Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt has addressed criticism regarding the company’s fully autonomous robotaxi technology, characterizing the criticism as “sensationalized.” Vogt’s statements follow Cruise’s rapid expansion across multiple U.S. cities, as well as a series of high-profile incidents involving the Cruise robotaxis. Meanwhile, critics say that without more oversight, incidents involving autonomous vehicles will only increase and may lead to serious harm.
In a recent interview with The Washington Post, Vogt said that while Cruise autonomous vehicles have been involved in some incidents, the reaction to these incidents tends to be overblown.
“Anything that we do differently than humans is being sensationalized,” Vogt said.
“No one has even been seriously hurt across several million miles of driving and hundreds of thousands of rides provided in San Francisco,” he added.
Cruise is headquartered in San Francisco, and first deployed its driverless robotaxi technology on the San Francisco’s public roads. San Francisco is considered a good test of the company’s AV technology due to the winding, hilly nature of the streets.
The company now has more than 400 units of its autonomous Chevy Bolt EV test vehicles operating across the country, recently expanding operations to Las Vegas, Washington D.C., Seattle, Raleigh, Charlotte, Atlanta, and Miami. The company is currently accumulating more than 1 million driverless miles per month across its fleet, recently crossing the 4-million-mile mark in August.
Nevertheless, Cruise has faced considerable criticism as the result of several high-profile incidents, including reportedly causing traffic jams and colliding with a fire truck. In light of these incidents, the California Department of Motor Vehicles recently ordered Cruise to reduce its fleet size in San Francisco by 50 percent while an investigation takes place.
Vogt, however, maintains these incidents do not warrant the dramatic reaction seen from critics.
“We’re talking about a 15-minute traffic delay for something that, on the other hand, is providing a massive and quite measurable public benefit to the community.”
Cruise was recently criticized in an internal San Francisco Fire Department report in which one first responder stated that Cruise robotaxis blocked an ambulance from transporting a patient to a hospital after the victim was struck by a human-piloted Muni bus. Cruise denies the allegations, saying it has proprietary video proof captured by the Cruise AVs at the scene demonstrating that no obstruction took place, and the SF fire chief later made a statement clarifying that it was not the judgement of the fire department or the fire chief that Cruise AVs contributed to the poor patient outcome in that particular incident.
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Comments
“You’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose.”
― Lou Holtz
What a clown. Vogt should get into politics- he certainly can spin things.
LOL, they should be banned from public highways, they are a menace and not needed.
So, when you say “they”, you’re speaking about human drivers, who are not as safe as Cruise autonomous vehicles?
When you say they’re “not needed”, I think we have a few years before Cruise and other autonomous vehicles are out in numbers sufficient to make human drivers unnecessary. But, probably fewer years than most believe – autonomous vehicles will proliferate very quickly. Kind of like cellular phones – at the time, they weren’t “needed”, but now we can’t imagine life without them, and they’re everywhere….
I don’t think the whole population is dumb enough to give up their privilege of driving for these POSs- at least not yet.
Stilling inferring safety by throwing around millions of miles driven as if it’s a significant number. Look at all the problems Cruise vehicles have had or caused with only a fleet of 500 vehicles and a sum total of 5 or 6 million miles driven. Can you imagine the chaos if there were millions of these AV’s on the road, everywhere, in all weather conditions, driving over 1 billion miles per day.
Cruise’s safety is only intact right now because their 500 vehicles with 5, 6 millions miles driven is an insignificant sample size.
The millions of miles driven by Cruise is a significant sample size, enough to compare the safety of Cruise vehicles with human drivers, and Cruise vehicles are far safer. They have the statistics to PROVE that, which is why the California state regulators gave Cruise the green light. Yes, there is a temporary pullback, but frankly that’s for public relations – Cruise remains far safter than a human driver. And with each mile driven, each million miles driven, improvments are made on a continuing basis. Cruise is safe now, and getting safer every day. Unlike human drivers.
Americans drive 3.2 trillion miles a year; the Cruise about 5 million over its existance. When Cruise reaches a few billion miles then we’ll compare.
I have used Cruise multiple times in Austin, Texas and was very pleased. It felt very safe, the Bolts were clean and comfortable. You can watch the route on the video screen. You can push a button and speak with a Cruise advisor. I will use again and am looking forward to Cruise’s expansion to Houston and San Antonio.
The advent of hydraulic brakes from mechanical was going to kill thousands.