Waymo AV Freaked Out by Traffic Cones, Blocks Traffic, Evades Support Vehicles
I gotta say, those cones are awful.  They marked off a lane, but used VERY few cones to do it, and from the side street the car is on it's not at all clear that it's the right lane that's been closed.This is the kind of situation that confuses new human drivers too.  Interpreting it basically requires that you have a model in your head of what cones are used for and the ability to guess that the traffic approaching from the left in only one lane indicates that the traffic to the right must use the left lane.I'd be very curious if this conework was even legal.   If you want to guide left-turning vehicles around the right lane you need to put something IN FRONT of the lane you closed.  And that applies to side streets too, I'm almost sure.Watch /r/idiotsincars for a bit, you'll see people misidentify this kind of situation all the time.Frankly what the car did, stopping and calling for help, is the right move.  A new human driver would almost certainly have just pulled out into the wrong lane.