They've been testing these for a while at a couple of places around the country. IIRC they've done tests and operations in Nevada. There are a ton of websites on this stuff. It's coming, but how soon, has been debated.

There have been several notorious auto-pilot and self driving car demo "failures" (mostly tech companies and Tesla, not the auto makers???), which have shown "gaps" in the level of detection necessary to allow for "safe" by the consumer, and "tort liability" "safe" (for the companies that make them), and this seems to have delayed for a while, at least, early deployment and not helped with public receptivity.

An article came out this week on integrating traffic signal indications, and evrn traffic control signs (slow curve, school, speed limit, et cetera) by sending it directly to the vehicle from the signal. This will fill one of the safety, reliability, and redundancy "gaps" in the driverless vehicle "architecture" (along with the use of "multiple" "confirmatory" radar, visual, laser detection and/or ranging systems necessary for autonomous driverless "look ma, no hands" "safe" operation).

There have been handful of "catastrophic" newsworthy failures, like the woman with the bike they killed because the visual detection system computer program had "discounted her" as a "false positive", after they turned off the radar system, that would have detected her and stopped the car. But, from the articles I've seen, almost all accidents involving the autonomous cars have been as a result of the perfectly operating autonomous vehicles being "hit" by, or by someone "spontaneously" deciding to drive into the path of on-coming autonomous vehicle, too late for it to overcome the laws of physics and stop in time, by vehicles being operated using today's current "highly lethal" "state of the art" "chimp-logic" based operating system.

They have just not figured out how to program the computer to anticipate what some dumbass may stupidly "decide" to randomly do when behind the wheel, like we are constantly hard wired to look for, based on our learned "experience" of being ever alert, just in case we notice that this dumbass is going to turn right in front of me.

When this is finally ready, it will almost certainly affect every mode, passenger and freight, choo-choo's both passenger and freight included, very likely in both "good" and "bad" ways. It will likely affect millions of folks livelihoods and it will likely save thousands of lives. It will reduce transport costs, especially "for hire" transport costs (where labor is the biggest cost) from Uber to UPS, and change how we use transport (like to and from the LRT or rail station on a "Johnny Cab" or an autonomous "circulator"), and it will impact what we pay for the goods we buy.

I am more interested short term, though, in what so-called precision railroading is doing to the economics of short lines and the impacts on existing and/or potential carload shippers?