A few of Google's cartoon-like self-driving cars began sharing the road with regular vehicles today around the company's Mountain View, California headquarters.
Google's Self-Driving Car Project team shared a photograph of one of the first of the fleet to cruise around Mountain View in a Google+ post published this afternoon.
"These prototype vehicles are designed from the ground up to be fully self-driving," the post said. "They’re ultimately designed to work without a steering wheel or pedals, but during this phase of our project we’ll have safety drivers aboard with a removable steering wheel, accelerator pedal, and brake pedal that allow them to take over driving if needed."
Google's prototype cars will be capped at a speed of 25 mph, making them more at home in a neighborhood for now rather than a highway. The cars are equipped with the same autonomous driving software used in Google's other self-driving fleet of Lexus vehicles.
The search giant is also asking its Mountain View neighbors to provide feedback via a website about their experiences sharing the road with Google's cars.
Google has racked up almost 2 million miles with its driverless technology, taking its autonomous fleet on the road with safety drivers in the front seat, allowing the team to learn more about the cars, how other drivers interact with them and additional insights into dangerous driving behaviors that contribute to accidents.