Along for the Ride #205
Rishi Sunak, Cruise's collision, and chocolate chip cookies
Heya friends, happy Friday!
This week has been really odd and sad, for reasons I won’t extrapolate on here. However, I’m going to use some of that odd energy to fuel a discussion on why Rishi Sunak is a bellend. For those of you not familiar with the popular UK term, here’s an urban dictionary link (note: it is crude).
Last week UK Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, announced that the UK was a “nation of drivers”. He proudly proclaimed on Twitter (no links to that because I refuse, but you can google it) that his government was “slamming the brakes on anti-motorist measures” across the UK. Upon seeing the news I immediately made this face: 😵💫. Rishi’s plan includes increasing speed limits and stating no more Low Traffic Neighbourhoods without community consent.
As much as eye-rolling is fitting, this news is also absolutely infuriating. When the UK decreased local speed limits to 20mph, road fatalities dropped by a quarter and serious injuries by a third (University of Edinburgh). I remember celebrating this accomplishment almost a year ago. The interventions Rishi has targeted save people’s lives. They decrease traffic congestion. And overwhelmingly, people actually fucking like them [see: Forbes, Polling, Department for Transport…].
And as if that wasn’t bad enough, Sunak also canceled the portion of High Speed Rail 2 (HS2) between Birmington and Manchester (Guardian). He announced this in Manchester, where he arrived by plane because obviously, the rail connection wasn’t good enough 🫠. I can’t believe I’m going to say that at least Boris Johnson didn’t get transport this wrong. The bar was so low, and Rishi Sunak is still taking it at the knees.
And with that little spiel over (for now), it’s time for the rest of the news, starting off with more Bad News™️.
Cruise’s latest crash clouds future in SF
In other actively unpleasant news, Cruise has been emboldened by more negative press after one of their cars drove over a pedestrian that was struck by an adjacent driver. To be clear on the order of events:
Pedestrian enters roadway
Pedestrian is severely struck by a human driver, and flung in front of Cruise’s AV
Pedestrian is run over by Cruise’s AV that was not able to stop in time
Human driver flees the scene
Pedestrian remained under the car, and firefighters used a tool they call the “jaws of life” to lift the vehicle off the victim before removing her from underneath it.
Pedestrian was moved to SF General Hospital with life-threatening injuries.
Beyond being heartbroken for this individual, I am left thinking about how introducing new technology in the automotive space can create new failure points that didn’t previously exist, and compound with existing failure points. At the end of the day, this woman should have been able to safely cross the street. She should not have been hit by the first driver. She should not have been run over by the AV after. It is heartbreaking, and it is also preventable.
UK council urges that cities should remain in power of AV regulations
Responding to Rishi Sunak’s plan to “back drivers”, the UK’s Local Government Association has called on the government to trust councils with transport powers. “Removing the ability of all councils to enforce moving traffic violations would be a backwards step that will risk creating a two-tier transport system between London and the rest of the country.”
Maybe people don’t want AVs after all
“The public’s trust in [autonomous vehicles] has declined for the second year in a row, according to a study conducted by J.D. Power and MIT. The growing distrust applies to self-driving cars in general, including autonomous vehicles used by ride-hailing services, as well as autonomous driving systems such as Tesla’s “Autopilot,” which belies its limited capabilities through a misleading name.”
The more you know!
The cities with the World’s slowest and fastest traffic (Time)
Interesting, but also annoying insofar as every measurement is based around car traffic vs. flows of people more broadly
Tesla’s autopilot trial begins
Tesla is on trial to determine whether an ‘experimental’ autopilot mode caused a driver’s death in Los Angeles in 2019. The lawsuit claims that Tesla’s autopilot system “caused the owner of a Tesla Model 3 car to suddenly veer off a highway east of Los Angeles at 65mph, where his car struck a palm tree and burst into flames.” They are accusing Tesla of knowing that autopilot and other safety systems were defective when it sold the car. Given Tesla’s climbing serious injury and death toll from Full Self-Driving and other similar products, does not seem like much of a stretch.
The more you know!
Austin’s emergency services are struggling with how to respond to AV incidents (Axios)
Waymo launches service in Miami (CBS)
Driver’s attitudes towards low-emission zones in Norway
“This study investigates attitudes towards a piloted low emission zone (LEZ) and distance-based differentiated road user charging (RUC) system. Both policy instruments are likely to be implemented in combination in Norway, aiming at curbing local environmental issues in the largest cities and cover other external costs of car use.. The participants who were successful in using the LEZ system as intended (i.e. increased use of the electrical modes within the LEZ) gained a more positive attitude.”
Why AVs are still ways away in Japan
My brain reading this clickbaity headline like… because they already have *perfect* mass transit and very cute fire trucks? The article itself is very woe-is-Japan, but I think it’s just fine the country is taking its sweet time.
“The limited availability of autonomous driving in Japan stands in stark contrast to the US and China, where robotaxis already roam the streets in some cities. Waymo, backed by Google parent Alphabet Inc., and General Motor Co.’s Cruise are testing driverless taxi services in San Francisco. Beijing has officially allowed robotaxi operators including Baidu Inc. to charge for fully autonomous taxis in some areas.”
Last weekend I attended my first ever Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in San Francisco. It’s a free, weekend-long festival put on each year, and this year I got to go and sing my heart out to Bahamas with my friend Kimee. It was my third time seeing Bahamas, and it was such a beautiful day + vibe.
Currently dog-sitting my best-dog-friend Pax and the weather in San Francisco is stupidly nice. We went to the beach, and besides Pax trying to eat some sand at the end, it was perfect.
I tend to cope with hard shit by baking cookies (thank you to my mother for instilling this coping mechanism in me, lol). This week I made some cookies and brought them to friends and work and ate them for breakfast. I can’t find the recipe online for the life of me, but it’s from Vancouver baker Jackie Kai Ellis’ memoir The Measure of My Powers which is a 20/10 book rec.
Last week’s newsletter had some of my favourite typos I’ve typo-ed. If you’re newer here, welcome. I am a human being who tries to proofread and often times I fail to catch them all. More often than not, I find them funny and I hope you do too.
That’s all from me. Have a beautiful weekend friends.
Sarah
