An autonomous taxi depot has given neighbours nightmares after its self-driving vehicles began honking their horns at each other in the middle of the night.
When Waymo’s autonomous cabs first arrived in the San Fransisco Bay area in the summer, there were no issues and residents were pleased with the extra security it brought.
To honk or not to honk
Disturbances caused by car horns are a serious nuisance and in the UK it is against the law to sound a horn in a restricted area between 11.30pm and 7am unless it is an emergency. Restricted roads are those that have street lights and a 30mph limit.
The UK Highway Code says a horn should “only be used when warning someone of any danger due to another vehicle or any other kind of danger, and not to indicate your annoyance”.
Those who flout this law could be given a fixed-penalty notice and pay £30 – which could rise to £1,000 if disputed and taken to court.
Honking hell
The nightmare began for neighbours living in condos next to the Waymo depot following a safety update to the robotaxis which caused them to honk their horns whenever another vehicle came too close as it parked or recharged.
Sky News reports that when Waymo’s autonomous cabs first arrived in San Fransisco, residents were pleased because they thought it would improve security in the area.
But after a few weeks, they could hear car horns honking randomly throughout the day and then at night. Neighbours had had enough when they were woken up at 4am several days running as the vehicles set off from the depot for the day – honking at each other as they manoeuvred through the car park.
Help!
The problem got so bad that resident Sophia Tung set up YouTube livestreams to show others what they were living with – and the videos have been viewed by tens of thousands of people.
In one clip revealing their nightmare, Sophia recorded the cars reversing out of parking bays with hazard lights flashing and being beeped by other vehicles as they manoeuvre out.
An exhausted Sophia is heard saying: “It’s ******* 4am. Help!”
Neighbour Christopher Cherry told Sky’s US partner NBC Bay Area: “We started out with a couple of honks here and there, and then as more and more cars started to arrive, the situation got worse.
“The cars are robotic and they’re honking at each other and there’s no one in the cars when it’s happening, and that’s absurd. It’s very distracting during the work day, but, most importantly, it wakes you up at four in the morning.”
Silent solution
Waymo, owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet, was quick to respond to the complaints and has put an end to the noisy nightmare.
A spokesman said: “We recently introduced a useful feature to help avoid low-speed collisions by honking if other cars get too close while reversing toward us. It has been working great in the city, but we didn’t quite anticipate it would happen so often in our own parking lots.
“We’ve updated the software, so our electric vehicles should keep the noise down for our neighbours moving forward.”
Following the update, neighbours – many of whom are Waymo customers – soon noticed a difference and are once again enjoying peaceful nights.
Whatever your views on robotaxis, the important thing is how quickly the company responded to complaints and took action to stop the disturbance. Despite the disruption, Waymo has enhanced its reputation with the way it dealt with the problem and has won back customers it risked driving away.
