You've heard of them for years, seen them on Austin's streets ... and now, finally, you can ride one.
I'm not talking about horses. Lyft Inc. announced Sept. 29 that it is now offering rideshare travel in autonomous vehicles.
Lyft said its AV service will be just like regular human rides and cost the same. For now, the self-driving vehicles will have two safety chaperones. No word on when these cars will be operating free of a safety operator at the ready, which is already happening in San Francisco. Riders will be able to use the app to unlock doors, start the ride and talk to customer support.
But, even with humans in the car that can take over, this will be the first chance that most of us will have to experience what almost everyone expects will be the future of transportation.
It follows years of development by Argo AI and Ford, which partnered with Lyft for the ridehailing service. Austin is the third city to get the service, following Miami and Las Vegas.
Lyft hailed it as a first for Austin. It's one of many firsts in the emerging AV era. Google, which spun out self-driving company Waymo, was the first to give a fully autonomous ride in Austin in 2015.
Argo AI has been promoting this launch for years, and it has had a few delays along the way, largely due to the pandemic.
Meanwhile, AV company Cruise recently announced plans to launch its robotaxi service here within about 90 days.
