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Shuffle Off to Buffalo: Cybercab Turns Up at a Wegmans Near Tesla's New York Plant
A photo shared overnight shows a gold Tesla Cybercab at the kerb outside a Wegmans in Amherst, a Buffalo suburb a short drive from Tesla's Gigafactory New York. It is the first Cybercab sighting Cybercab.news has logged in western New York.
Sam Ellison, Live desk
Published · 2 min read
AMHERST, New York - Tesla's Cybercab has turned up in western New York. Robotaxi Radar, an X account that tracks Tesla's driverless rollout, shared a photo late Sunday of a gold Cybercab it said was "spotted testing in Amherst, NY (Buffalo area), not far from Tesla's Gigafactory in Buffalo."
The picture shows the two-seat robotaxi stopped at the kerb outside a brick building with tall arched windows and an American flag, while a shopper wheels a trolley across the car park. Two Tesla fan accounts, TeslaZoa and Teslasti Basti, posted the same photo on Monday morning and placed it outside a Wegmans supermarket in Amherst, a suburb on the north-east edge of Buffalo.
TeslaZoa added that, according to an eyewitness, the Cybercab was driving itself. The photo shows the car parked, and Cybercab.news could not confirm who was inside or whether it was operating without a driver.
The setting is no accident of geography. Tesla already runs a factory in the city, Gigafactory New York, which puts a Tesla site a short drive from the spot where the car was photographed.
Buffalo would also be a very different proving ground from Austin. The region is famous for heavy lake-effect snow, and a purpose-built robotaxi that can cope with a Buffalo winter would answer one of the biggest questions hanging over driverless cars. Whether this Cybercab stays long enough to see the snow is not yet clear.
New York has been a busy state for the Cybercab this autumn. Last week an X user counted about 50 Cybercabs at a Tesla lot in College Point, Queens, and the cars have been seen as far west as Wheat Ridge, Colorado. On Sunday the Teslas.R.Us account also shared an image of a gold Cybercab on a highway in Orlando, Florida.
None of this is a launch. Tesla has not announced Robotaxi service in New York, and paid Cybercab rides remain available only in Austin. Tesla's Robotaxi service also runs Model Y vehicles in Dallas, Houston, Miami, Orlando and Tampa.
What the Amherst photo does show is reach. A car built with no other job than carrying passengers is now turning up in supermarket car parks more than 1,300 miles from Austin, and western New York has just joined the map.
