What if riders don’t close a robotaxi door after a ride? Try DoorDash.

Robotaxis can't escape the gig economy as Waymo tries to solve a human problem.

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[yakinabe]

Is there a reason they can't just blare the horn and have a message on the screen telling anyone who comes by to close the door?

It may cause someone to vandalize the car.

 

[icwhatudidthere]

Is there a reason they can't just blare the horn and have a message on the screen telling anyone who comes by to close the door?

And also charge the prior customer a fee.

 

[killerhurtalot]

Pretty sure I rode in at least one Japanese Taxi built in the '00s that had automated doors. And several built in the '10s. And no, those automated doors weren't standard issue for Toyota. Seems wild to me that this problem wasn't originally considered and addressed before they started actual service.

They took off the shelf cars and modified them. So when they chose a car without powered doors, they already chose poorly.

Automatic closing doors is a very much extant solution in high end luxury cars. Granted it would take work to engineer it to taxi levels of usage but it's not a significant hurdle. I don't think that Waymo intended the Jags as a vehicle to truly scale with, rather they were a stepping stone in the development curve. Door operation was not a high priority versus the driving stack. It's telling that the door left open issue has risen to visibility now in terms of friction points for successful operations. Clearly Waymo also knew that they'd need to eventually (co)develop an autonomous first vehicle and I'm sure this is informing their timing.

Uh.... automatic doors is pretty common in mid tier Chinese EVs... even those that cost under $50,000 USD, which is far cheaper than the iPaces they're using brand new...

On that note, the Waymo/Zeeker purpose built cars are starting to make its way here, and those have automatic doors.

 

[Jeff S]

It may cause someone to vandalize the car.

Also, as a passerby there is literally no cost to me giving your car camera the finger, laughing, and walking on . . .

Some people probably would close the door, but anyone who hates robo-capitalism will get some schadenfreude out of the situation and not lift a finger to help trillion dollar corps. . . which is quite a lot of people, I think.

 

[balthisar]

I never touched a door on a taxi in Japan.

 

[numerobis]

Think of the mechanical design of those doors compared to a car's. In terms of how the motors work, the directions they have to push, and the position of sensors to make sure they don't close on someone. They are very different.

Which doesn't mean they can't come up with one. It's just not as analogous to this mature technology as you think.

Clearly the door-ajar problem is rare enough not to bother with power doors, otherwise Waymo would fit them. It's not a particularly hard mechanical engineering problem.

There's also that power doors still don't shut if something is in the way, which is probably most of when the doors don't actually close as passengers leave.

 

[hillspuck]

Clearly the door-ajar problem is rare enough not to bother with power doors, otherwise Waymo would fit them. It's not a particularly hard mechanical engineering problem.

Exactly. It's just not worth the added cost of construction not to mention the nonzero chance that your design - no matter how much it's intended to avoid it - cuts someone's fingers off. At least for most cars where the power close isn't a status symbol or needed for accessibility.

The only mainstream power door I really see is the rear door on vans.

Edit: forgot to include the bit about construction
Edit: Yes, in the US, which is the subject of this article
Edit: To be clear, I'm not talking about sliding rail power doors. I'm talking about power doors as shown in the type of cars in the article. Typical side closing hinged doors.

 

[numerobis]

Exactly. It's just not worth the nonzero chance that your design - no matter how much it's intended to avoid it - cuts someone's fingers off.

Dude, we aren't talking about Tesla here.

 

[hillspuck]

Dude, we aren't talking about Tesla here.

We aren't? I thought they were all going to be robotaxis any day now. ANY DAY NOW.

 

[Demosthenes642]

Uh.... automatic doors is pretty common in mid tier Chinese EVs... even those that cost under $50,000 USD, which is far cheaper than the iPaces they're using brand new...

On that note, the Waymo/Zeeker purpose built cars are starting to make its way here, and those have automatic doors.

Yep, I agree. I don't know the story of why exactly Waymo went with the iPace but I'm sure automatic door operation wasn't high on their list of must haves. I don't have any inside info but I'd bet that the Waymo addenda on the iPace is worth 2-3x the cost of the base vehicle and getting that bit to work was always the goal of their development program. Waymo's ultimate goal doesn't seem to be to operate fleets themselves anyway but to sell them to owner operators. Some of that might be a full autonomous taxi package intended for public transit levels of usage, some of that might be add on packages for existing vehicles in lower utilization cases, but either way Waymo's business is mostly independent of the underlying vehicles instead they sell the "driver".

 

[Deleted member 221201]

I mean..... this is a solved problem already... at least outside of the US and it's mediocre EVs....

It's called a powered/automatic door... which A LOT of EVs that's cheaper than the waymo cars have...

And the next generation waymo cars will have these...

Waymo does not make its own cars AFAIK

 

[void&]

A humanoid robot driver could just get out and close the door.

 

[numerobis]

We aren't? I thought they were all going to be robotaxis any day now. ANY DAY NOW.

We aren't. Waymo actually operates robotaxis.

