Waymo is planning a major expansion project for 2025 which includes operating in more than ten metropolitan areas. There is no official information available on the number of cities. Though the company did revealed its plans for a multi-city road trip beginning in 2025 during which it will visit over ten urban areas. First up: Las Vegas and San Diego.”
The company further provided details about how these road trips improve Waymo Driver’s artificial intelligence (AI). The following excerpt from their post outlines how they operate their road trip:
When testing Waymo Driver outside its usual operating areas we always focus first on safety alongside responsible environmental management. Our approach to these road trips consists of the following procedures:
- Travel- We begin city exploration with a limited number of Waymo Driver equipped vehicles either in new locations or in areas we have previously visited. Testing fleets operate with restricted access as they remain unavailable to public use. The initial vehicle operations run manually under human supervision to offer the Waymo Driver essential location-based information.
- Drive- Each Waymo Driver enters autonomous operation only after learning about the geographic terrain. Human specialists evaluate driver experiences while monitoring unusual conditions that emerge when operating vehicles in unfamiliar locations. Our engineering team assesses the Waymo Driver’s performance through a virtual simulation that models the new location to verify its generalization abilities.
- Apply- The information we gather in this phase helps our teams improve both the Waymo Driver’s functionality and the user experience. Years of driving across multiple cities have allowed us to collect extensive data. This data has been crucial in advancing our sensing technology and enhancing the operations in existing cities. It also ensures that our technology is safe for deployment in new regions. For example, our testing in Miami’s rainfall has allowed us to provide fully autonomous rides for customers in both California and Phoenix, even during wet and rainy weather.
In addition to this, Waymo continues its employee transport expansion with Los Angeles as a new location. Employees now get fully autonomous rides on freeways. The company plans to transition this service for public routes in the near future when development phase closes successfully.
Overall, 2025 seems like it could be a banner year for Waymo. As in all likelihood it will expand its service area in its existing markets (Phoenix, Los Angeles, and San Francisco). However, only time will tell for sure 🙂
Reference- Waymo website & X handle, PR agency, Inside EVs, The Verge