That's pretty terrifying that it can't read street signs and is dependent on mapping. Here in D.C., there are all sorts of fine-grained road rules, such as streets that are one-way only certain times of day, streets that reverse direction at certain times of day, turns that are legal or illegal depending on time of day, etc. That's not including random road closures.
These databases apparently don't get updated that often. Recently, D.C. moved a major highway on-ramp. It used to be that you could get on 395-S heading west on H street, by taking a left onto the on-ramp. They replaced it with an underground entrance ramp on eastbound Mass. Ave., such that westbound traffic on H or Mass. Ave. could no longer use the on-ramp, and had to go several blocks south to use a different one. This was a widely-publicized move planned long in advance. And at least Apple Maps tried to steer me down the old route for awhile.
Similar thing in our neighborhood just outside the Annapolis city limits. They closed our street to car traffic with barriers, so that you can get in an out but can't drive along it for more than one cross street. Whatever database Uber uses still hasn't figured this out--I'll get Uber drivers waiting for me on the other side of one of the barriers.
It can read street signs, even hand-held STOP signs in the hands of construction workers. And the cars are continuously mapping their surroundings. But they ALSO use a shared, extremely high quality map database for first-level path planning.
These databases apparently don't get updated that often. Recently, D.C. moved a major highway on-ramp. It used to be that you could get on 395-S heading west on H street, by taking a left onto the on-ramp. They replaced it with an underground entrance ramp on eastbound Mass. Ave., such that westbound traffic on H or Mass. Ave. could no longer use the on-ramp, and had to go several blocks south to use a different one. This was a widely-publicized move planned long in advance. And at least Apple Maps tried to steer me down the old route for awhile.
Similar thing in our neighborhood just outside the Annapolis city limits. They closed our street to car traffic with barriers, so that you can get in an out but can't drive along it for more than one cross street. Whatever database Uber uses still hasn't figured this out--I'll get Uber drivers waiting for me on the other side of one of the barriers.