Waymo driverless taxis are coming to London – but how safe are they?

If you’re worried that the next time you miss the last train home you’ll have to chat to your taxi driver for an hour, we have some good news.

Robotaxi firm Waymo said today it will launch a fully driverless ride-hailing service in London in 2026.

Self-driving taxis are nothing new in California, where they have been picking up customers since last summer.

But after testing its service in Tokyo, Japan, earlier this year, Waymo robotaxis will now face its biggest challenge yet – the M25.

Waymo, which was started as Google’s self-driving division, will start deploying supervised robotaxis for data collection within weeks.

Don’t expect an empty car to pull up in front of you just yet – a safety driver will be behind the wheel.

Users will be able to hail a robo-cab on the company’s mobile phone app, as roughly one million in the US already have.

This doesn’t mean the autonomous taxis will be here for good, as it’s part of a pilot programme the government has approved.

Uber has said it’s ready to put robotaxis on the road as soon as the government agrees, and they already have driverless taxis in the US, China, the UAE and Singapore.

Tesla has also tested its self-driving software on London streets to launch its Cybercab here.

In July, ministers said they would fast-track pilot schemes for self-driving taxis and ‘bus-like services’, so they could start from spring 2026.

Driverless taxis will get the full green light in the UK from 2027, when the Automated Vehicles Act is implemented.

Waymo let slip that it was planning to move to London after posting an array of job adverts on its website, including a ‘fleet readiness lead’ who will earn up to £95,000 to establish the robotaxis in the capital.

How safe are robotaxis?

As many other firms try out computer-aided driving, especially in the US, the number of self-driving vehicle incidents has begun to increase.

Tesla, owned by Elon Musk, has been testing cars powered by self-driving software since 2015. To date, 59 people have died in crashes involving the vehicle, monitoring groups say.

From July to December 2023, the number of crashes in the US averaged about 17 per month, according to official figures.

But the tally has been rising since, now averaging at 59 incidents a month, peaking in May with 110.

Analysts say that the increase isn’t a verdict of the safety of the self-driving cars but just the result of more being on the road.

But in cities where passengers can hail autonomous vehicles, self-driving taxis have blocked ambulances, caused accidents and increased traffic. Some, such as Tesla’s Robotaxi scheme in Austin, don’t run in bad weather.

American highway authorities have opened an investigation into Tesla’s Full Self-Driving tech after receiving reports that the software caused vehicles to run red lights or cross into the wrong lanes.

Waymo’s previous schemes have seen the firm carefully map the areas it operates in and use specially modified vehicles.

Each driverless vehicle has a remote operator who can be spoken with through a device in the car.

Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana said in a blog post that it’s ‘making roads safer and transportation more accessible where we operate’.

He added: ‘We’ve demonstrated how to responsibly scale fully autonomous ride-hailing, and we can’t wait to expand the benefits of our technology to the United Kingdom.’

James Gibson, Executive Director of Road Safety GB, added in the post: ‘The data shows that the Waymo vehicles have performed far safer compared to human drivers across more than 100 million autonomous miles.’

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