Drawing attention as they zip past buildings and shopping malls, driverless taxis are slowly spreading across many Chinese cities, surprising and alarming many.
Chinese tech companies and automakers have poured billions of dollars into self-driving technology in recent years to catch up with industry leaders in the United States, according to AFP. Wuhan city now has one of the world’s largest self-driving car networks with a fleet of more than 500 taxis that can be booked via the app.
At an intersection in an industrial area of Wuhan, at least five self-driving taxis passed each other as they swerved through traffic. A local resident surnamed Yang described the scene as something out of a science fiction movie, but not everyone was as impressed as Yang. Controversy over the safety of self-driving taxis arose in April when a Huawei-backed Aito was involved in a fatal accident due to a malfunction in its automatic braking system. A minor collision between a jaywalker and a self-driving taxi in Wuhan last month further fueled concerns. Drivers at traditional taxi companies are also worried about being replaced by artificial intelligence, although the technology is still far from fully developed.
From 5 to 500
The Wuhan self-driving taxis are part of Baidu’s Apollo Go project, which will receive its first license to operate in the city in 2022. Initially, just five self-driving taxis were used to ferry passengers around 13 square kilometers in the city of 14 million. Baidu now says its self-driving taxis cover 3,000 square kilometers, more than a third of Wuhan’s total area, including a small portion of the city center. By comparison, US leader Waymo says its largest area of operation is 816 square kilometers, in Arizona.
When the car arrives at the pick-up point, passengers scan a QR code with their phones to open the doors, but the front seats are blocked for safety reasons. Prices are now being slashed, with a 30-minute ride costing just $5.43, nearly half the price of a regular taxi. Deng Haibing, a taxi driver in Wuhan, fears that self-driving taxi companies will push traditional drivers out of the business by cutting prices, then raise prices after they dominate the market. “Right now, the impact is not too big because self-driving taxis are not very popular and cannot run everywhere,” Deng said.
Simple but not ready
Self-driving cars make up just a fraction of the tens of thousands of taxis in Wuhan. More and more Chinese cities are rolling out policies to encourage autonomous driving. Baidu and rival Pony.ai have been testing varying degrees of autonomy for years in industrial parks across the country. Shanghai approved fully autonomous vehicles last month, and Beijing approved autonomous driving in its suburbs. The southwestern city of Chongqing and the southern tech hub of Shenzhen are also running pilot projects.
There is still a long way to go before self-driving taxis become commonplace, according to Tom Nunlist, a technology policy analyst at Trivium China. Even with Wuhan’s Apollo Go taxis, which can detect obstacles and stop at intersections, the ultimate responsibility for safety lies with the staff monitoring the ride remotely. Self-driving taxis are also far from replacing humans. “Some passengers are disabled, and self-driving cars obviously can’t help them. Also, some passengers carry bulky luggage,” said driver Zhao.