Driverless cars are coming to the UK – but the road to autonomy has bumps ahead | Self-driving cars

The age-old question from the back of the car is as pertinent as a new era of autonomy threatens to dawn: Are we there yet? For the Brits, who have long promised fully driverless cars, the answer is as usual: yes, almost. But not exactly.

A landmark moment in the autonomous driving journey is once again around the corner. This week, Waymo, which has successfully operated robotaxis in San Francisco and four other US cities, announced it would bring its cars to London.

Details are scant, but the promises are striking: The Silicon Valley pioneer said it would bring its fully autonomous service “across the pond, where we plan to offer trips without a human behind the wheel in 2026… We look forward to serving Londoners and the city’s millions of visitors next year.”

These millions might want an Oyster card for the London Underground, just in case. Intent on luring big tech, the UK government has announced plans to accelerate the introduction of driverless cars in the summer; This means robotaxis could start operating in organized public trials as early as spring 2026. But the rules are not yet fully established and testing may include a safety driver for a while.

British firm Wayve, in partnership with Uber, has released a slightly more serious “plan to develop and launch public road trials of level 4 fully autonomous vehicles in London.”

While Americans sit back and enjoy autonomous driving, Britain’s winding road to self-driving cars has been marked by commitments that vanish like pedestrians in the rain. In 2018, one-time up-and-comer Addison Lee, along with scientists at Oxford University, were promising to bring robotaxi to market by 2021.

A year ago Nissan almost managed to get one of its Leaf cars around Beckton, east London, without crashing. Then-transport secretary Chris Grayling said driverless cars would be on the market within four years, with small pods driving autonomously around the O2 in Greenwich. The love child of a British invention, the union-liveried Sinclair C5-Tardis, appeared in a Milton Keynes car park in 2015; Vince Cable, then trade minister, said 100 of them would soon be carrying passengers within the city for £2 per person.

But abroad, particularly in America and parts of China, autonomous taxi services are now very much a reality; This means Waymo’s arrival is more significant than previous hype or hopes.

In Waymo’s hometown of San Francisco, driverless cars have become a routine part of urban life; humming along the hilly streets at a cautious but determined pace.

Since their full launch in June 2024, they have taken their place alongside the city’s electric scooters and public buses. Riding Waymo has become as much of a must-do tourist experience as riding one of the city’s historic streetcars.

Democratic mayor Daniel Lurie promoted the expansion to revitalize downtown areas with large numbers of homeless people living on the streets; which led to the jarring juxtaposition of cutting-edge AI-controlled robot cars driving past those in extreme poverty.

With rapidly rotating cameras on each wing and a police siren-like camera on the roof, converted white Jaguar iPace vehicles resemble surveillance infrastructure. On smartphone apps, they are hailed like Uber or Lyft rides; However, the absence of a human in the driver’s seat and the steering wheel turning under the control of an invisible algorithm reminds us of the economic turmoil they cause.

In 2010, Uber launched in San Francisco, disrupting the way taxi drivers were employed and paving the way for precarious jobs. Now these Uber drivers face a second wave of technological disruption.

According to data cited by the Economist, the number of people working in taxi companies in San Francisco increased by 7% in 2024; and wages increased by 14%. Lyft CEO David Risher was quoted as predicting that driverless taxis will “really expand the market.”

But not everyone on the front lines feels this way. Asked about Waymo in San Francisco’s Mission district, a Venezuelan Uber driver replied: “I think I have about a year left in this job.”

For a customer, riding Waymo is feeling abandoned to the control and power of artificial intelligence. After being greeted via the app, the vehicle slowly approaches and the customer’s initials are displayed on the digital screen in the roof hub. One tap on the app unlocks the car doors; A pleasant voice reminds riders to fasten their seat belts. A screen offers an extensive music menu to navigate behind the tinted rear windows in a truly private space.

Tap the “Start drive” button on the touchscreen and the vehicle moves safely towards oncoming traffic. The steering wheel with the “Please keep hands off” sign spins like a ghost train ride at an amusement park.

