Waymo has enlisted the help of a new advocacy group loaded with influential former state and city officials, making it clear the company is ramping up efforts to bring its driverless taxis to New York. A Better Road Forward is a nonprofit group that launched in September, with an advisory board made up of former state environmental commissioner Basil Seggos, former City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, former state DMV Commissioner Mark Schroeder, former Assemblyman Kenny Burgos, Tech:NYC President and CEO Julie Samuels and Buffalo NAACP President the Rev. Mark Blue.
The group says it is independent and focused, for now, on educating New Yorkers about Waymo, but its leaders are clear on where the campaign will ultimately lead: “New York does not have legislation that would enable AVs to operate in New York, so the conversation has to obviously end at a legislative and then regulatory outcome,” Seggos said.
“The goal is to ensure there are autonomous vehicles in Syracuse and Albany and Buffalo, in Binghamton, on Long Island and in the middle of Manhattan,” added Samuels.
A Better Road Forward has been buying ads in POLITICO’s New York Playbook and City & State’s Albany Agenda, and has also been commissioning polls and planning community events to build support for its autonomous vehicle push.
Waymo also formed a state political action committee called Upward NY in June. The company spent about $1.1 million lobbying New York officials in the first half of 2026, according to preliminary data. That comes after years of lobbying at City Hall. Crain’s reported last year that Waymo had spent more than $600,000 targeting officials there. Waymo suffered a major setback in Albany earlier this year. As part of her original budget proposal, Gov. Kathy Hochul had planned to allow some driverless vehicles to operate in New York. But she dropped the plan the next month after discussions with lawmakers made clear “the support was not there to advance this proposal.”
State Sen. Jeremy Cooney, who chairs the body’s transportation committee and is sponsoring legislation to legalize fully autonomous vehicles, said he plans to keep pushing the issue.
“As we prepare for the upcoming legislative session, I’ll be continuing to push legislation that allows for the careful implementation of autonomous vehicles in New York while balancing workforce concerns,” Cooney told Crain’s. His bill would legalize fully autonomous vehicles and commercial robotaxi services in New York, essentially creating a statewide regulatory framework while allowing New York City to set its own rules. Robotaxi companies operating in the five boroughs would have to pay a $5 million startup fee and $1 million annually, with the money set aside for workforce development and training for Taxi & Limousine Commission-licensed drivers.
Under former Mayor Eric Adams, the city authorized Waymo to test eight autonomous vehicles in parts of Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn, with a trained operator behind the wheel. That authorization has since expired, and the Mamdani administration has not renewed it. Mayor Mamdani’s Vision Zero Reimagined plan calls for local oversight over any future deployment of autonomous vehicles. “My vision is for keeping New Yorkers safe and also of ensuring that we’re protecting the livelihoods of so many of the drivers who have helped to power the city over many, many years,” he said.
Source: Crain’s New York Business
