Beijing Fully Opens Driverless Taxis, Free Trial Rides Available From Now On

Friends in Beijing can experience driverless taxis in person. At present, Baidu's self-driving taxi service has been fully opened in Beijing, and trial rides are available in Haidian, Yizhuang, etc. No reservation is required, just place an order and you can take a free ride, so hurry up and make an appointment!

In April this year, Changsha fully opened its driverless taxi service. As the first city in China to open this service to the public, Changsha has attracted curious and envious glances from many people.

Now, friends in Beijing have finally waited for this day.

Starting from October 10, Beijing has also fully opened driverless taxi services, which are operated by Baidu's Apollo Go project. Friends in Beijing can now experience self-driving taxi stations in Haidian, Yizhuang and other areas.

Order directly on Baidu Maps and enjoy free trial rides in Haidian, Yizhuang and other places

Previously on September 10, Baidu opened autonomous driving manned testing in Beijing. At that time, 40 driverless taxis Robotaxi were deployed in Beijing. Users had to make reservations in advance through the Baidu Map App or Apollo official website.

After a month of testing, the service is now fully available in Beijing.No reservation is required, just place an order for a free trial ride on the self-driving taxi service.

The test ride method is very simple, similar to the usual process of calling an online car-hailing service:

The first method: Baidu Map - Take a taxi - Autonomous driving - Select the boarding and alighting points - Select the number of passengers - Call Apollo GO immediately.

The second method: Download the Apollo GO App and open it - select boarding and alighting - select the number of passengers - call Apollo GO immediately.

Although Baidu's driverless cars have nearly 100 stations in Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone, Shunyi District, Haidian District, etc.However, the test ride locations currently open only include Haidian, Yizhuang, Tongzhou, Shunyi and other areas.

Currently, the open boarding and alighting stations are located in more than ten stations including Daxing District and Shunyi District (as shown in the table below), and the operating hours are from 10:00 to 16:00 from Monday to Sunday.

There are certain restrictions on the age and number of passengers.**You must be between 18 and 60 years old, and each vehicle can accommodate up to 2 passengers at a time.**There will be a safety officer in the car to ensure driving safety at all times.

This experience event will end on November 6th, which is less than a month, so users who want to experience it should make an appointment quickly.

User experience comments: stable

Apollo Go is a pre-installed mass-produced model developed with deep customization by Baidu Apollo and FAW Hongqi. It has the first passenger car production line in China with L4 level autonomous driving.It has currently obtained 45 licenses for manned autonomous driving testing and has undergone more than 60 vehicle safety tests.

At the Baidu AI Developer Conference on July 3 last year, its Robotaxi project "Apollo Go" was first publicly unveiled. At that time, Baidu Vice President Li Zhenyu said, "The project started in Changsha and will take the lead in helping Changsha complete the city-level intelligent upgrade."

Therefore, in April this year, Robotaxi was fully opened in Changsha for the first time, allowing local friends in Changsha to experience the thrill of autonomous driving.

Later, in August this year, the service was opened free of charge in Cangzhou.Beijing is the third city after Changsha and Cangzhou to fully open this experience service.

Since Beijing has only been open for trial rides for two days, many people have not had time to test ride and comment. Based on the test ride experiences shared by friends in Changsha and Cangzhou, we can summarize the following advantages and disadvantages of self-driving taxis.

Pros: It feels very cool, drives very smoothly, and can accurately identify pedestrians and road conditions.

Disadvantages: The driving speed is relatively slow, and it may still be difficult to cope with some complex road conditions (such as mountain roads, rainy days) and peak hours; in addition, a safety officer is still required to take over at any time.

But in any case, autonomous driving, a futuristic scene, has indeed gradually entered our lives. Although the technology is still immature, it is only a matter of time.

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