Waymo robotaxis are starting to return to freeways

Waymo is dilatory adding freeway routes backmost to its work country much than 2 months aft the institution stopped driving these high-speed roads implicit however its rovotaxis behaved adjacent operation zones.

Waymo announced Wednesday successful a post connected X that it would gradually adhd freeway routes, starting with Phoenix — the company’s archetypal driverless ride-hailing market. More cities, including Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area, would travel successful the coming days, a Waymo spokesperson told TechCrunch.

In an emailed statement, Waymo said it was “resuming freeway operations crossed its full work area, including areas with construction, aft implementing bundle updates designed to amended show astir freeway operation zones.”

Those bundle updates improved show astir operation zones done enhanced country designation and routing, according to the company.

The freeway intermission — and its restart — comes amid accrued scrutiny into Waymo and different robotaxi operators, peculiarly implicit however these self-driving vehicles behave successful definite high-traffic situations and astir exigency responders. Earlier this week, Rep. Kevin Mullin (D-Calif.) proposed a bill that would nonstop national regulators to found minimum nationalist information standards for autonomous conveyance operators pursuing a fig of incidents successful which autonomous vehicles blocked ambulances and occurrence trucks, drove into progressive transgression scenes, and failed to admit information signals specified arsenic postulation cones and flares.

Waymo started offering robotaxi rides that utilized freeways crossed San Francisco, Phoenix, and Los Angeles successful November 2025, a captious enlargement for the institution arsenic it sought to pull riders with shorter commute times and faster entree to airports. It would aboriginal adhd freeway routes successful Miami.

The enlargement proved to beryllium popular, and erstwhile it abruptly disappeared successful May, riders took to societal media to inquire why. At the time, Waymo told TechCrunch it wanted to amended the show of its robotaxis successful operation zones, noting that it was successful the process of integrating “recent method learnings into our bundle and expect to resume these routes soon.”

Weeks later, Waymo voluntarily recalled its fleet of astir 4,000 robotaxis aft identifying astatine slightest 13 instances of its robotaxis driving into road sections that were closed for construction, according to a filing submitted successful June with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. A Waymo spokesperson said determination were nary injuries oregon collisions reported successful transportation with these events. However, aft reviewing the incidents, the institution said it decided to temporarily restrict freeway operations.

This was Waymo’s sixth callback of its robotaxis. Previous recalls included bundle fixes aft its robotaxis drove into flooded roads and behaved illegally around school buses.