A deadly shooting at an Austin bar last month is raising questions about how self-driving vehicles affect emergency response.
At a City Council committee meeting on Wednesday, Council Member Zo Qadri shared video taken by a bystander that showed a Waymo vehicle blocking an ambulance that was responding to the incident.
Officials with the Austin Police Department said an officer was able to manually drive the Waymo vehicle out of the way, but it took a few minutes.
Officials said the incident did not significantly hinder emergency response, but it shines a light on how autonomous vehicles can cause traffic delays and pose safety issues.
Qadri's district includes Buford's, the bar where the shooting took place. He said public safety comes first.
"We want to make sure innovation does not come at the expense of safety," Qadri said. "And we want the community to understand what is happening on our roads."
Austin streets have been a testing ground for self-driving vehicles, operated by companies like Waymo, Tesla and Avride.
During Wednesday's meeting, first responders highlighted issues with self-driving cars driving through flooded roads and train barricades. They said autonomous vehicles typically obey traffic signals, but there have been several instances when an officer was directing traffic, and autonomous cars disregarded their directions.
Representatives for Waymo did not attend Wednesday's meeting. A spokesperson with the company said their teams have already had "substantive conversations" with city and state leaders.
"Safety is fundamental to everything we do and that means taking responsibility and always improving based on what we learn," the company said in a written statement. "We will keep working with Austin's leadership and first responder community, because ongoing collaboration is how we build the trust this city deserves and make Austin's streets safer."
A Waymo spokesperson said it had provided a detailed and confidential overview of the event to city and state officials and will be making improvements to Waymo's emergency response procedures.
Qadri said these concerns apply to all autonomous vehicle operators in Austin, not just Waymo.
"Last week we reached out to other AV companies testing or operating in Austin," he said. "My hope is they are taking these lessons learned and work with our public safety departments [to make things safer] because too many people count on them to do this right."
During the Wednesday meeting, Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said officers and paramedics responded to the March 1 incident within 57 seconds.
Three people died and more than a dozen were injured during the shooting. The incident is under FBI investigation.
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