Driverless Rideshare Proposal Draws Questions About Passenger Choice

A requirement to put a human monitor in every robotaxi is intended to protect workers. At a public hearing, residents also raised concerns about disability access, safety and whether the city should await its own research.

A blind resident accompanied by a service animal told Minneapolis council members that a Lyft driver had canceled their ride after seeing them—on the way to a hearing about the future of transportation.

Another blind resident described arriving late for a job interview after a rideshare cancellation. He wanted the option of choosing an autonomous vehicle.

Their testimony at the September 22 Business, Housing and Zoning Committee meeting brought a passenger perspective to a debate largely framed around protecting rideshare drivers from automation. For some residents who cannot drive, the question is whether Minneapolis will allow another way to get around.

The proposed Workers Drive Minneapolis ordinance would require companies offering autonomous rides to obtain a city license and place a paid human monitor in the driver’s seat, with immediate access to steering, braking and acceleration controls. It would take effect October 1, 2027.

Sponsors say the requirement would protect workers and provide basic safeguards while the city develops more comprehensive regulations. Opponents say it would restrict the defining feature of driverless service and limit choices for passengers who might benefit from it.

The committee continued the matter to September 29. Sponsors outlined a possible full council vote on October 1.

Different needs, different rides

Drivers who testified described work that extends beyond getting passengers from one address to another. They help people with walkers and wheelchairs, carry belongings and assist riders who need support reaching their destinations.

Several said their earnings pay for housing, groceries and other family needs. Some described years spent building their livelihoods around rideshare work and investments in vehicles they still must pay off.

Those concerns were central to the proposal’s presentation by Council Members Robin Wonsley and Jamal Osman. Council Members Jason Chavez and Aurin Chowdhury are also sponsors.

Wonsley described the ordinance as a starting point that could be amended as the city learns more and state lawmakers consider legislation. Osman emphasized the consequences for families whose income depends on driving.

But testimony from blind residents challenged the assumption that keeping a human in every vehicle necessarily serves every passenger’s needs.

The resident accompanied by a service animal sought stronger enforcement against discriminatory ride denials, including consequences for companies that fail to address them. Another blind speaker argued that passengers should be able to choose a human-driven vehicle, an autonomous vehicle or whichever service meets their needs.

Osman called the reported discrimination unacceptable and pointed to the city’s complaint process. Wonsley acknowledged discrimination in existing rideshare services and described work with state officials to pursue accountability.

Council Member Warren, who said she previously drove for Lyft, supported preserving transportation choices. She raised the possibility that passengers who have experienced harassment or assault might prefer a ride without another person in the vehicle.

She also recalled helping an intoxicated passenger reach safety, acknowledging that a driverless vehicle might not provide the same assistance. Her position was that different passengers and circumstances call for different options.

What the requirement would do

The ordinance applies to the defined autonomous ride services carrying fare-paying customers on trips originating in Minneapolis. It would require background checks and driving qualifications for monitors, establish business licensing rules and prohibit human remote operation of the vehicles.

Companies would also have to provide a way to request wheelchair-accessible transportation. A company unable to provide such a vehicle would have to direct the request to a licensed provider that could.

Sponsors repeatedly said their proposal is not a ban on autonomous vehicles. Companies could operate under its requirements. However, the covered services could not operate without an onboard monitor, and the text contains no automatic expiration of that requirement or exemption based on demonstrated safety performance.

Although described as an initial framework, it would remain in place unless changed.

Safety claims need comparisons

The sponsors’ presentation included headlines about autonomous vehicles passing stopped school buses, encountering construction zones and flooded roads, and interfering with traffic or emergency response.

Those incidents raise legitimate questions. The National Transportation Safety Board, for example, has an ongoing investigation involving Waymo vehicles and stopped school buses in Austin.

But the presentation did not include comparative crash rates or research measuring autonomous driving against human driving over similar distances. Its safety slide also combined incidents involving different companies and systems.

Several opponents of the ordinance argued that this left out evidence favorable to Waymo.

The company’s published safety dashboard, covering 220.6 million miles without a human driver through March 2026, reports 94 percent fewer crashes involving serious injury or worse and 82 percent fewer injury-causing crashes than its human-driving benchmarks.

Those are company-published results from its operating environments. They do not establish how the service would perform throughout a Minneapolis winter.

A separate study coauthored by researchers at Swiss Re and Waymo, covering 25.3 million driverless miles, found lower frequencies of property-damage and bodily-injury liability claims than human-driving benchmarks. That research offers another measure of performance, although Waymo participated in the study.

The evidence supports examining both comparative safety and specific failures. It does not establish that every autonomous system performs alike, or that favorable results elsewhere resolve questions about local conditions.

A workforce count is not a job-loss forecast

The sponsors’ materials repeatedly refer to approximately 10,000 rideshare drivers whose livelihoods could be affected. Some hearing participants predicted that autonomous vehicles would eliminate thousands of jobs.

The figure requires context.

The March 2024 Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry report cited in the FAQ counted approximately 10,300 active drivers statewide at the end of 2022. It also suggested the number could have reached 12,000 or more by early 2024.

That report examined driver earnings and pay standards. It was not a forecast of job losses from autonomous vehicles.

The proposal’s supporting materials do not estimate how quickly driverless services would expand, what share of rides they would capture or how many driving jobs or hours would be displaced.

Competition could reduce drivers’ earnings without eliminating their work entirely. Conversely, claims that no drivers would lose income—or that expanding demand would offset all losses—also remain unproven.

Why vote before the research arrives?

Council Member Shaffer questioned the proposed timetable, asking why the council would vote before receiving a research report it had requested on autonomous vehicles.

She said the findings should inform the decision and asked the sponsors to wait.

Wonsley declined. She argued that the ordinance would establish baseline protections and that its October 2027 effective date would leave time to incorporate findings from the city’s research and decisions by the Legislature.

Chavez likewise said the report could provide an opportunity to add protections later.

The disagreement leaves council members with a consequential choice about how to proceed: adopt the human-monitor requirement and revisit it as more information arrives, or first use that information to determine what requirements are warranted.

When the hearing resumes September 29, the council will again hear from residents whose interests overlap but are not identical: workers seeking to preserve their incomes, passengers who value personal assistance and riders who want the option of traveling without a driver.