Uber had a substantial driverless car project more than a decade ago. That's right. It launched in early 2015 when Travis Kalanick was CEO. At the time, Uber was a real contender, racing against Waymo and Tesla. Then, disaster struck. While testing in Arizona in 2018, an Uber driverless car, with a safety driver behind the wheel, hit and killed a pedestrian.
I'm a driver, if I get a minor in my car, I can be deactivated, or if we have an accident with a minor, it can be a huge, huge problem. So, I believe Waymo have to follow the same rules that we have.
Waymo's incursion into the U.S. rideshare narrative reminds us of the Kool-Aid commercials from our childhood. The Kool-Aid man kicks down walls, causes havoc, screams 'oh yeah,' and runs off into the next scene. In the case of Waymo, they're kicking down the walls of an entrenched industry, wreaking terror on the multiples, and then running off to the next city announcement.
Uber Technologies isn't trying to build autonomous vehicles. It's trying to be the road every AV company drives on. The strategy is to become the distribution layer for the autonomous vehicle era, the app that passengers open regardless of whose robot is doing the driving.
AVs [autonomous vehicles] amplify the fundamental strengths of our platform, global scale, deep demand density, sophisticated marketplace technology, and decades of on-the-ground experience matching riders, drivers, and vehicles, all in real time.
L.A. Metro transit ambassadors are making Metro trains and buses safer and more welcoming. SBLA speaks with real life ambassadors, and Madelyn Brozen, co-author of a recent UCLA study that found ambassadors are improving Metro riders' experiences.
Alphabet remains the world's dominant digital advertising powerhouse, with a sprawling empire that includes the likes of Google Search, YouTube, and an absolutely giant (and fast-growing) cloud business that spews off an incredible amount of cash flow for investors.
Researchers at the University of Texas-Arlington found in a new meta-analysis of 26 earlier studies that vehicle miles traveled would increase if U.S. cities made a major shift away from human-driven automobiles, with the papers collectively predicting about a 6-percent bump in average VMT. Worse, they'd still increase more than 5 percent if people shifted away from personally owned cars towards shared autonomous taxis instead.
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey announced plans to test electric autonomous shuttle vehicles at EWR throughout spring 2026, the agency's latest experiment with self-driving technology as the airport undergoes a sweeping redevelopment. The tests, which won't be open to the public, are intended to explore whether automated transit could eventually move passengers between airport facilities and the new AirTrain Newark system currently under construction.
Einride has secured an oversubscribed $113 million PIPE (private investment in public equity) ahead of its public debut that's expected for the first half of 2026. The Swedish startup is most well-known for building both electric trucks and autonomous pods that are designed to carry freight with no room for a human driver.
Autonomous vehicles are in use around the world and around the country, and they are part of the modern travel experience. We are building a new Newark Liberty that meets the demands of the next generation of travel.
