The key metric is probably "obscure incidents" per miles driven, probably classified manually into various levels of danger. Once the "incidents that lead to disaster" count reaches 0 statistically, it will definitely roll out en masse without the need of safety drivers.
My guess is that they know how many miles they have to drive in order to reach that number, and it's a whole lot. Statistics and math stuff but you can probably pin it down to the month or quarter based on trends. Either that, or it's about driving every road in the city with all sorts of weather / traffic / pedestrian conditions until there's no issue. This isn't generalized AI driving (L5) but it's a much more logical approach to getting autonomous driving coverage where it's the most valuable.
My guess is that each city will involve a safety driver rollout until they have enough data to know the incident rate is zero. There might be a lot of variance between cities - maps data, weather conditions, customs, etc. Then remove the safety drivers.
I'm sure they also are experimenting with disaster/safety protocols while they do the roll out.
My prediction is that waymo will be a mainstream option within the next 5 years.
My guess is that they know how many miles they have to drive in order to reach that number, and it's a whole lot. Statistics and math stuff but you can probably pin it down to the month or quarter based on trends. Either that, or it's about driving every road in the city with all sorts of weather / traffic / pedestrian conditions until there's no issue. This isn't generalized AI driving (L5) but it's a much more logical approach to getting autonomous driving coverage where it's the most valuable.
My guess is that each city will involve a safety driver rollout until they have enough data to know the incident rate is zero. There might be a lot of variance between cities - maps data, weather conditions, customs, etc. Then remove the safety drivers.
I'm sure they also are experimenting with disaster/safety protocols while they do the roll out.
My prediction is that waymo will be a mainstream option within the next 5 years.