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Comment by bytemut | Hacker News Reader

NYC is a new set of challenges. As you already mentioned snow and ice is new. But also missing the high density of people and cars per square area. Behavior of drivers and pedestrians are different and much less polite. I can see it working in NYC but "just fine" is a bit of an over confidence... at least not for the first few years before they learn to deal with these issues that they don't face yet in LA and SF.

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We do have narrow streets in LA with double parked cars, cars parked in the street only allowing one car through the middle at a time, and plenty of construction closures and obstacles.

Why do so many NYC people think there’s comically no cars in LA or neighborhood streets?

Also, I can assure you LA drivers are a tad bit more aggressive than NYC drivers (less honking and flicking off though, LA people are more a drive you off the road or into the shoulder sort of passive aggressive).

I was born and raised in NYC and have lived in LA for quite some time, still going home often for family. I’m really struggling with reading these “NYC is unique” comments regarding Waymo traffic.

There's a weird thing where people like to brag(?) that their city has the craziest, worst, drivers/roads.

>Also, I can assure you LA drivers are a tad bit more aggressive than NYC drivers (less honking and flicking off though, LA people are more a drive you off the road or into the shoulder sort of passive aggressive).

>I was born and raised in NYC and have lived in LA for quite some time, still going home often for family. I’m really struggling with reading these “NYC is unique” comments regarding Waymo traffic.

Slightly OT, but that reminds me of a cartoon I saw many years ago (I can't remember the publication though :( )

It had two identical panels with two cars and two drivers on a road:

One panel was marked "Los Angeles" where the driver of one car had a "speaking" bubble that said "Have a nice day!" and that same driver had a "thought" bubble saying "Fuck you!"

The other panel was marked "New York," where the driver noted above's "speaking" bubble said "Fuck you!" and the the "thought" bubble said "Have a nice day!"

I've always thought it was a great metaphor. Then again, I'm a native NYer. ;)

Having driven in both LA and NYC+NJ, LA drivers feel almost serenely calm to me most of the time.

In LA, as long as you don't do anything obviously stupid and give plenty of room for people to see you coming, people will just chill and leave you be. Every now and then I will see someone do something unfathomably crazy though.

In NYC (NJ especially), this didn't work. I had to be actively psychologically manipulating other drivers in order to get even a simple lane change done. Make the other guy think he won by signaling earlier than normal so he'll gun it sooner and leave space behind him, or don't signal until I'm halfway into the lane already.

Don't forget the unique NYC challenge of people waiting to cross the street not on the sidewalk but just into the street itself.

People in LA wait to jaywalk on the street or even in the suicide lane all the time. The Waymos handle it fine; generally by asserting it has right of way unless collision is obviously imminent. They'll even happily swerve around you if you're too far out.

What is a "suicide lane"?

A single middle lane shared by both directions for left turns. Also unofficially used as parking for food/package delivery drivers in LA.

Shared turning lane.

Pedestrians always have the right of way on city streets. Jaywalking is just walking.

No, you cannot just step in front of a moving car such that they cannot stop.

This is what they tell you in driver's education to try and reduce the odds you hit pedestrians, but it's not legally true in most jurisdictions.

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