SoylentNews

takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Lyft will begin offering "autonomous" rides [washingtonpost.com] (with a test driver in the front seat) to some ride-hailing customers by the end of the year. The program is expected to launch in Boston first:

Silicon Valley's steady march toward self-driving cars took another step forward Friday as the ride-hailing company Lyft said its customers will be able to summon a driverless vehicle on some roads by the end of the year.

The autonomy program, which is expected to launch in Boston before eventually spreading to other cities, could ultimately involve hundreds of thousands of vehicles, said company officials. Depending on the precise conditions of a trip — including the route, traffic, weather and time of day — riders who opt into the trial may be automatically picked up in a self-driving car built by one of a number of manufacturers working with Lyft, rather than a human driver. "You're going to see it. You're going to see these vehicles on the street," said Taggart Matthiesen, Lyft's senior director of product.

As with other companies that have been publicly testing self-driving cars, Lyft riders who participate in the program will be accompanied by test drivers sitting in the front seats of the vehicles.

Lyft announcement [medium.com]. Also at TechCrunch [techcrunch.com], Reuters [reuters.com], and Bloomberg [bloomberg.com].

Original Submission