All eyes on Waymo as dangerous winter storm threat looms

The massive winter storm blanketing much of the continental U.S. this weekend is a crisis for some and an opportunity for others.

If you are one of the fortunate people who don't have to leave the house this weekend, then a winter storm is a great opportunity to curl up with loved ones — two-legged companions, four-legged furry companions, or both — and watch a "Rocky" marathon (or other marathon of your choice).

But if you are one of those unfortunate people who have to leave the house for work, errands, or whatever reason, then the storm could present a crisis.

Traversing ice and snow-covered roads is never an appealing option. Even with the best snow tires, the highest clearance, and the most powerful AWD engine possible, the road is only as safe as your fellow travelers make it. So vehicles without those bells and whistles are potential dangers for which you can't account.

Best passenger cars for snow driving

• Ford Bronco Sports
• Chevrolet Tahoe 4WD
• Jeep Grand Cherokee
• Audi A5 Sportback
• BMW 3 Series xDrive
• Cadillac CT4 AWD
  Source: Kelley Blue Book

Drivers in New England and the northeast are used to these types of storms. Still, major metropolitan areas in southern states like Atlanta and Dallas, which already have notoriously bad traffic, tend to struggle with handling slick winter weather.

Ride-hailing services will be crucial for some unfortunate travelers this weekend, and Waymo, an automated service, wants people in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area to know that their service is safe.

Waymo says its vehicles are ready for weekend winter storm

This week, the National Weather Service issued a winter storm watch for Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, a metro area with more than 8.3 million people.

The NWS expects cold rain on Friday, Jan. 23, to transition into freezing rain and sleet on Friday night and Saturday, then mostly sleet and a little snow for the rest of the weekend through Monday, Jan. 26.

Related: Despite recall, Waymo can't seem to fix this dangerous issue

While Waymo is not yet available to the public in Dallas, the vehicles have been spotted all over the metro area, transporting Waymo employees as the company gears up for its release to the wider public in the coming months.

And while there have been a couple of high-profile mishaps involving Waymo vehicles that caused traffic issues recently, the company says its vehicles are prepared for what's coming this weekend and won't pose an impediment to Texas drivers.

Waymo Driver can operate in a "range of conditions" including freezing temperatures, fog, rain, and hail, the company told The Dallas Morning News.

“Through a combination of closed-course testing and public road driving with autonomous specialists, we are expanding our capabilities for safe operation in freezing conditions as we introduce our next-generation Waymo Driver,” Waymo said in a statement to the newspaper.

Waymo currently does not operate in any cold-weather cities, but it has been testing in cold cities in anticipation of debuting in Denver, Detroit, and other places in the coming months.

Waymo has been preparing to expand to cold-weather cities

As of 2026, Waymo is available 24/7 to the public in Phoenix, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Los Angeles, and the company is expanding its ride-hailing service to Miami and Washington, D.C., next.

Waymo partners with Uber in Austin and Atlanta, and it has also announced plans to expand to more than a handful of new cities in the near future, including overseas cities such as London.

Waymo quick facts:

• Waymo One is available 24/7 to customers in Los Angeles, Phoenix, and the San Francisco Bay Area, as of July 2025
• Founded in 2009
• Passed the first U.S. state self-driving test in Las Vegas, Nevada, in 2012 (Source:IEEE Spectrum)
• Spun out from Alphabet as a separate subsidiary in 2016

Related: Waymo exec admits harsh truth about company's safety record

Last fall, Waymo announced it would begin test-driving its fleet of Jaguar I-PACE vehicles in Denver. And while training in Denver, the company said, “Our next-generation system is informed by years of winter weather experience across Michigan, upstate New York, and the Sierra Nevada and engineered to autonomously sustain operations in harsher climates."

The company is also expanding to Seattle, a city Waymo says has been one of the “early leaders in autonomous vehicle testing.”

Waymo says it has spent years canvassing the area due to its unique weather and layout, and that data has informed its tech as it operates in other cities.

City dwellers have not been kind to Waymo or other autonomous companies

Urban centers have large clusters of college-educated citizens, so one would think that cities embrace forward-looking tech like autonomous driving with open arms. 

However, this could not be further from the truth. 

Advocacy groups are making their voices heard in New York City, where Waymo recently received permission to conduct tests. 

“From a safety perspective, this is a technology that hasn’t been tested out in incredibly dense cities like New York City," Michael Sutherland, a policy researcher with Open Plans, told Gothamist.

Nearly 80% of California voters support requiring a human safety operator in self-driving trucks and delivery vehicles, and just 33% of voters express a favorable general impression of autonomous vehicles. 

Waymo says compared to those with human drivers, its autonomous vehicles have been involved in 88% fewer crashes with serious injuries. 

Related: Waymo drives on freeways: what's next