I jumped into a driverless car in the US. Here’s how they could hit Australia

October 30, 2026 — 2:00am

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When I visited San Francisco a few weeks ago, it took me a while to notice the driverless cars. It was only when I was crossing the street one day, and looked up to see a car with an empty driver’s seat slowing down for me, that I began seeing them everywhere.

As someone who hasn’t learnt to drive, rideshare services such as Uber and Didi have been crucial in getting me to places where public transport is patchy or nonexistent. While taxis can be optimal in some circumstances, Ubers are often cheaper (at least during non-peak times) and more abundant – and the upfront pricing allows me to make a considered choice about whether to take the long way home when I’m trying to save money.

The latest development in on-demand transport shakes things up a bit.

Driverless rideshare platforms such as Waymo, owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet, have been rolled out across more than a dozen cities in the US, including Miami, Dallas and Los Angeles. The company’s website shows Tokyo as a future destination.

Economically, these driverless vehicles pose some trade-offs. They also provide some insight into how AI could affect the economy – as it has already begun to do.

One major concern, for example, is how Waymo might affect jobs.

While Uber shook up the taxi industry when it was introduced more than a decade ago, sparking anger and worry from some taxi drivers and businesses, it wasn’t a technology that looked like it would wipe out drivers entirely.

With Waymo, there’s a physical absence you feel as soon as you step into a car and see the empty driver’s seat. An array of sensors outside the car feed data into a machine learning model that decides what will happen and what path the vehicle will take.

The Transport Workers’ Union has pushed to pause the rollout of these........

© WA Today