This is the monthly edition of the Transport Workers Union’s Transportation Technology Newsletter. We aim to inform and educate our members, the labor movement, the public and policymakers about developments in transportation technology – and what the TWU is doing to ensure that new technology doesn’t undermine safety or harm the livelihoods of hard-working blue-collar workers. For suggestions and questions, please email ewytkind@gmail.com or adaugherty@twu.org.
ITEM OF THE MONTH
CHANGING THE PLAYING FIELD ON AVs
A few weeks ago, the Transport Workers Union successfully secured first-of-its-kind contract language with the Central Ohio Transit Authority to give the union veto power over the deployment of autonomous vehicles. And the TWU isn’t stopping there. The Ohio contract language will be a template for future TWU negotiations in cities across the country.
“Big Tech and its profit monger investors are aggressively trying to foist an ugly future on us, where everything is automated, including mass transit,” TWU International President John Samuelsen said. “We will always fight to protect transit worker jobs – and the safety of the riding public.”
TWU has 37 transit locals and represents Bus Operators in Houston, Miami, Philadelphia, New York City, Akron, Ann Arbor, Omaha, San Francisco, Winston-Salem, and other cities. The contract language also says Bus Operators and mechanics cannot be laid off or have their wages reduced because of new or modified technology.
But the contract language goes beyond just protecting jobs – it protects passengers. Bus Operators serve many critical functions beyond driving, TWU International Administrative Vice President Curtis Tate said.
“Bus Operators have spotted lost children and reunited them with parents, performed life-saving CPR, alerted first-responders to crimes in progress, aided pregnant women going into labor, helped disoriented and confused senior citizens, and more.” Tate said. “You name a situation. They’ve seen it and helped.”
The Ohio contract language was drafted by the TWU Technology Task Force and TWU Local presidents. Samuelsen and Tate congratulated Local 208 President Jarvis Williams for negotiating the COTA contract and managing its ratification by the membership.
While autonomous cars have generated negative headlines in states like California for being a menace to public safety, a potentially dangerous step toward autonomous mass transit has begun with the emergence of shuttles capable of seating four to 15 passengers and prototype autonomous full-size buses.
WHAT ELSE IS COOKING
CA Regulators Stall Waymo’s Plans to Flood CA Roads with Driverless Zombie Cars
Menacing driverless ride-hail services run by mammoth corporations General Motors and Alphabet (formerly Google) continue to draw heightened safety scrutiny as California regulators have put a pause on Waymo’s application to expand dangerous experimentation on the state’s roads.
This action comes on the heels of orders issued last fall by the state’s safety officials to pull Cruise autonomous vehicles from service if they do not have an operator on-board. All of this is occurring in the wake of a spate of severe safety incidents involving both Cruise and Waymo driverless vehicles including disruption of fire and police emergency response and a woman run over by a Cruise-operated autonomous vehicle.
“We must stop allowing the use of people as human crash dummies in unsafe, poorly regulated autonomous vehicles run by billionaire tech and auto companies,” said TWU International President John Samuelsen. “This technology isn’t ready for primetime – it’s time for regulators to finish the job and protect the public from dangerous applications of autonomous transportation.”
9 in 10 in US Don’t Trust Autonomous Vehicle Tech
A Forbes Advisor survey of 2,000 Americans shows that over 9 out of 10 have safety and other concerns about autonomous vehicles, with barely over 1 in 10 saying they are “very trusting” of this technology. Among those polled, 67% said they were, ranked in order, skeptical, concerned, afraid, or overall negative. Amidst rising criticism about Tesla’s irresponsible deployment and marketing of “autopilot” features in its cars, more than 6 out of 10 respondents also said they are not confident in Tesla’s self-driving technology.
Apple Scraps its AV Apple Car
After seven years of fits and starts, Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed the tech giant is scrapping its autonomous car project, stating in an interview with Bloomberg “it’s probably one of the most difficult AI projects to actually work on.” Most of the Apple Car’s workers will switch over to generative AI projects, though some layoffs are expected.
The Verge writes: “It’s not a surprise that the demise of the Apple car coincides with a bleaker outlook for electric and autonomous vehicles” as investments in driverless cars are “going through serious growing pains.” And The Verge notes that Apple, ever conscious of its public image, was seeking to avoid the negative headlines of other robotaxi companies in California.
WHAT WE’RE READING
New Driverless Shuttle Coming to Houston Metro in 2024? ABC 13 Houston.
Self-Driving Cars: The Revolution That Wasn’t? The Week.
Autonomous Electric Vehicles Will Guzzle Power Instead of Gas. Bloomberg.