GM-backed Cruise begins testing self-driving cars in Seattle

Ready to Cruise Seattle’s streets: General Motors-backed Cruise is bringing its self-driving cars to the city to collect data from the hilly and often wet environment. The company will join Zoox and NVIDIA under the Seattle Department of Transportation’s permitting process for testing. Cruise has been conducting driverless taxi rides in San Francisco, but in Seattle the cars will have humans in them — for now. Read more. 

• Related: Last week the Seattle Department of Transportation released a 20-year “blueprint” for the city’s transportation vision that included mentions of autonomous vehicles and other tech-fueled ideas such as urban air mobility and electrification. Read the full draft here, and go to the “New and Emerging Mobility” section. 

It was a quiet day on Lake Washington for GeekWire Contributing Editor Alan Boyle, who took a ride and test drive in an Arc One electric boat as the California-based company is targeting potential buyers in the region. Read more.

“There is a better way forward” when it comes to controlling wildfires, says University of Washington School of Environmental and Forest Sciences researcher Susan Prichard. Scientists have developed a data model called REBURN to simulate and visualize prescribed burn strategies. Read more.

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