San Francisco, the United States: The sidewalk outside Majed Zeidan’s grocery store in San Francisco’s Mission District has stayed filled with flowers, candles, memorials and pictures since his cat was crushed under a Waymo in late October. A month later, a Waymo reportedly crushed a dog.Amid the pictures of the cat, a visitor had placed a poster that said, “save the cat, kill the car”. That’s when Zeidan knew Kit Kat, his bodega cat, had become the face of the simmering discontent over San Francisco’s growing number of self-driving cars.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of listTwo years since it got approved to ply its driverless cars, Waymo, owned by Google parent company Alphabet, has become a part of San Francisco’s landscape.Residents became increasingly comfortable riding one, costumed Halloween parade goers clambered on its rooftops and danced, and pedestrians occasionally banged its bonnet to get it to give way to them.In November, Waymo got approvals for its biggest expansions so far – to ply on the Bay Area’s freeways and pick up passengers from San Jose International Airport. Waymo also started, or is about to start, services in Dallas, Houston, Orlando, Miami and Washington, DC, in the last few weeks.But the expansion comes with heightened safety concerns and new competition. Amazon’s Zoox driverless vehicle has begun running in the Mission, too. …
