Waymo opens robotaxis in Las Vegas, its 15th market
Waymo is taking riders on the Strip. Tesla Robotaxi may be following soon behind
Waymo said Monday it has begun inviting the public into its robotaxis in Las Vegas, TechCrunch reported. It is the company’s 15th market. Tesla has approval to put more cars on those streets than anyone else, but it hasn’t started commercial service there quite yet.
Waymo is using the same invite process it has used in 14 other cities. You request an invite and wait for an access code. The company typically lets everyone in within a month or two. For now it is starting with “dozens” of its new Ojai minivans on a slice of the city that includes the Strip south of Highway 589 and runs into Boulder Junction, according to a Waymo spokesperson quoted by TechCrunch. The fleet and the service area will grow over time.
The Nevada Transportation Authority approved commercial robotaxi service in Clark County a few weeks ago. Waymo may operate up to 1,000 autonomous vehicles there over the next year. Tesla is allowed 5,000. Uber is allowed 1,000, which it would run through partnerships with Motional and Zoox. Add those together and you get 7,000 robotaxis on paper. Nobody should expect the companies to hit those numbers anytime soon though. Waymo’s whole fleet today is more than 4,000 vehicles, already spread across more than a dozen cities. In an August meeting with the Nevada Transportation Authority, Tesla Cybercab chief engineer Eric Early said the company would be “extremely happy and satisfied if we could get ourselves up to 2,500, maybe a bit higher than that in the next year.”
Even a slice of those caps could fill the Strip. Zoox is already running a commercial service in Las Vegas. Motional is planning one. The city may get crowded before anyone reaches the permit ceiling.
Waymo has not been sitting still. Earlier this month it started offering rides to invited members of the public in Denver, San Diego, and Tampa. It already operates in Austin, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, Phoenix, and the San Francisco Bay Area. It launched in San Antonio and then paused. Soon autonomous vehicles will be available in every major U.S. city. The biggest missing pieces are some of the major northeastern cities, like New York City and Boston.
Congratulations to Waymo on another new city launched. I’m looking forward to Tesla bringing Robotaxis and Cybercabs to Nevada as well.