possible odd situation should be alerted on and then investigated by the company so that they are the first to respond and can more easily respond to situations.
 

Bill906

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Anyone find it a bit eerie that they sought out their peers and grouped together? Like many animals do? Is this a sign of sentience? Now that we are onto them, will they be more secretive in their meetings? "Oh look, a bunch of Cruise vehicles went down a dead end street and got stuck there. Boy are they dumb." (Cruise vehicle under his breath) dumb indeed... (evil laugh).
 

SolarWizard

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All joking aside they either clustered because they wanted too (terrifying) or because of some pretty serious fault. Either way I hope robotaxis aren’t a real thing until at least 2035
 


Cybr on

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We went to SF June 2nd for the Dont tax the Sun rally in front of CPUC cuz it’s just the right thing to do and I immediately recognize cruises autonomous vehicle. It was really cool to see. I thought, damn, if that works in SF, it will work anywhere. 🤣
then I read about them grouping together. We all were thinking, what the heck are they doing?
Apparently it did not take them long to start their sinister plans to wipe out human civilization as we know it. 🤣😈
Just kidding.
I truly don’t want to repeat an Orson Wells scenario. (War of the Worlds😆)
 

Cybr on

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I truly don’t know how far out we are with this tech. It’s all truly speculation when it’s comes to predicting when, but we certainly know that there’s lots of money going to that technology.
 

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They clustered because their test routes are exactly the same for every car.

Add to they they all use the same navigation solutions and map data, and there are few routes between certain segments of the city, and they're all going to end up in the same place behind a single faulted vehicle.

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