CA: New poll shows what San Francisco residents really think about Waymo cars

When robotaxis first appeared on San Francisco streets, people weren’t sure whether to treat them as a captivating novelty, an extremely forward-thinking invention or a rolling symbol of gentrification.

Waymo’s white electric Jaguars with weird spinning sensors were, at one time, the most polarizing things on the road. They inspired fandom and incited rage, made a perfect selfie-backdrop for tourists and drew a reputation for blocking emergency vehicles or crushing small animals. Critics of the vehicles tried to outsmart and paralyze them by placing traffic cones on their hoods.

But now we know what people really think. And it’s largely positive. A new Chronicle poll suggests that in an era of autonomous vehicle ubiquity, San Franciscans have come to accept and value these machines.

The survey of 1,077 registered voters showed that 42% of respondents consider self-driving cars “a good thing,” dwarfing the 18% who react negatively. Thirty-nine percent harbor mixed emotions and 2% are not sure how to respond. Opinions largely fell along ideological lines, with self-identified progressives more skeptical of the vehicles (25% pro, 30% against, 43% conflicted) while liberals, moderates and conservatives are more likely to embrace them. (Moderates, for example, were 54% pro-AV, 10% anti and 35% ambivalent.).

None of the results surprise former San Francisco transportation chief Jeffrey Tumlin, who would put himself in the “mixed emotions” camp. He said it’s typical for people to cautiously approve of technology that presents advantages (convenience, strict adherence to the speed limit), and disadvantages (congestion, a tendency to park in bike lanes).

Progressives will naturally voice more suspicion than moderates or conservatives about any breed of technology that threatens to displace labor, Tumlin said. Much of the lobbying for tighter restrictions of Waymo and other AV companies comes from unions representing human union ride-hail drivers. This opposition mirrors the resistance to Uber and Lyft 15 years ago, when those companies represented a Big Tech force trying to squash the taxi industry.

Brad Templeton, a self-driving car consultant based in Sunnyvale, said he understands people’s panic about job disruption. At the same time, he believes progressive opposition to AVs may stem from general mistrust of corporations (Waymo is owned by Alphabet, Zoox by Amazon) or distaste for artificial intelligence.

“People used to be very scared of elevators,” Templeton said, citing an ancient culture war over a 19th century apparatus. “And remember, elevators used to have drivers, too.”

Politics weren’t the only driver of perception in the Chronicle’s AV poll. It also showed a slight generation gap, with younger and middle-aged people being more open to this new iteration of mobility than people over age 65. Men were somewhat more favorable of autonomous vehicles than women, and college-educated people were a little more receptive than their non-college-educated counterparts. Perhaps, Templeton said, the demographic disparities are a bellwether for how people feel about the future, and whether they think technology will help or hurt them.

San Francisco has long held a fraught relationship with innovation on public roads, with good reason, Tumlin said. Uber and Lyft barrelled onto the scene with promises to alleviate congestion, complement public transit and make it possible to live without a car. In reality, studies by the San Francisco County Transportation Authority found these ride-hails accounted for two-thirds of the traffic increase between 2010 and 2016, largely because they offered quicker, easier transport than buses or rail, at a price point people could rationalize. AVs are just as vexing, since they drive around empty at least part of the time. Technologists have a term of art for this practice: “ghost miles.”

By increasing traffic overall, AVs also create the conditions for more crashes, even if they don’t cause the collisions themselves, Tumlin noted. He’s long questioned the reports that Waymo and its competitors release, finding that their fleets make streets safer. Not to mention they are still developing the hardware and software: Last month Waymo voluntarily recalled nearly 3,800 vehicles after one of its robotaxis drove onto a flooded lane in San Antonio and got swept into a creek.

Such one-off incidents haven’t discouraged Templeton, who sees AVs as far more reliable and compliant than human motorists.

“For the first time in history, we’re gonna get cars on the road that are well-behaved,” he said. “Right now, we have humans. We try to make the humans behave by making laws, and having police enforce them, and hoping the humans will be afraid of getting tickets. But with robots, we can just go to the company, give them a rule, and the robots will just obey it.”

In the coming decades, Templeton surmised, San Francisco and other cities could use AV technology to make transportation more orderly. If traffic is a problem, why not restrict the number of vehicles that can enter a given zone or artery? If efficiency is a problem, how about telling the robots they have to carpool? He conjured visions of commuters riding in “solo pods” on a highway and then getting out at a transfer station to switch to an autonomous van.

Getting there won’t be easy. Because technology moves faster than the government, there will likely always be tension between AV companies and their regulators. As the dominant player in the market, Waymo has grappled with advancing its own commercial interests while also cooperating with the Department of Motor Vehicles and the California Utilities Commission. Those entities have barred the company from offering certain services — like rides for unaccompanied minors — in spite of growing demand.

And then there’s the struggle to placate a fickle public. Even as more players swarm the AV market, some people remain skeptical. San Franciscans haven’t forgotten the December power outages, during which hundreds of Waymos became paralyzed in intersections because they couldn’t navigate without stoplights. Cellphone videos of AV blunders still often go viral on social media.

“There is definitely going to be a debate about this technology, because people are afraid of change,” Templeton said, casting a sober eye at all the challenges that AV companies are facing. He’s optimistic that with more exposure, the anxiety over self-driving cars will dissipate. Just like it did with elevators.

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