2020Primary sourceWell documented
Waymo and the First Public Robotaxis
On the timeline · around 2020 ·
What happened
In October 2020 Waymo — the self-driving company spun out of Google's early autonomous-car project — opened its fully driverless ride-hailing service to the general public in the Phoenix, Arizona area. For the first time, ordinary riders could hail a car with no human safety driver behind the wheel and be carried across the metro area by the vehicle itself.
Why it matters
Waymo turned the self-driving car from a research demo into a service people could actually ride, marking the arrival of the commercial robotaxi and a possible glimpse of a future in which cars drive themselves.