Cruise, General Motors’ autonomous vehicle subsidiary, has announced that it is now running a fleet of fully driverless cars on the streets of San Francisco. The move is a major step forward in offering a fully autonomous taxi service to compete with the likes of services like Lyft and Uber.
As outlined in a recent report from the Associated Press, GM Cruise is now operating a fleet of fully autonomous vehicles in California. Unlike in previous testing, the vehicles do not have a human pilot behind the wheel ready to take control if needed. Although the vehicles do have a Cruise employee in the front passenger seat, the employees does not have access to the vehicle controls, and eventually, it’s expected that the employee won’t sit in the front of the vehicle at all.
As GM Authority covered back in October, GM Cruise received approval to operate fully autonomous vehicles in California via a permit issued by the state Department of Motor Vehicles. The company has tested its autonomous vehicle technology in California for years, but will now run a fleet of five fully autonomous vehicles on the streets of San Francisco.
“You’re seeing fully driverless technology out of the (research and development) phase and into the beginning of the journey to being a real commercial product,” said Cruise CEO Dan Ammann.
GM purchased Cruise in 2016. The company has developed its autonomous technology in the real-world over the course of two million self-driven miles, as well as in computer simulations. Earlier this year, General Motors unveiled Cruise Origin, its first-ever fully autonomous vehicle approved for production.
Now, the race is on to develop commercially viable self-driving technology, with competitors like Google’s Waymo and Amazon’s Zoox also in the hunt.
In addition to launching a new taxi service, self-driving technology has also proven useful during the COVID-19 pandemic, with GM Cruise assisting in more than 50,000 contactless deliveries to bring meals to less fortunate individuals and families in San Francisco.
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Comments
Consumer Reports is based in San Francisco. What are the chances GM is still sore about years of unfair reviews.
Seek and destroy
Cruise is based out of SF. I doubt GM even cares about Consumer Reports these days.
Andy
Recent articles would indicate consumer reports personnel smoke a lot of dope. Let them think a few driverless cars are after them.
Peter, the ludicrous notion that a multi billion dollar corporation would make such huge decisions based off of such pettiness aside, consumer reports is based out of Yonkers, NY.
Charlie
CR & J.D. Power both test vehicle dependability. Reason dictates that both should yield similar results. Differences in results indicate inaccuracies in testing.
Get CR to improve it’s testing method for autos, and I’ll get GM to call off their killer drones.
This is another dumb idea. Imagine the atrocities committed in Driverless Vehicles before you get in! GM should be embarrassed.
norm
“atrocities committed in driverless vehicles”
Are you taking about elevators, Ski lifts or something you may find at a theme park?
Driving is a dying skill. Most people are focused on their phones, and are barely paying attention to what’s going on on the road in front of them.
If driving is a dying skill so is liberty. Controlled mobility is tyrannical. Americans love freedom and resent control. GM will need some sort of Communist government to pull this crap off. Good luck. We are done with lock downs and masks.
Norm
You got it all wrong. You are the one ordering the car where to go. You can get out of the car anytime you want, and order it to go park itself. Personally I would never buy a vehicle without a manual override.
I’m not much of a law biting citizen. My driving record shows a flagrant disregard for traffic laws, but I do respect my neighbors. Not wanting to cause them any harm is why I wear a mask and try and keep under 100 mph when driving.
@norm: Brilliant parody account. Almost bought that you were serious.
You only need a mask when you rob someone. This is a first. The one being robbed is the one wearing a mask. The flu goes through masks. We are done with the BS here in Florida.
Sure, ignore science.
You mean the same science that gave us Auschwitz? You can have it.
Guessing this is not the Norm everyone calls out to when he enters a bar.
Good one…lol.