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Next stop, Singapore
Singapore, meanwhile, has been working with autonomous vehicles since 2014, which gives Waymo a country that already has years of testing and regulation behind it.
Waymo is bringing its fully autonomous ride-hailing service to Singapore in 2028, and driverless taxis are now much closer to the Philippines than the streets of California where many of us first saw them.
Its first electric Jaguar I-PACE vehicles are expected to arrive in Singapore within the next few months, while trained specialists will drive them manually in 2027 as Waymo maps local roads and prepares its system for Singapore’s road layout and monsoon weather. Commercial service, subject to government approval, is planned for the following year.
With Singapore only a short flight from Manila, it is not difficult to imagine one of those cars eventually finding itself on our roads, where motorcycles regularly pass between vehicles and jeepneys may stop whenever a passenger needs to get on or off.
Filipino motorists, through years of experience, learn to watch small movements that often say more than a signal light. A motorcycle that moves closer to the gap between two cars may be preparing to pass, while a vehicle that slowly drifts toward a lane line may soon cross it even before the driver uses the turn signal, if it comes on at all.
Waymo’s autonomous system, known as the Waymo Driver, has to read the same road without human instinct or experience. Its cameras identify traffic signs and other road users, while radar measures the distance and speed of nearby objects and lidar uses laser pulses to build a three-dimensional view around the vehicle.
In effect, the system uses several sensors because each one provides information the others may miss. A camera can recognize a motorcycle, for example, while radar can determine how quickly it is approaching and lidar can help establish its exact position beside the car.
Once those objects have been identified, the software must also predict where they are likely to go and decide how the vehicle should respond. Filipino drivers make similar judgments every day when they slow down for someone waiting near the roadside or leave room for a vehicle that appears ready to squeeze through traffic.
The difference, however, is that a human driver can draw from years of experience and recognize familiar behavior without consciously measuring it. A robotaxi has to translate speed, position and direction into data, then use that information to decide whether it should continue, slow down or stop.
Singapore, meanwhile, has been working with autonomous vehicles since 2014, which gives Waymo a country that already has years of testing and regulation behind it. Waymo has not announced any plans to operate in the Philippines, and our roads would give the system a different set of situations to handle from those in the cities where Waymo already operates.
Roadside loading almost anywhere and motorcycles between vehicles are ordinary parts of driving here, and human motorists eventually learn how to deal with them through experience. An autonomous vehicle would have to recognize the same situations through sensors and software, often within seconds.
Waymo has already taught its cars how to steer and recognize other road users without someone behind the wheel. If robotaxis eventually reach the Philippines, the more interesting lesson may be how they learn the small movements and habits that Filipino motorists already understand.
By then, perhaps even the computer will have learned what Filipino drivers already know, that a vehicle’s movement can sometimes reveal where it is going before the turn signal comes on.
It is like knowing someone for years, when a glance or a raised eyebrow can already tell you what may come next.
People who know each other well call that familiarity. Engineers call it prediction.