Waymo wants to bring self-driving cars to New York City but with one big difference

Elon Musk’s Tesla is set to launch its own robotaxi service in Austin as Waymo brings its self-driving cars to Manhattan

Waymo cars pictured in San Francisco. The company wants to bring its self-driving cars to New York City with "trained specialists" behind the wheel (Getty Images)

Waymo wants to bring its self-driving taxis to New York City, but with one major change: the cars will have someone behind the wheel.

Waymo, an offshoot of Google’s parent company Alphabet, has applied for a permit for its self-driving cars to operate in Manhattan with a “trained specialist” in the driver’s seat. Until the permit is approved, Waymo will operate with manual drivers, Reuters reports.

The cars also won’t be serving customers yet. Waymo called the test “an important step towards one day serving New Yorkers.”

It’s currently illegal in New York for autonomous cars to operate without someone behind the wheel ready to take over if needed. But Waymo says it is advocating for that law to change, according to Reuters.

“This is not an expansion, but we have every intention of bringing our fully autonomous ride-hailing service to the city in the future,” Waymo said in a statement.

Waymo cars pictured in San Francisco. The company wants to bring its self-driving cars to New York City with "trained specialists" behind the wheel (Getty Images)

The company first brought its cars to Manhattan in 2021, but only for data collection purposes.

Mayor Eric Adams’s office said the city’s transportation office is reviewing the permit.

“As we have said, New York City leads the nation in responsible innovation, and our autonomous vehicle program is no different,” the mayor’s office told NBC News.

“Public safety is our first priority, which is why we have strong guardrails and requirements in place on any sort of autonomous vehicles to ensure that we get AV technology right,” the office added.

Waymo’s self-driving cars are already well-established in several cities. Waymo has more than 1,500 vehicles running more than 250,000 rides each week in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix and Austin, according to Reuters. The company plans to expand soon into Atlanta, Miami and Washington, D.C.

Waymo vehicles made headlines earlier this month after demonstrators in Los Angeles set several of the self-driving cars on fire during the anti-ICE protests.

A Waymo car burns amid anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles earlier this month (Getty)

This comes as Elon Musk’s Tesla prepares to launch its own robotaxi service in Austin over the weekend. Musk said the rollout will start with 10 to 20 cars and warned plans could change because the company has been “super paranoid about safety,” Bloomberg reports.

Musk’s announcement came on the heels of his public feud with President Donald Trump over the so-called “Big, Beautiful Bill”. Musk accused Trump of appearing in the Epstein files before later saying he “regret[s]” his comments.

Trump also said he would be open to forgiving the billionaire, who was once a close ally and the leader of the Department of Government Efficiency.