Calling this service public is misleading, especially since Waymo created the bifurcation between Waymo One (no NDA) and Early Riders (NDA). Both of these programs you have to apply for and be accepted, so neither is public. And Waymo has made no claim of merging these. The upcoming driverless rides Waymo refers to in this article could very well be for the Early Riders still under an NDA - which theoretically could already be happening based on their past announcements (although the abundance of cell phones strongly suggests this is not the case).

This announcement is just a repeat of what they've said before. If they actually do it this time then that's great, but they haven't actually said anything new here.