 

[killerhurtalot]

Think of the mechanical design of those doors compared to a car's. In terms of how the motors work, the directions they have to push, and the position of sensors to make sure they don't close on someone. They are very different.

Which doesn't mean they can't come up with one. It's just not as analogous to this mature technology as you think.

It's a mature technology outside of the US

Waymo does not make its own cars AFAIK

You're right. That's why they partnered with zeeker to make the next Gen waymo vans.

 

[Fatesrider]

All that technology... defeated by the equivalent of Is the Parking Break on?

 

[numerobis]

Waymo does not make its own cars AFAIK

Waymo operates its own cars. It procures them from various providers. When choosing which car to procure, it has decided not to get power doors fitted.

 

[Jeff S]

Waymo does not make its own cars AFAIK

Probably not, but whoever does make them, is making them to Waymo's design and requirements.

 

[numerobis]

It's a mature technology outside of the US

It's going to take two generations before the US discovers how far behind it is.

I'm in Canada, we have an inferiority complex so we know we're behind. But we're on par with the US in terms of most technology.

 

[killerhurtalot]

It's going to take two generations before the US discovers how far behind it is.

Not if we keep deluding ourselves and staying in our hyper individualistic bubbles and can't afford to travel!

 

[huskcummerbund]

It may cause someone to vandalize the car.

Unwise, seeing as the cars are covered in cameras, inside and out. Then again, vandals aren't known for being particularly intelligent.

 

[McTurkey]

Is there a reason they can't just blare the horn and have a message on the screen telling anyone who comes by to close the door?

If a robotic car honks at me to close the door, I might close it, but I also might tell it to fuck off. Others might well decide to just throw something at it. A car honking its horn (as opposed to a human honking to signal for help) is a great way to piss people off, not to get actual help.

 

[evan_s]

Couple issues I can see:

1. Dashing requires you to have your phone on and connected to a GPS signal, so Waymo/DD could probably figure out the overlap
2. Accounts require real identities, so that would probably trip some kind of database
3. There's probably some kind of penalty for leaving the door open

At most, a group of Dashers could try this, but I imagine that after a couple incidents there'd be some kind of cooldown or account bans.

3 is the simplest thing. Don't bother trying to identify people or cross reference them. Just charge more for someone to come out and close the door than you pay the person. If someone wants to pay $20 extra every time they take a Waymo then that's on them. They might not do it initially but I'm sure if it becomes at all problematic then they'll just be charging people for the privilege of leaving the door open.

 

[TigerAway]

I never touched a door on a taxi in Japan.

If you didn't get the chance to ride in a Toyota Crown, then you are missing out!

(You now have another excuse to visit Japan again. You are welcome.)

 

[gerbal]

Why does Waymo get to import Chinese EVs when us mere individuals can't purchase a Zeekr Mix?

Yet another case of Rules for Thee, but Not for Me.

 

[numerobis]

Why does Waymo get to import Chinese EVs when us mere individuals can't purchase a Zeekr Mix?

Yet another case of Rules for Thee, but Not for Me.

Just certify the car as safe and pay the tariffs, and you too can import a Zeekr.

 

[filburt]

So DoorDashers will dash to these robotaxis to close the door?

On a serious note, these services will probably add "door closing fee" soon, and move on to automated doors.

 

[android_alpaca]

It's going to take two generations before the US discovers how far behind it is.

That is basically what happen to rural Americans two decades ago when they connected to the cablet v and internet (instead of local news broadcast and newspapers). Suddenly the they were forced out of their bubble to see what life was like in the cities/metro were (where now a majority of Americans actually live).

This is similar to surprise Japan had when Admiral Perry cracked Japan's 200+ year of self-imposed isolation and when South Korean KDrama VHS tapes reached North Korea - the population was suddenly aware that things were a lot better "out there" then they were telling themselves.

I could already see it in this year Superbowl, when people visited San Francisco Bay Area and they were surprised at how nice it was in the area - while in their mind from Trump/Fox News it sounded like Fallulah combined with Sodom and Gomorrah.

 

[numerobis]

If a robotic car honks at me to close the door, I might close it, but I also might tell it to fuck off. Others might well decide to just throw something at it. A car honking its horn (as opposed to a human honking to signal for help) is a great way to piss people off, not to get actual help.

If a robot car honks at me to close the door I'm hoping there's police nearby to ticket it.

 

[Stochastic]

I feel like it would be cheaper to offer riders a $1.00 post-ride discount if they remember to close the door.

 

[hillspuck]

We aren't. Waymo actually operates robotaxis.

I'm very confused. I thought you were making a joke about Tesla and their many questionable features in terms of safety.

So I don't get what your comment about "we aren't talking about Teslas" is even supposed to mean. I was agreeing with you when you said

Clearly the door-ajar problem is rare enough not to bother with power doors, otherwise Waymo would fit them.

We both agree that the door-ajar problem is rare enough to not bother with it, given the other factors of adding the tech.

Does that clear it up for you or do you still have some kind of disagreement with me, the person agreeing with you?

