Waymos can take freeways in the Bay Area, Los Angeles and Phoenix – Jalopnik starting today

Car enthusiasts often shudder to imagine a world where cars drive themselves, but I don’t think this would necessarily be the case. We already have self-driving cars in some cities, including the city I live in, and honestly, I’m in favor of the technology if it takes inattentive, impatient, impulsive, and potentially impaired drivers off the public road. One of the best-known robotaxi companies, Waymo, today announced that its autonomous Jaguar i-Paces will officially be able to pick up passengers on highways in the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, California and Phoenix, Arizona.

Waymos has completed more than 50 million miles of driverless rides in its service areas, yet its accident statistics are remarkably low. In reality, Ars Technica looked at Waymo crash data and found that the vast majority of crashes involving a Waymo were caused by other cars backing up, side-swiping and crossing the centerline to hit the autonomous vehicles.

In addition to today’s announcement about freeway access, Waymo also announced that it is expanding its service area beyond San Francisco itself, and now to the entire Peninsula, including service to the cities of San Bruno, San Mateo, San Carlos, Palo Alto, Redwood City, Mountain View, all the way to San Jose. This expanded service includes curbside service at San Jose Mineta International Airport (SJC).

Waymo plans to soon expand highway capabilities to its self-driving cars in other regions, including Austin Texas and Atlanta Georgia, but for now this is limited to the California Bay Area, Los Angeles and Phoenix. Although these regions remain largely temperate for most of the calendar year, winter is approaching and will likely bring with it a series of weather-related surprises. Thanks to our ongoing love affair with fossil fuels, seasons and weather systems have intensified in recent years, which could be challenging for these computer-controlled cars to navigate safely.