Can you envision a future where driverless cars are the norm? One Los Angeles City Councilmember says he can. And it scares him.
Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez introduced a motion Wednesday asking the city of L.A. to join legal action currently underway in San Francisco to rein in the testing of autonomous vehicles in California.
“The city of Los Angeles should not be a test subject for the tech industry,” he said. “Robotaxi safety incidents, including crashes and congestion, are becoming the norm. Some of the stories that I have heard are absolutely egregious and should not be happening here in the city.”
Soto-Martinez highlighted recent incidents where driverless cars shut down at intersections, blocked first responders, injured pedestrians, and killed pets. He’s also concerned the vehicles could be taken over in a cyberattack.
In August, the California Public Utilities Commission expanded robotaxi permits for Cruise and Waymo, allowing the two companies to operate their driverless cars 24/7 throughout San Francisco. Barely 24 hours later, at least six Cruise vehicles stalled in the middle of the road due to “connectivity issues,” blocking traffic on a Friday night.
On Tuesday, the California Department of Motor Vehicles ordered General Motors to suspend deployment of its Cruise driverless cars, deeming them “an unreasonable risk to public safety.” The DMV said Cruise had “misrepresented” safety information, and failed to turn over video footage of an Oct. 2 incident where one of its vehicles struck a pedestrian.
Also on Tuesday, the Teamsters held a rally outside Google’s Venice headquarters to protest the recent expansion of Google-owned Waymo self-driving cars in Los Angeles. The union cited safety concerns as well as the threat to human drivers’ jobs.
About a dozen Teamsters members joined Soto-Martinez outside City Hall Wednesday to support his new proposal, which would ask the L.A. City Attorney to join San Francisco’s lawsuit asking the CPUC to reconsider its expansion of robotaxi use.
“I stand firmly with folks from labor in looking at, how do we protect union jobs?” Soto-Martinez said. “This is just yet another threat from large corporations and tech companies that are trying to cut people out of the equation.”
Soto-Martinez said that even if driverless cars became safer, he would still oppose them because they would eliminate jobs.
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