Is the world finally ready for driverless vehicles? The view from the passenger seat

The taxi pulls up to the kerb, attracting a number of spectators who snap photos as I hop in the front. Out of habit, I turn to greet the driver - and find an empty seat.

The ride from my hotel to the state capitol in Atlanta, Georgia, is surprisingly uneventful, apart from the fact that the car is one of a handful of Waymo driverless vehicles operating on the city's busy streets.

On exiting the car, I make sure to give the driver a five-star rating.

After decades of existing only in science fiction, autonomous vehicles are finally having a moment in several cities throughout the world - but will they ever be a dominant mode of transport? That question is causing ample discussion among researchers, economists and elected officials.

In Washington, home of The National's US bureau, fully autonomous vehicles are not yet street legal. But Atlanta, along with Los Angeles, Phoenix, San Francisco and Austin, has approved Waymo's self-driving vehicles to operate on city roads. Waymo started as a Google research endeavour in 2009, but currently operates as a subsidiary of Google owner Alphabet.

Ordering the driverless vehicle was surprisingly easy: I simply opened the Uber app, updated the settings to allow for a pick-up by a Waymo self-driving vehicle, and then booked a ride.

The company's Jaguar I-Pace is a quiet vehicle, but far from subtle. That's largely due to the Light Detection and Ranging (Lidar) sensor rotating on the top of the car, and several others on other parts of the vehicle.

Despite piquing the interest of Atlanta passers-by, it has not exactly been an autonomous vehicle free-for-all in the city, or other places the vehicles are available.

For Waymo, different cities come with different issues. In Atlanta and Austin, you need to use the Uber app to ride in Waymo's vehicles, but in San Francisco, Phoenix and Los Angeles, you can use the Waymo app. Using the Uber app, you can't specifically request an autonomous ride, but only have to the possibility of being assigned one.

The distances that the self-driving cars can travel are often limited. In Atlanta, for example, Waymo operations are limited to within 104km of the city. In addition, out of an abundance of caution, for the most part, Waymo vehicles do not go on motorways.

Srinivas Peeta has spent much of his life researching the promises and potential pitfalls of autonomous technology. He says that although the market finally seems to be at a tipping point for autonomous adoption, there is still a lot of work to be done.

"The question that comes up is when they're faced with situations that they haven't encountered previously," Mr Peeta, director of Georgia Tech's autonomous and connected transport lab, told The National.

In some instances, Mr Peeta said that humans are still able to adapt to various road conditions in ways that autonomous vehicles cannot.

He pointed out that in many of the cities where Waymo currently exists, the weather tends to be relatively stable - and that's no accident. Rain, snow and ice could expose some of the shortcomings of autonomous technology.

"There are conditions that a human driver, will be able to intuitively process and respond to things, but these autonomous systems may be challenged because they're not trained in terms of the data that they have," Mr Peeta said, adding that he expects the systems to improve over time once testing and vehicle availability increases.

There may be a learning curve in places where the climate is more volatile. It also remains to be seen exactly when autonomous vehicles will be allowed to operate on motorways, where safety becomes even more of a factor given the higher speeds.

As autonomous technology is increasingly tested in more places, Mr Peeta said that for every step forward, we should expect a few steps back, largely due to a chasm in consumer assumptions and inevitable problems that might arise.

"There's an underlying expectation that these autonomous systems were going to replace human drivers," he said. "If that's the case, then they should do so at least to the same level as human drivers."

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), there were a little more than 39,000 traffic fatalities in the US last year, so there is clearly the opportunity for autonomous vehicles to make things safer by taking out the human element.

Yet despite recent technological advances, coupled with initial statistics showing a major improvement in safety, there is still a ways to go in terms of convincing people to get inside and go for a ride in an autonomous vehicle.

In 2025, only 13 per cent of US drivers said they trust self-driving vehicles, according to polling from the American Automobile Association - a slight increase from the survey results last year which showed 9 per cent of drivers trusted the technology.

The survey also indicated that 53 per cent said that they would not choose to take a ride in autonomous vehicles, though those falling in the Millennial and Generation X age groups seemed more open to the idea.

Public perception of driverless vehicle safety has proven to be incredibly sensitive to various incidents, although incidents have been rare.

In 2023, two Cruise autonomous vehicles were reported to have malfunctioned and temporarily blocked emergency response vehicles from transporting a patient. Cruise, a subsidiary operated by General Motors, also came under heavy criticism for discrepancies in how the company reported a crash in which an autonomous vehicle struck and killed a pedestrian.

Non-fatal glitches have also dominated headlines in the past. One Waymo rider in Phoenix had to call for help when his vehicle refused to exit a roundabout.

Frank McCleary, of the Arthur D Little consulting company, said that despite statistics showing driverless technology is growing ever safer, there is a lingering stigma against rapid adoption.

"I talk to a lot of original equipment manufacturers, and a lot of it is just a matter of getting butts in seats," he said. "You've got to get over that hump that this is a car without a human driver and people need to become comfortable with that."

And consumer perception and technology are not even the biggest obstacle holding back autonomous vehicles from taking over transport. Basic economics have also proven to be a major hurdle.

Mr McCleary said that from a rideshare perspective, the costs of an autonomous vehicle are still too high.

"You're essentially talking about a finished vehicle that'll cost you somewhere between $40,000 and $60,000 and then you're adding an entire technology suite with integration batteries and everything else to run that beyond whatever auxiliary power you may need," he explained to The National, cautioning that while the costs will eventually come down, it might take longer than many realise.

"That's really the challenge that needs to be overcome in the midterm."

Ultimately, the biggest factor in determining whether or not autonomous vehicles become the new normal is us.

"I have to say, it's pretty intriguing," Nia Roberts of Atlanta told The National as she watched one of Waymo's autonomous vehicles dropped off several riders. "I keep wanting to ask people what it's like riding in it."

Ms Roberts said that although Waymo has been available in Atlanta since June, she still hasn't used one.

"I do plan to try it eventually, but I don't think I'm going to make it a consistent part of my day," she explained, adding that while the technology is incredible, there's still a "weirdness" factor when she sees Waymo vehicles on the road.