Quick Shifts

Each week I bring you the top stories in the auto industry along with my commentary or sometimes amusing thoughts about the craziness that goes on in the world of cars.  

• Waymo Discovers Trains Don’t Yield to Algorithms
• Stolen Car, Stolen Keys: Dealership or Drive-Thru?
• How to Turn a Free Corvette Into an $11,500 Loss
• Florida Driver Thinks He’s Racing, Law Enforcement Disagrees
• The State That Still Doesn’t Trust You With a Gas Pump

Waymo Discovers Trains Don’t Yield to Algorithms.  The future of transportation arrived this week, promptly drove itself onto active train tracks, and then waited there like a Roomba that had made a series of very poor life choices. A Waymo robotaxi in Phoenix somehow found the light-rail line more appealing than the actual road, trapping its human passenger inside a steel box while an oncoming train approached — at which point the rider did what no autonomous system has yet mastered: used common sense and ran. Video shows the empty self-driving car lingering on the tracks afterward, inching along as if it were thoughtfully considering whether trains have the right of way, while transit officials scrambled to stop rail service and restore order to the future. Nobody was hurt, service resumed quickly, and Waymo assured everyone this was just another rare “edge case,” which at this point appears to be Silicon Valley shorthand for “something a human driver wouldn’t have done unless extremely distracted, lost, or auditioning for a Darwin Award.” The company continues to insist its cars are safer than people, which may be true in the abstract, but most drivers — even bad ones — know that steel rails generally indicate the presence of a much larger vehicle that does not brake for software updates.

Stolen Car, Stolen Keys: Dealership or Drive-Thru?  A Georgia man kicked off the new year by apparently confusing a car dealership with a valet stand, a locksmith convention, and a low-security Costco, pulling up to Atlanta Unique Auto Sales in a stolen vehicle, wandering inside like he was there for a test drive, and calmly stuffing four sets of dealership keys into his pockets before strolling back out into daylight. Police say the man didn’t smash anything, didn’t run, and didn’t seem especially hurried, which suggests either remarkable confidence or the kind of poor decision-making that begins with “this will probably work.” Surveillance footage reportedly shows him lingering near the counter, selecting keys with the care of someone choosing produce, and then leaving in the same stolen car he arrived in, because why complicate the crime when consistency is important. Officers later noted the suspect may have been armed, which adds a fun layer of menace to what was otherwise a master class in casual audacity. Nobody was hurt, the dealership quickly secured its vehicles, and the suspect was eventually identified, but the episode stands as a reminder that while automakers obsess over biometric security, encrypted fobs, and rolling codes, sometimes the biggest vulnerability in the system is still a counter, a set of keys, and a guy who acts like he belongs there.

How to Turn a Free Corvette Into an $11,500 Loss.  Winning a brand-new Corvette should be the kind of story you tell forever, but one raffle winner managed to turn his moment of automotive glory into a case study in instant depreciation, selling his nearly new 2025 Chevy Corvette just weeks after winning it and watching the final price come in about $11,500 below sticker. The car, a base convertible with roughly 1,500 miles on it, went from “free dream car” to “used sports car with questions” in record time, proving once again that the market does not care how you acquired the vehicle — only what it is, how it’s equipped, and whether someone else wants it more than you do. Maybe the owner realized mid-ownership that a mid-engine V8 isn’t ideal for grocery runs, maybe insurance quotes hit harder than expected, or maybe he simply discovered that a free car can still be an expensive lifestyle change. Whatever the reason, the episode is a reminder that depreciation doesn’t pause for celebrations, raffles, or good intentions, and that even America’s sports car can shed five figures faster than most owners can figure out where the front trunk release is.

Florida Driver Thinks He’s Racing, Law Enforcement Disagrees.  A Florida driver allegedly decided he was in a street race — despite the complete lack of other racers — blasting along at a reported 120 mph while attempting to outrun police, apparently under the impression that flashing lights were a green flag and deputies were just really aggressive competitors. According to authorities, the driver later told officers he thought he was “racing,” which raises several questions, starting with who exactly he believed had entered this event and why none of them bothered to show up in another car. The high-speed run ended the way these things always do, with law enforcement catching up, the driver being arrested, and the realization that Florida highways are not a video game, there is no respawn button, and “I thought we were racing” does not appear anywhere in the criminal-defense handbook. Nobody was injured, which is the best possible outcome, but the episode stands as another reminder that when you hit triple-digit speeds on public roads, you’re not proving your car is fast — you’re proving your judgment is not.

The State That Still Doesn’t Trust You With a Gas Pump.  In most of America, pumping your own gas is considered a harmless, routine activity that requires roughly the same level of training as squeezing ketchup onto fries, but in New Jersey it remains a suspicious act that lawmakers apparently believe could end civilization. Thanks to a law dating back to 1949, drivers are forbidden from touching the pump themselves, meaning that stepping out of your car and grabbing the nozzle can technically earn you a fine of up to $500, which feels wildly aggressive for the offense of wanting fuel sometime before next Tuesday. Supporters insist the rule is about safety and job protection, even though the other 49 states have spent decades letting drivers pump their own gas without mass explosions, societal collapse, or the extinction of service station employees. Oregon eventually admitted defeat and loosened its own ban after realizing attendants do not possess supernatural fire-fighting abilities, but New Jersey remains committed to full service theater, where drivers sit helplessly in their cars, making awkward eye contact with the pump while waiting for someone else to perform a task they mastered as teenagers. It is a system that turns a two-minute stop into a test of patience, reinforces the idea that adults cannot be trusted with simple machinery, and proves that sometimes the most dangerous thing at a gas station is not gasoline, but a law that refuses to die.