“Waymo said Wednesday it has applied for a permit to test its autonomous vehicles in New York City, the Alphabet company’s first step in a sticky regulatory process to bring its robotaxis to U.S.’s largest city.

Waymo applied for a permit with the New York City Department of Transportation to operate its self-driving Jaguar I-Pace vehicles with a human safety operator behind the wheel in Manhattan. New York’s autonomous vehicle demonstration or testing permit requires a human driver to be able to take over; a $5 million insurance policy; and every test vehicle operator must be adequately trained in the safe operation of the test vehicle. 

New York law is especially prohibitive of autonomous vehicles. While securing a permit would be notable, Waymo is far from being able to launch commercial operations in the city — or even test without a human safety operator behind the wheel.”

From TechCrunch.