Advocates Launch Campaign to Reintroduce Driverless Waymo Taxis in New York

A Better Road Forward, a newly formed nonprofit, is campaigning to bring driverless Waymo robotaxis back to New York after an anti-robotaxi study was forced to retract key findings. The organization is running television spots and holding informational sessions across the state, with former City Council Speaker Christine Quinn emphasizing the need for safe, reliable transport for late-shift workers and families. Interested firms can still submit applications via the New York State DMV and the city Department of Transportation.

The contested report had incorrectly matched NYC’s “critical injury” data with Waymo’s broader “serious injury” category, and the corrected analysis shows Waymo’s nationwide injury crash rate at 0.712 per million miles versus 1.871 for city taxis, a roughly 62% reduction. Only three Waymo-involved crashes were cited in the original fatal-or-serious-injury comparison. The controversy follows the release of a fictional novel, Autokill, by Sam Schwartz, which the Sam Schwartz Transportation Research Program at Hunter College declined to comment on. Waymo officials expressed eagerness to collaborate with state and city leaders on a regulatory framework for autonomous vehicle deployment.