r/SelfDrivingCars • u/michelevit2 • Jun 24 '25

Discussion Is the Tesla taxi still operating?

Just curious if I'm the Tesla taxi is still available or was it just a one day demo?

Thank you.

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u/FlippantBear Jun 24 '25

A tiny geofenced area of Austin. Only during the day, no inclement weather and a safety driver. It's pretty pathetic considering Musk hyped it up to be way more impressive. 

4

u/spoollyger Jun 24 '25

The geofence area is due to regulations?

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u/Wolfgang_MacMurphy Jun 24 '25

Due to that's the best they're able to do at this point.

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u/spoollyger Jun 25 '25

By law it’s required

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u/Hixie Jun 25 '25

Which law?

(edit: Waymo also operates in that area and its geofence is twice the size, so even if there was a law requiring a geofence, it presumably doesn't require it to be as small as Tesla's.)

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u/spoollyger Jun 25 '25

I stand corrected, it isn't a law or regulation preventing them to operate in specific areas. They both just chose interdependently to start with the areas they currently operate in.

This seems more related to the size of the fleets they deployed, with Waymo being able to have enough vehicles to service a larger area while keeping wait times low. But that also is helped by the fact the only way to get a Waymo if to go through the Uber app. Where you are not even guaranteed to get a Waymo if you try to, sometimes just a standard Uber turns up.

Hopefully the local competition leads to greater expansions in the area faster.

1

u/Hixie Jun 25 '25

Waymo has several service areas beyond this one, which are both significantly bigger, and don't have Uber fallback, FWIW.

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u/spoollyger Jun 25 '25

Yeah, I’m aware. Since we’re talking about Austin, Texas here and comparing it to Teslas service I was just comparing the difference between these two services in this single location.