It doesn’t take long for him to feel comfortable because he avoids dangers and acts cautiously. Screens with scrolling street maps track progress and update arrival times; The “pull over now” button is a nice reminder that it’s possible to override the original destination instruction, but only pull over when it’s safe to do so.

Waymos sparked a lot of social backlash. When three people lingered at the intersection of a busy nightlife area in the Marina district last month — apparently confused, lights flashing — revelers screamed with delight and a man did multiple backflips off the roof of one of them.

In July, a prankster organized people into a cul-de-sac to order all the Waymos at once, to create the spectacle of a cluster of just 50 robocars. In early 2024, when Waymos were used in more limited numbers, one of the Waymos was smashed, covered in graffiti, and burned during Lunar New Year celebrations in the Chinatown area.

A similar welcome could await driverless taxis here, even if it’s not at the hands of black taxi drivers personally. Licensed Taxi Drivers Association General Secretary Steve McNamara said: “You’re seeing kids hacking Lime bikes – how long will it be before Waymo rooftop surfing becomes the latest TikTok craze?”

McNamara claims relief: “This is a solution to a problem we don’t have. These vehicles, which allegedly work so well in San Francisco and Los Angeles – in London, are unlike anywhere else. I want someone to explain to me how this self-driving car will get to a place like Charing Cross Road at 11pm at night, where everyone is walking on the opposite side of the road. As soon as we see the lidar dome.” [sensor] “When you’re on top of the Waymo car, you’re going to get out or get into a car because you know it’s going to stop.”

Christian Wolmar, author of Driverless Cars: The Road to Nowhere, agrees: “We don’t have jaywalking rules here – and if Google expects us to enforce jaywalking rules for the sake of their cars…”

Despite the US experience, he remains resolutely skeptical that fully driverless taxis will appear here next year: “Without a human operator, there’s absolutely zero chance.”

Waymo, which has announced plans to partially prevent London’s test cars from appearing on the streets as it begins a lengthy mapping process, is feeling confident after nearly 100 meters of autonomous rides and a dozen more trials in San Francisco, a city that is far from flat and orderly.

Operators have long argued that the real challenge is regulation rather than technology. Even rapid progress has its limits: The results of a consultation completed last month, although unconfirmed, should allow the pilots to move forward.

That may have been the trigger for Waymo, but it still has to jump through a series of hoops from London’s Department of Transport and Transport to get its testing scheme into the car – and wider legislation won’t be in place for at least another two years. Insurers in particular say many questions remain regarding liability.

Similar pre-legislative pilot programs have left other new forms of transport in limbo: e-scooter “trials” are now set to last eight years. LSE government professor Tony Travers believes driverless vehicles have a better chance: “They have to follow the rules. They could lead to congestion – but not the near-anarchy caused by e-scooters.”

But even if driverless taxis emerge, the real question, according to Wolmar, is: “So what?”

According to Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana, the answer lies in the “reliability, safety and magic” of the automobile, with a strong emphasis on safety. To date, Waymo cars have been involved in a fraction of the crashes experienced by human-driven cars over the same distance.

It also hopes to bring a different form of autonomy to those who lack it: The Royal National Institute for the Blind welcomed Waymo’s news as the dawn of “technology that could safely enable autonomous travel.”

Waymo said its entry into the UK market would mean investing in warehouses, charging infrastructure, cleaning and support teams and, for now, “human experts” in the driver’s seat.

The coming autonomous vehicle revolution could create 38,000 jobs in the UK, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander has said.

But professional drivers are more clearly at risk: some 300,000 are private hire licensees and a further million are in the HGV and delivery field. Many of Britain’s 82,000 bus drivers have recently received significant pay rises; and 27,000 train drivers are known to be in fairly good shape.

In a climate of general concern about the potential for AI to eliminate human jobs, if not yet humans, it is little surprise that polls suggest that public opinion in the UK is hardly positive about driverless cars.

License and legislation are awaited. McNamara is optimistic: “Who will sign it? If I were looking for a successful career in politics, I wouldn’t have written my name on that piece of paper.”