Waymo started offering service in Miami earlier this year. I had signed up to be on the invite list several months ago, and a few days ago the app finally allowed me to call for rides. So this weekend DW and I took our first Waymo trips - just to get breakfast about a mile away and back.
The ride itself was completely unremarkable. Oh, sure - we were geeking out over the fact that there was no one behind the wheel, that the car was driving itself, etc. A very novel experience. But the ride was smooth and utterly indistinguishable from the way a human would drive, except that the AI driver used turn signals and yielded to other cars. Very not Miami.
App function was pretty much the same as either Uber or Lyft - order a car, it shows you the route to your destination, where the car is on its way to get you, ETA, etc. I checked Uber at the same time - time to pick-up was 2 minutes and 4 minutes longer with Waymo than Uber on the two trips. Price charged was about 5% then 10% less with Waymo than Uber (before tip, which is expected for Uber but not necessary with Waymo).
Pretty much an equivalent experience - other than the novelty factor of being in an AV, which I really enjoyed but DW was a bit nervous about.
They’re all over the place near downtown/Brickell. My office is in that area, and I see a Waymo in the wild almost every day.
In the last couple of weeks, I’ve now started seeing Zoox vehicles more often as well. They haven’t launched any public service in Miami, but it sure seems like they’re stepping up the testing - at least (again) in the downtown/Brickell area.
I don’t think those are the ones I’ve seen here. The ones I’ve seen on the Miami roads are their test vehicles, that look like conventional cars with a sensor array on top, like below. Not the new, bespoke cars that look like little train cars.
Yep. Those are adorable. But I haven’t seen those around yet - just the ombre painted test cars.
In more Waymo news, they’ve already expanded their service area to more of Miami - now up to 100 square miles. It now covers nearly all of the city that I would ever want to go to.
