The way I understand it is: There are two cars waiting to go through an intersection. The Cruise and the Human-Driven car. The light turns green, and the Cruise's pathway through the intersection is clear.
A pedestrian is crossing the intersection in the path of the human-driven car, but not in the path of the Cruise.
Both cars enter the intersection, the human-driven car strikes the pedestrian, who then rolls off the human-driven car into the path of the Cruise, and is run-over the Cruise.
Of course, I haven't seen the accident, but if that's broadly correct, I'm not sure that this is the damning evidence of "driverless cars are unsafe" some people seem to be spinning it up to be.
It is a tragedy, but it seems to be a tragedy caused primarily by a human driver who struck a pedestrian, and a human pedestrian who ignored a traffic signal.
Should the bar for driverless cars be "able to predict when other vehicles will hit a pedestrian and roll that person in their path"?
Would a human-driven vhicle have done any better? If the places were reversed, would the Cruise have struck the pedestrian in the first place?
I think we're all right to be skeptical of machine-driven cars, but I'm not certain that this specific incident is a point against them.
JFC. How about "do not enter an intersection where pedestrians are present?"
So no entering intersections at all in major cities during rush hour?
No, but in the case of pedestrians crossing the street it may be reasonable to expect a driverless car to avoid getting into a situation where that can happen. This will depend on details of traffic laws where it is operating.
What are the clearance rules in California for staying clear of pedestrians crossing the street?
Here in Washington it is that if they are in your half of the street or within one lane of your half you have to wait. For purposes of this rule your half of the street is all lanes moving in your direction.
No Washington driver should be going until either the pedestrian finishes crossing or there is at least one lane between the lanes in the car's direction and the lane the pedestrian is in.
If a human driver here goes early and hits the pedestrian and the pedestrian ends up in an adjacent lane they should still be safe from other cars that did not go early.
> ... shall exercise all due care and shall reduce the speed of the vehicle or take any other action relating to the operation of the vehicle as necessary to safeguard the safety of the pedestrian.
In addition, all of the rules for pedestrians (no jaywalking, don't dash off the curb in front of a car, even in a crosswalk) include a provision that state they do not "relieve a driver of a vehicle from the duty of exercising due care for the safety of any pedestrian within the [roadway or crosswalk]"
This is great in principle but in practice cars will just drive straight at you even when you are crossing on a walk signal.
Coming from a country where the walk signal means only pedestrians can be in the crosswalk this almost got me killed the other night.
I was hoping self driving cars would help things but it seems they drive straight for you too.
> Notwithstanding any official traffic control signal indication to proceed, a driver of a vehicle shall not enter an intersection or marked crosswalk unless there is sufficient space on the other side of the intersection or marked crosswalk to accommodate the vehicle driven without obstructing the through the passage of vehicles from either side
Assuming the pedestrian counts as being on the "other side of the intersection" and prevents there from being sufficient space to "accommodate the vehicle being driven" I think you are correct.
1: They would put up a "do not block intersection" sign anywhere that this became a problem, and then you could get ticketed for disobeying a road sign.