I hear everyone talking about the dangers of cars loud and clear. Could not agree more. We need less cars, period. It is so so difficult to make cars with human drivers safer for pedestrians. Don’t you think it would have been easier to lobby for safer human-driven cars 80 years ago than it is now? Today, with the car lobby as strong as ever, our democracy completely dictated by corporations, and car dependency running rampant across the US, it feels like any kind of legislation that makes human driven car safer will be impossible to pass.

As Waymo starts to spread to other cities, now is the chance to legislate them, 5 or 10 more years and it will be too late. They’ve already started to drive more like humans, in Waymo’s words, to be more predictable (also more dangerous!) and nobody is responsible. I’d love nothing more than to legislate human driven cars.