Waymo robotaxis tracks potholes and shares that data with Waze users

Two Alphabet-owned businesses are teaming up to find potholes and share them with cities.

Waymo and Waze announced Thursday a data-sharing pilot program that will feed pothole data collected by robotaxis into a free Waze platform designed for cities. Any city or state where Waymo operates will be able to access this data as the program expands.

Waymo already operates commercially in 11 cities and is testing in more. For now, the pilot will focus on five initial markets — Austin, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Phoenix and the San Francisco Bay Area, where Waymo says it has already identified about 500 potholes. The partnership is expected to expand to more cities over time.

However, cities will not be the only recipients of this data. Anyone with a Waze app in the cities where Waymo operates will also have access to this data, and by the way, it will help you verify that those pothole locations are accurate.

Waze users already had the ability to report potholes in the app. The pilot program aims to increase and expand these reports and make them readily available to cities.

Loaded with cameras, lidar, radar and other sensors, the Waymo robotaxis are ideal tools for gathering data about potholes and other road hazards.

There are other companies that use sensors in cars, or even phones, to track traffic patterns and other information, which can be sold or shared. Waymo appears to be the first company to use robotaxis to do the job.

And it makes sense why. Robotaxi companies must win cities. Offering potentially useful data about potholes or even other dangerous road conditions could help generate goodwill. And Waymo is currently shouldering much of that burden as it ramps up its expansion to more than 20 cities this year.

Waymo noted in its blog post that the idea came from city officials who have shared feedback over the years. Waymo said the pilot program aims to help fill reporting gaps and support cities’ efforts to maintain safer roads.

“Waymo is putting the good neighbor principle into practice: sharing data that helps cities solve problems faster and make roads safer for everyone,” Sarah Kaufman, Director of New York University’s Rudin Center for Transportation, said in a statement on Waymo’s blog. “It’s a simple step, but it reflects a wider principle of responsibility, that companies operating on public roads can help improve them.”