Waymo expands self-driving taxi service into Silicon Valley

Waymo began offering their self-driving ride services to select customers in Mountain View, Los Altos, Palo Alto and parts of Sunnyvale starting Tuesday, March 11. 

Rides will be available to select Waymo One customers who live in the service area, with the company expecting to serve more riders across the region over time. The 27-square mile service expansion into Silicon Valley comes after Waymo extended its services to San Francisco in June and to parts of the Peninsula such as Daly City in August. 

The extension of services into Mountain View marks a return to Waymo’s roots, where the company is headquartered and initial testing of the autonomous vehicle prototypes took place in 2009. The self-driving car company, owned by Google parent company Alphabet, began piloting autonomous vehicles in 2018 across multiple Santa Clara County cities.

Driverless taxi services have since launched in San Francisco and extended into northern San Mateo County last year. Waymo now serves over 200,000 paid trips and drives over 1 million miles every week across four major cities, according to a press statement. 

“Opening our fully autonomous ride-hailing service in Silicon Valley marks a special milestone in our Bay Area journey,” Saswat Panigrahi, Waymo’s chief product officer, said in a statement.  “Now we’re bringing seamless rides, safer streets, and sustainable transportation to our local community.”

Waymo works closely with city officials, local communities, and their partners to ensure safe and accessible rides, product communications manager Chris Bonelli said in an email. Bonelli noted that the company tests their technology across a range of driving environments from urban centers such as San Francisco to the sprawling suburbs of metro Phoenix. 

“Before taking any step to expand our capabilities or service area, we do extensive testing in simulation, on closed-courses, and in the real world,” Bonelli said in the email. “We follow a playbook where we continuously scale incrementally and work towards offering a great service for riders which involves preparing our vehicles and infrastructure.” 

Community Services Agency, a nonprofit that offers social services to vulnerable populations such as seniors in Mountain View, Los Altos, and Los Altos Hills, is partnering with Waymo to offer rides to clients and staff members. CSA’s case managers will use Waymo cars to make home visits to homebound seniors and to accompany seniors to medical appointments.

CSA’s development director Simone Berkowitz said that their organization welcomes an additional safe and effective transportation option.

“The more options for transportation, the better,” Berkowitz said. “A huge issue is senior clients not having those transportation options, and they become isolated if they can’t get to where (they need) to go.” 

Customers can access Waymo through the Waymo One app. Pricing for Waymo One is comparable to other ride-hailing services, Bonelli said, and can vary based on the distance and duration of the trip.  

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