Self-Driving Ubers Are Picking up San Franciscans Starting Today

Starting today, you can now hail a ride from one of the self-driving cars Uber is currently testing on the streets of San Francisco.

The launch in California’s third-largest city — and Uber’s hometown — is an expansion of the public pilot program that the company first rolled out in Pittsburgh earlier this year. The program allows ride-hailers to experience self-driving cars firsthand, while letting Uber work out some of the glitches and kinks before the technology becomes widespread, according to The Associated Press.

Uber has been testing their retrofitted Volvo XC90 self-driving vehicles on the streets of San Francisco for a few weeks, but Wednesday’s official launch marks the first time that Uber users in the city can actually ride in one. The luxury SUVs, among the first vehicles produced with innovative technology such as LIDAR, are the result of a collaboration between Uber and Volvo etched out in August, according to the New York Times.

Not everyone is happy about the autonomous cars, though. California regulators are saying that Uber is breaking state law by testing their vehicles without a required autonomous vehicle permit. Uber has countered by saying they don’t need one — as the rule applies to self-driving vehicles without any human supervision. Uber’s self-driving cars in San Francisco currently have humans behind the wheel, ready to take control in case of an emergency, Wired reported. Of course, Uber has a long history with testing the boundaries of authority.

In Pittsburgh, Uber limited the pilot program to a select group of users. That’s not the case here. Any Uber user in the city could find themselves getting a notification that a self-driving car is on the way — and skeptical ride-hailers can even opt out, and receive a human-operated Uber instead, according to The Verge.

Notably, the streets of San Francisco are a perilous place for any driver — due to the steep hills, weather, cable cars, thriving bicyclist community and frequent roadwork. Uber’s self-driving cars will certainly be put to the test there.

If all goes well, Uber’s ultimate goal is to sell the underlying self-driving technology to the public. While several crashes involving autonomous vehicles have made major headlines, self-driving cars are still much, much safer than human drivers. One estimate predicts that driverless cars could eliminate 90 percent of the deaths and injuries associated with auto accidents, the Wall Street Journal reported.