 

[numerobis]

That is basically what happen to rural Americans two decades ago when they connected to the cablet v and internet (instead of local news broadcast and newspapers). Suddenly the they were forced out of their bubble to see what life was like in the cities/metro were (where now a majority of Americans actually live).

This is similar to surprise Japan had when Admiral Perry cracked Japan's 200+ year of self-imposed isolation and when South Korean KDrama VHS tapes reached North Korea - the population was suddenly aware that things were a lot better "out there" then they were telling themselves. In Japan this led to it sending out lots of envoys to learn about Western cultural, technology and bring back what they saw was the best parts of it.

Whereas China felt superior, being obviously the most powerful empire on Earth for a couple thousand years... and promptly started getting hit by humiliation after humiliation for a century and a half. It's only circa 1980 that they started modernizing.

We'll see which way the US goes.

 

[vdiv]

"The door is ajar."
No it's not, it's a door

 

[Dr Gitlin]

Call me paranoid but unfortunately I have very sensitive eyes. Things that would be minor annoyances to most people (being photographed once with a flash, driving 30 minutes without sunglasses on a cloudy day) give me headaches for the rest of the day.

So I'm still waiting for long-term studies on getting hit in the retina many times per second by fleet of LIDAR-equipped vehicles. Until I can see a satisfactory answer to that, I will strongly distrust Waymo and similar approaches.

Humans should not be able to see either 905 nm or 1550 nm wavelengths and the FDA already regulates lasers (including lidar) and won't let anything go on a car that could damage a human eye. The laser high beams that have been available in Europe for more than a decade now were first banned then gimped here because the FDA was concerned about them.

If you're being blinded by lidar you should contact an opthamologist and maybe a vision scientist.

 

[hillspuck]

I think a couple of issues have gotten mixed up in the thread (and I didn't always help clarify either). There's power close doors, and then there's AUTOMATIC power closing doors.

Are the latter on anything anywhere? That's what we'd be talking about adding to the robotaxis to solve this problem. A power door that isn't operated by a human who is using their meat brain to understand when it is and isn't safe to close the door.

 

[athauglas]

motorized doors? hello?!

 

[Dr Gitlin]

It's a mature technology outside of the US

You keep saying this like the Jaguar I-Pace wasn't designed in the UK. You also say that lots of cheap EVs have automatic closing doors: since I'm unaware of any, I'd appreciate it if you could share those details with the thread.

 

[Cafox]

A Waymo coming to pick me up pulled up and stopped. I opened the door and got in. The ride didn't start. The app showed no sign of why it wouldn't. Had to call support and wait for a while for the agent to troubleshoot. After quite a while, it became apparent that the car didn't think it was at the pickup spot. The car had stopped 5 feet short of where it saw the pick up spot being, presumably because of pedestrian traffic or something else. I didn't know it was 5 feet short and opened the door and got in. Since it could tell someone was in the car when they shouldn't be, the car wouldn't move.

Even the agent took a while to figure out that I needed to get out and close the door, let the car move 5 feet, and get back in.

As a software developer, I get what happened and why. I also get that there are a ton of edge cases and odd scenarios in real world traffic and with humans engaging with the cars.

Hard to imagine why they wouldn’t keep the doors locked until the car got to where it was going. That seems like a simple problem to solve.

 

[huskcummerbund]

Humans should not be able to see either 905 nm or 1550 nm wavelengths and the FDA already regulates lasers (including lidar) and won't let anything go on a car that could damage a human eye. The laser high beams that have been available in Europe for more than a decade now were first banned then gimped here because the FDA was concerned about them.

If you're being blinded by lidar you should contact an opthamologist and maybe a vision scientist.

Just because the spectrum of light isn't visible to the eye doesn't mean it can't damage the eye. The light that can destroy your retinas during welding isn't actually the light you can see, bright as it is, it's the UV. Extreme example, I know. Just illustrating a point. I do agree that, generally, lidar systems probably don't pose much risk, but FDA approval isn't always proof that it doesn't. They've been wrong, and admitted it, more times than most of us are comfortable admitting.

 

[Dark Jaguar]

I used to be incredibly excited for autonomous cars, until I realized that they simply can't handle the unexpected, and when it comes to roads, there are ALWAYS unexpected scenarios. Humans can adapt to bizarre intersections with a 5th road exiting off a highway right into a four way intersection, nuancing out exactly which of the lights are meant for them, while AI would need a very specific exception for that scenario, and countless others I've encountered around where I live, especially getting into the rural backroads. I also think it's entirely the wrong solution to the problem of too many cars on the road. Replacing the drivers with machines doesn't address the core problem, modern N.A. city design.

Also, I just can't justify spending money that gets poor people out in a very dangerous situation, what with all that slippery ICE all around lately.

 

[RZetopan]

Lol, further evidence that the system isn't as good as a human driver. Just pull out, and give it a half second of hard acceleration and the doors close themselves. Could probably even close the hatch like that. I learned that as a teenager giving rides to friends that thought it would be funny to leave my door open when they got out. Jokes on them. Didn't even allow me down.

And if that doesn't work, sideswiping another vehicle, or even a pedestrian would surely work! /S