It’s a steamy summer day in Miami, and I’m cruising down Biscayne Boulevard in the backseat of Ford and Argo’s AV. A safety driver sits in the driver’s seat, though he isn’t driving. His hands hover at about 8:00 and 4:00, like he’s waiting to catch the steering wheel if it suddenly flies off. A co-driver sits shotgun. A computer in his lap lets them see everything the car sees — a geometric map of its surroundings. Blue, yellow, and red boxes move around the digital map. Every now and then a red box gets too close and the car pumps its brakes or pulls away from the encroaching object, and the driver grabs the wheel in response. It’s a somewhat uneasy experience, like riding with a student driver.

An elderly couple walks out in front of traffic, inexplicably coming to a complete stop in the middle of the road. The driver intervenes and brakes the vehicle and waves at them to cross the street. Better safe than sorry.

Although self-driving cars have ostensibly been on the horizon for decades, the last five years have seen automakers accelerate the hype. But despite Elon Musk’s perennial predictions or Audi’s and GM’s promises, the age of truly autonomous vehicles is further away than we’ve been led to believe.

The experts interviewed for this article were reticent to put a timeline on the deployment of AVs, noting that the term “self driving” is often misused or misconstrued. The Society of Automotive Engineers has separated driving automation into six levels, from 0 (no automation) to 5 (full automation). Tesla’s Autopilot falls between Levels 2 and 3, requiring drivers to monitor the road and take control of the vehicle if necessary. Level 4 autonomous shuttles, which can drive without human intervention, currently operate at some airports, but in a recent survey by J.D. Power, experts predicted that Level 4 consumer AVs won’t be available for purchase until 2030 at the earliest. Deploying safe AVs has proven more challenging than even the experts originally thought.

All of which forces the question: has Florida gambled on a pipe dream? And could this wager put its citizens’ lives at risk?

University of South Carolina’s Walker Smith admits that true AV is still a distant ambition, but it’s finally close enough to justify investment: “Even though automated driving has been 20 years away ever since the 1940s, the fact that people are now predicting significant opportunities five years away, that gets into the realm of people [being able to] make or lose a lot of money. I put more stock in those kinds of predictions.”

The question now is whether that investment is worth the risk. While experts agree that self-driving cars will greatly reduce the number of vehicular deaths (up to 90% by one estimate), it’s generally recognized, publicly or not, that the vehicles will kill people on their path towards autonomy. Brandes acknowledges the dangers in the road ahead. “Anytime you put a moving vehicle on the road, whether it be with human drivers or with self driving, there are risks associated with that,” he says. “I think the question is what is the state’s responsibility to mitigate those risks.”

“These companies don’t have a specific definition for testing. They don’t know when it’s safe enough.”

For now, Walker Smith says Florida’s current laws have failed to properly mitigate those risks. “All the legislative activity has not brought [Florida] to a point that might be sustainable in the long term.”

“There’s a lot of conversation about whether people trust these technologies,” he adds. “I think this is a premature question to ask. The more important question is whether the companies that are deploying these technologies are worthy of our trust.”

Even some local AV academics are raising concerns. AMI’s Sargolzaei says Florida’s lack of formal guidelines for how companies should test their AVs could lead to preventable crashes. “Our main concern... is there is not any specific framework to say that [an autonomous vehicle] is safe and secure,” he says. “These companies don’t have a specific definition for testing. They don’t know when it’s safe enough.”

Even AV companies worry about these things, although their concerns are with their competitors. Voyage CEO Cameron stressed, “It only takes one bad actor in another company to put the brakes on this thing and ruin it for the rest of us.” The companies we spoke to said they wouldn’t deploy their AVs without safety drivers until they deem the vehicles safe and ready. However, they declined to get more specific than that.

The public response to AV companies in Florida has been mixed. The driver of the Ford and Argo AV told me that pedestrians in Miami pose for selfies with the car and even toss money at it as if it was a dancer. But other drivers are quick to lay on their horns when the AV obeys explicit traffic laws, such as stopping for yellow lights, and hesitates when taking unprotected left turns at green lights. If AVs and humans are going to safely share the road, vehicles might first need to drive more like people.

The worry remains among some Floridians that the state’s commitment to AVs comes at the expense of its citizens. “The promise of robot cars is intoxicating,” says plaintiff’s attorney Swope. “But it’s important we embrace the technology while ensuring it is deployed in a responsible way.”

Readers of the South Florida Sun Sentinel put it more bluntly when the paper asked for their feedback to Governor DeSantis’s bill in June. Concerns ranged from job loss due to automation to the threat of hackers infiltrating AVs and wreaking havoc on the roads.

“The lack of inspection and certification is unacceptable,” wrote a Sun Sentinel reader named Laurette Ellis. “The lack of a trial over a longer period of time... is unacceptable. Have we gone completely mad?”