Introduction to Driverless Taxis

Uber and Lyft plan to launch driverless taxi trials in London in 2026, in separate partnerships with Chinese tech giant Baidu. This move strengthens their role in the United Kingdom as Europe’s leading test bed for commercializing robotaxis, driven by the Automated Vehicles Act 2024. The Act provides a legal framework for liability for self-driving cars, setting the stage for competitive testing between US and Chinese autonomous giants in a European capital for the first time.

Driverless Taxi Trials

Lyft’s boss, David Risher, announced that the company’s Apollo Go trials would use RT6 vehicles built specifically for ride-sharing. "We expect to begin testing our first fleet of dozens of vehicles next year, pending regulatory approval," Risher said. The company plans to scale to hundreds from there. Baidu is competing against rivals such as Waymo, owned by Google parent Alphabet, whose cars have already been seen on London’s streets.

Regulatory Framework

Fully autonomous trials in the UK depend on the government finalizing self-driving car regulations and giving companies the green light to operate. The UK’s Automated Vehicles Act 2024 shifted legal responsibility for incidents from the person in the car to the authorized self-driving body. Self-driving taxis have become a staple on the streets of San Francisco and were recently introduced in Tokyo.

Reaction from Taxi Drivers

Steve McNamara, general secretary of the Licensed Taxi Driver’s Association, said he was not currently worried about competition from driverless taxis. "It’s a novelty, it’s a gimmick. It’s the solution we don’t need. Who needs a driverless taxi?" he said. He didn’t think Londoners would trust taxis, let alone put their children in one to go to school.

Challenges for Driverless Taxis

The introduction of self-driving taxis has not been without obstacles. In December 2024, a dizzy robotaxi passenger almost missed his flight after his taxi started driving in circles. A 2024 study also found that while self-driving cars are safer most of the time than those driven by humans, this is not the case when it is dawn or dusk or when the vehicle is turning. In poor light conditions at dawn or dusk, they were more than five times more likely to have an accident than a car driven by a human.

Future of Driverless Taxis

London-based start-up Wayve is also preparing to launch driverless trials in 2026, investing around $1bn to test its mapless AI technology on London’s complex roads. For Lyft, the UK trial is a cornerstone of its international expansion after it acquired European taxi app FreeNow for $200 million this year. The company plans to scale its driverless taxi service to hundreds of vehicles, pending regulatory approval.