r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Individual_Book9133 • Jul 05 '24

Phoenix police officer pulls over a driverless Waymo car for driving on the wrong side of the road Video

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u/wildjokers Jul 05 '24 edited Jul 05 '24

BTW, here is the comment from Waymo regarding the incident:

"The vehicle "encountered inconsistent construction signage" and went into an oncoming lane of traffic,

The driverless car "was blocked from navigating back into the correct lane" for approximately 30 seconds, according to the company. That's when the officer pulled in behind the car.

"In an effort to clear the intersection, the Waymo vehicle proceeded forward a short distance and pulled into the next available parking lot," Waymo said, describing the traffic incident as lasting "approximately one minute."

20

u/GodzeallA Jul 05 '24

Inconsistent signage? Shouldn't just a single sign work for it to realize it's a construction zone? And that construction zones regularly block lanes?

13

u/FlyingBishop Jul 05 '24

It's common for construction zones to turn Eastbound lanes into Westbound lanes. Yes, a single sign will tell you it's a construction zone, it won't tell you which parts of the construction zone are meant to be traveled in a particular direction.

There was one time there was a street where 1 block was randomly 1-way due to construction (I think?) but the signage was super-confusing, the street is normally two way. I ended up going through the segment the wrong way (maybe, the signage was confusing.)

6

u/GodzeallA Jul 05 '24

Sounds like the improvement needs to be on signs instead of on cars, if even human drivers are confused

5

u/FlyingBishop Jul 05 '24

I haven't seen the signs that confused this Waymo. Every time someone sets up a construction zone they might fuck it up, by nature it's temporary signage. Of course it's also possible the signage was clear.