General Motors Still Awaits Permit To Test Self-Driving Cars In New York
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General Motors announced last year it would begin testing its self-driving cars in New York City—a major change from sunny California and Arizona. However, the city of New York has reportedly dragged its feet and hasn’t issued a permit yet.
According to a Jalopnik report last Thursday, there’s been zero movement on the city’s part. The original announcement between GM and the state of New York called for an early-2018 deployment of the self-driving cars. As a reminder, we’re now in the middle of May and quickly approaching the half-way mark of 2018.
The delays could have something to do with the NYC mayor Bill de Blasio’s opposition to robo taxis operating on the city’s streets.
“The Mayor has strenuously opposed this pilot on heavily traveled lower Manhattan streets,” said Seth Stein, a spokesman for the mayor’s office.
Stein’s statement added the state should “stop” GM’s plans immediately.
General Motors and Cruise Automation have continuously tested its self-driving cars, the Cruise AV, in California and Arizona. Tests in those states provide rather ideal conditions for autonomous-driving technology with clear skies, a lack of rain, and warm temperatures. New York City will likely prove a much more challenging locale.
GM has reportedly mapped a “significant” portion of NYC since the automaker announced plans to bring the Cruise AV to the Big Apple. Previously, just five square miles of the city had been mapped.
The automaker hopes to commercialize self-driving cars sometime in 2019.
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Some additional info, Cruise tests in CA but it’s San Francisco which where it does more rains, can get cold (July average is 67f) and has clear skies due to the fog/marine layer…
GMs Cruise applied at the STATE level, the CITY of NYC is apparently opposing this due to speculation its a taxi city…Unlike other locations, NY requires a police escort at all times, paid for by the self driving company so one could debate if NY even makes sense since you have to pay a premium for the police detail…Lot of other congested cities in the US…