Add in the fatigue and long, repetitive drives that are a feature of long-distance trucking, and it seems like a situation more ripe for automation.
If it was an easy and profitable problem to solve it would have been solved by now. I agree that it would be very beneficial for everyone if trucks/truck routes were automated (except maybe the truck drivers getting laid off) but it's obviously a very hard and very risky problem to automate.
No one said it was easy. The issue was easier than another problem that is also not yet solved, not easy in some absolute sense.
https://www.commercialappeal.com/story/money/industries/logi...
In fact, Otto probably suffered negative impact from its association with the Waymo scandal, coupled with the recent bad press for Uber's autonomous vehicles. It sounds like Uber is retrenching in favor of just automating cabs for now.