Waymo plans to test robotaxis in New York City with supervision

Waymo announced plans Wednesday to bring its autonomous cars to New York City streets starting next month, but humans will be behind the steering wheel.

Waymo announced plans Wednesday to bring its autonomous cars to New York City streets starting next month, but in a change from its robotaxi service in other states, the company said it plans to have a person behind the steering wheel to meet local regulations.

Waymo needs a permit to operate its robotaxis even with supervision, under guidelines Mayor Eric Adams announced last year. Waymo said Wednesday that it had applied for the permit with the city’s Transportation Department and, in the meantime, would start manually driving in the city.

Waymo, a spinoff of Google, also said it wants to change state law in New York to allow for operating a vehicle with no human behind the wheel, as Waymo operates now in cities including Los Angeles, Phoenix and San Francisco. New York law mandates at least one hand on the steering wheel for any vehicle in operation.

The mayor’s office said in a statement that the New York City Transportation Department was reviewing Waymo’s application.

“As we have said, New York City leads the nation in responsible innovation, and our autonomous vehicle program is no different. Public safety is our first priority, which is why we have strong guardrails and requirements in place on any sort of autonomous vehicles to ensure that we get AV technology right,” the mayor’s office said.