There's also a trial of "platooning" of driverless trucks on I-70 in Ohio and Indiana: https://www.forbes.com/sites/richardbishop1/2025/04/24/ease-...

A "drivered" lead truck is leading one or more driverless trucks in this case.

I drive the stretch of highway these trucks are on fairly regularly. I don't know that I've seen a group of them yet but I'm keeping my eye out.

I'm probably just showing my age, but I like the idea of a "drivered" truck leading driverless trucks versus a completely autonomous system. It's similar to my attitude on crewed spaceflight-- I like the idea of the ingenuity and capacity for independent thought supervising an automated systems, versus autonomous automated systems.

I am of two minds about all this. On the one hand, I see the clear, long-term potential given that half the people I see while driving are somehow on their phone. From that perspective, it can't come soon enough. Some people need to be off the road. On the other, I am annoyed that we are effectively beta testing those on public roads with public paying the price.

In America, we are willing to do anything to avoid expanding or upgrading our rail infrastructure.

> help bolster a critical sector of the American economy, which often can't find enough drivers.

They can find enough drivers, but won’t pay them enough or give them any dignity. The industry has a 90% turnover rate per year. So obviously they are finding drivers all the time…they just don’t keep them.

Curious if there are specific route features that make this feasible or not, like traffic conditions or the roads or the warehouses on either end.

Is anyone working on an electric truck system where the battery is on the trailer? Many businesses are constantly rotating the same dry van trailers between hubs. If you charged the trailers at the doc during loading/unloading, the rigs could run 24/7, only stopping to swap trailers.

I expected to find some of the tech that snow plows use on Donner Pass for lane keeping, RRDPS, but couldn't find any info indicating that they are using highway embedded sensors to aid the autonomous trucks.

https://dot.ca.gov/-/media/dot-media/programs/research-innov...

> The RRPDS must maintain an estimate of the vehicle state (i.e., position, velocity, heading, and heading rate) relative to the roadway with position accurate to a few centimeters.

I feel like the ideal scenario would be to prioritize self driving truck at set times and set long haul freeways (i.e. Long Beach to Las Vegas or Galveston to Dallas) during the night time when there is no regular auto traffic - for example from 1 am-6 am.

That way if a human driver is concerned, they can choose not to drive during this period of time.

Perhaps run the trucks in a train style configuration where a "conductor" can sit in the lead truck and manage any emergency issues that arise (i.e. security, crash or weather related).

If fully autonomous, I could see securing the cargo being real issue - what would stop a few cars passage in front of the truck and helping themselves to the cargo.

I can't wait to hear the new versions of the "Texas Hammer" Jim Adler's commercials. (for those outside of his market, he has an injury law firm, and has over-the-top ads for those injured by 18 wheelers)

Having spent a good bit of time driving in Texas, I'd say the safety-average just measurably went up.

Hmmmmm.

So we're going to have a lot of people potentially unemployed because of this...

I remember reading an online study that listed the jobs most likely to be replaced by automation and "truck driver" was listed at the top.

For the keen eye, automation creates new jobs as it replaces others. Someone has to design, implement, and maintain these systems. There is always a higher level of abstraction where a human being is needed to oversee things.

If anyone else is just curious about the companies involved:

> autonomous trucking firm Aurora announced it launched commercial service in Texas under its first customers, Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines

https://aurora.tech/

I think having some kind of a sign/light on a vehicle (especially big one) saying that it's being operated autonomously could be quite useful. You can't wave at an autonomous vehicle and expect it to understand from the context why you are waving at it.

It's good they're doing this first in a place that doesn't get long term snow accumulation on roads. But eventually there should be autonomous vehicle tests in places with non-cherry picked road conditions.

Tangent

Reminds me of this (automated systems still doing their thing after humans are gone)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhRapsbwhqE

Autonomous trucks will be fantastic. Truckers are compelled to work without sleep to finish routes with tight deadlines. It creates a lot of danger on the highway.

It feels like autonomous vehicles could become one of America's superpowers. We have so many miles of road and interstate highway. Autonomous vehicles could double down on that strength and flip the underinvestment in passenger rail on its head, making it much less of an issue.

I'm really unfamiliar with autonomous cars, but how do they handle cases like constructor workers or even regular people (in case of an accident), manually handling the traffic by waving at drivers to go or stop? Are they systems smart enough to recognize these? Or is there someone on the other end, getting remote access to the vehicle if the road situation gets weird?

It will be interesting to see how this plays out with any impacts from tariffs if we keep playing that game long term.

I guess I should say its morbid curiosity. If we do in fact have a lot of drivers out of work because international shipping is way down, I hope humans are hired before these trucks.

One company's name was conspicuously absent from the article. Does anyone believe Tesla is still a player in the autonomous driving game? They always seem to be playing catch-up.

I lament the trucking industry because I think it is only a matter of time before it becomes largely autonomous.

Is that what the public wants? I suspect that if the public was aware, the verdict would be clear.

I'm assuming these are electric? Because even with a driver, longhaul electric trucks are not practical at scale right now, the energy infrastructure and capacity to support them is nowhere near there.

My point being (and please correct me), this is practical but 15-20 years away from widespread adaption, best case.

The future is here. Truckers are one of the largest employers in the country. We are moving fast towards a new era. We need to start thinking about how we adjust as a society

Such a stupid move. The first major accident (and there will be one, I see them every couple of weeks or so on I35) and they will be taken off the road for 10+ years while they are investigated or outlawed straight up by a reactionary Texas legislature

hitchhikers, stowaways, and truck parts thieves will thank you.

here's an idea for freight transport efficiency: trains

So now one can hack a truck and steal its cargo? Neat.

Just as there's about to be nothing to ship

None of those numbers are impressive. Longhaul only from Dallas to Houston. What's missing in the article is the huge number of issues that the system most certainly has.

We've been promised driverless technology for over 10 years now. If you can't do it with cars, then why does anyone think we would have it with delivery trucks?

Please use critical thinking for one second. I beg you HN. This is just another tech company scam that will get dumped as soon as they get the investor money.

When these things can drive to Moose Fucker in the far north, across frozen lakes etc then we are in the future. For now: cute but could do better.