Most of those problems can be handled by moving very slowly and carefully, and allowing lots of safe distance around anything that looks like an emergency. That seems to be Waymo's default. They understand some traffic cop hand signals. But most human drivers won't get those, either. There's not much in the Vehicle Code about that.
CALTRANS uses trucks with big flashing arrows and portable collision barriers on the back to protect road workers ahead. They make no attempt to make ordinary drivers do anything more complex than stop or change lanes.
The people from Pepe's Towing in LA post videos of large vehicle accident recoveries, and they often talk about road worker coordination problems. They have to coordinate with CALTRANS, the California Highway Patrol, local cops, fire departments, HAZMAT services, railroads, terminal and port operators, and the drivers involved. The pros who clean up such messes seem to know each other, at least by reputation, but the drivers are often clueless. Pepe's has two questions for drivers - how heavy is your load, and what are you carrying? The answers they get run about 80% "duh". Those are the drivers who roll over semis on freeway ramps.
When autonomous trucking gets going, that kind of coordination will be necessary. But not for passenger cars.
CALTRANS uses trucks with big flashing arrows and portable collision barriers on the back to protect road workers ahead. They make no attempt to make ordinary drivers do anything more complex than stop or change lanes.
The people from Pepe's Towing in LA post videos of large vehicle accident recoveries, and they often talk about road worker coordination problems. They have to coordinate with CALTRANS, the California Highway Patrol, local cops, fire departments, HAZMAT services, railroads, terminal and port operators, and the drivers involved. The pros who clean up such messes seem to know each other, at least by reputation, but the drivers are often clueless. Pepe's has two questions for drivers - how heavy is your load, and what are you carrying? The answers they get run about 80% "duh". Those are the drivers who roll over semis on freeway ramps.
When autonomous trucking gets going, that kind of coordination will be necessary. But not for passenger cars.