In recent years, the landscape of urban transportation has been significantly transformed by the advent of autonomous vehicles (AVs), particularly in tech-forward regions like California. Notably, San Francisco has emerged as a pivotal testing ground for these self-driving cars, with companies like Cruise and Waymo leading the charge.
However, a critical shift in the reporting of crash liability data by the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) raises questions about transparency and safety in this rapidly evolving field. Until late 2019, the California DMV meticulously tracked and reported who was at fault in almost every reported AV collision.
This practice provided invaluable insights into the safety and reliability of autonomous vehicles. From 2014 to 2019, DMV data showed that in 225 of 226 AV-related crashes, there was clear attribution of fault, with human-driven vehicles being responsible 82% of the time.
However, this practice came to an abrupt halt in November 2019. Since then, there has been a conspicuous absence of at-fault data in public records for AV collisions. This change coincided with a substantial increase in the presence of self-driving cars in San Francisco.
From 2019 to the present, the DMV has not reported at-fault data for any of the 442 crashes involving AVs, 341 of which occurred in San Francisco. The DMV’s explanation for this shift is that while it analyzes factors contributing to collisions, it does not make fault determinations. These are typically left to law enforcement or insurance companies.
This explanation, however, marks a significant departure from the earlier practice of collecting at-fault data through police reports and insurance agencies. The lack of public at-fault data has become a contentious issue in San Francisco, where city leaders have expressed concerns about the safety of AVs.
This is in contrast to claims by AV companies like Waymo and Cruise, which advocate for the safety of their technology. Waymo, for instance, has released studies showing a 76% reduction in property damage claims compared to human-driven cars, while Cruise has reported a 92% lower rate of their vehicles being the primary contributor to collisions.
The DMV requires all autonomous vehicle companies to report any collision resulting in property damage, bodily injury, or death within 10 days of the incident. However, this mandate only applies to testing vehicles, not those carrying paying customers. The ambiguity around reporting standards and the lack of clarity on who decides to track or report at-fault data add to the complexity of assessing AV safety.
As of August, state regulators gave Cruise and Waymo permission to work freely in all of San Francisco. Waymo’s fleet can still be used without any restrictions, but Cruise’s license to operate was taken away after an accident near Union Square on October 2 in which a woman was seriously injured after being hit by a Cruise vehicle and dragged about 20 feet.
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