A motorcade escorting Vice President Kamala Harris to San Francisco’s Fairmont Hotel was brought to a standstill late Friday by a stalled Waymo.
Video from ABC7 shows the driverless car stopping while making a U-turn on California Street. A police officer then gets in the robotaxi to drive it out of the way.
HAPPENING NOW: A driverless @Waymo gets stuck making a u-turn as @VP’s motorcade arrived at the Fairmont S.F.
— LaurenABC7 (@LaurenABC7) September 28, 2024
An SFPD officer had to manually drive the vehicle out. We’re hearing this wasn’t the only one… @abc7newsbayarea pic.twitter.com/uCdiTf9lbB
The distinctly San Francisco traffic jam punctuated a visit that’s likely to be Harris’ last stop in the city before the election. The Democratic presidential nominee was set to speak at a private fundraiser the next day.
The Waymo malfunction is just the latest of many incidents in San Francisco involving self-driving cars, which are still exempt from traffic citations. But that will soon change.
Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday signed a bill that allows law enforcement to cite driverless car companies for traffic violations.
The citations won’t come with fees, but the car companies will have to report them to the California Department of Motor Vehicles. If a company racks up enough citations, the DMV will then be able to change or pull its permits.
The law, however, doesn’t take effect until 2026, which means Waymo is off the hook for the robotaxi that stalled the vice presidential motorcade.
San Francisco’s many traffic issues with driverless cars — including incidents in which cars impeded first-responders during emergencies — helped inspire the new law authored by Assemblymember Phil Ting, D-San Francisco.
Driverless car company Cruise lost its permit to operate in San Francisco after a series of incidents, including a high-profile case in which a car caught and dragged a pedestrian along the street.
Incidents had already begun to decline, according to data analyzed by The Frisc, and continued to drop off after Cruise pulled its fleet off the streets.
More recent data wasn’t immediately available on Saturday, but a spokesperson for the San Francisco Fire Department said the agency could provide updated figures early next week.