The era of driverless cars is fast approaching, and the companies leading the charge are building out real estate networks to make it happen.

This year alone, Lyft, Uber, Alphabet-owned Waymo and Amazon-owned Zoox have signed leases for nearly 1M SF of industrial space, according to Cushman & Wakefield data provided to Bisnow. That's a huge acceleration for the companies, which are all developing autonomous vehicles — they leased 830K SF combined between 2022 and 2025. 

The deals for facilities that are used to store, clean, charge and repair the companies' fleets show what sort of impact the autonomous vehicle industry could have on industrial real estate markets around the country. 

“It being doubled in, call it, the last nine months — that's pretty impactful,” said Reed Vestal, CEO of Houston-based brokerage and investment management firm Junction Commercial Real Estate. “We're probably talking tens of millions of square feet probably in the next decade, I'll bet.”

While robotaxis were allowed to operate in 26 states as of June, their real estate deals haven't been confined to the markets where they have regulatory approval to start operating.

And many are shopping for space in the shadows, keeping their identities private to avoid scrutiny or tipping off the opposition.

“They've been so good at not disclosing what they're doing,” Vestal said.

Waymo, Zoox, Lyft and Uber, as well as Tesla, another major robotaxi player, did not respond to Bisnow's requests for comment and information about their real estate activities.

They have been more open about their activity in markets where they have full clearance to operate, like Tennessee, Texas and California. 

Lyft subsidiary FlexDrive began construction in April on an 80K SF depot in Nashville, which supports Waymo's driverless ride-hailing services in the city.

In Houston, Uber secured a 50K SF space for a robotaxi depot and charging facility in June, with plans to begin operating out of the center in 2027.

And in California, Zoox signed a 34K SF lease in May in Hayward, near San Francisco, for a logistics and staging hub for finished vehicles, down the street from a 219K SF manufacturing space it opened in 2025, The Real Deal reported.

Tesla already has a leg up on its robotaxi competitors with its nationwide network of service centers and charging stations, which it is using to “get ahead of robotaxi autonomous vehicle demand,” Tesla Vice President of Engineering Lars Moravy said on a January call with analysts.  

“We're excited that because of this network, we are the only company capable of scaling at the rate that is needed for the tsunami of autonomy that is coming,” Moravy said.

Many are fighting against the supposed inevitability of robotaxis, with critics arguing that the technology isn't being adequately tested and that it will kill taxi and transit jobs. 

Opposition from the People First Transportation Alliance, an advocacy group representing community organizations and worker advocacy groups, pushed Gov. Kathy Hochul to withdraw a proposal allowing self-driving cars in Upstate New York. 

When the NYC Department of Transportation granted Waymo a trial testing period in Downtown Brooklyn and Lower Manhattan, organizations representing ride-hailing drivers pushed hard against legalization. Waymo’s permit was not renewed when it expired at the end of March, and it is unclear when autonomous vehicles could begin to legally operate.

But the lack of approval hasn’t stopped autonomous vehicle companies from sniffing around for space.

“We're continuing to see increased demand from the robotaxi, EV charging, etc., across all industrial properties in the city,” said Turnbridge Equities Managing Principal Ryan Nelson, whose firm owns industrial properties in New York, New Jersey and Sun Belt markets. “We've seen it nationally as well, but we've definitely seen a pickup in New York City as of late.”

The companies are typically looking for between 50K SF and 100K SF in neighborhoods where vehicles can easily serve Manhattan, like Long Island City and the South Bronx, he said.

Washington, D.C., has become a hotbed of political debate over the future of robotaxis. 

D.C. Council Member Charles Allen, who chairs the Committee on Transportation and the Environment, introduced a bill in May that would allow driverless cars to operate on a limited basis as a test period.

Advocacy groups representing local cyclists and disability advocates asked for greater transparency and more specific rules. The local Teamsters union and 32BJ chapter, along with the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689, argued that driverless cars would kill taxi and ride-hail drivers’ livelihoods. Religious groups are planning to join labor unions on Oct. 6 for a rally against the bill.

But Waymo has been pushing ahead anyway. It leased a 32K SF facility in Northeast D.C., one of three maintenance and charging facilities in the city Waymo is developing, the Washington Business Journal reported in August. 

Waymo spokesperson Ethan Teicher told Axios in July that the company had “committed tens of millions of dollars in Wards 5 and 7 to build the service centers and charging facilities needed to support our service."

Waymo has argued that its business wouldn’t result in lost jobs, telling Axios ahead of the hearing that it would hire hundreds, including former drivers, to clean and maintain vehicles like it already does in cities such as San Francisco and Atlanta.

Autonomous vehicle companies are likely moving into markets before legislation passes in an effort to get ahead of their competitors, even if that means making risky bets on real estate, Rosenberg & Estis Counsel for Transactions Stephen Millington said.

Millington, who has worked on deals for electric vehicle lots in New York City, has seen firsthand how long it can take to get the power hookups that both EVs and self-driving cars need in their parking lots.

“Let's say it's made legal somewhere today,” he said. “You have to have the lease in place, the approvals and all the permitting and everything, and the construction part and the infrastructure that goes into it. That's what takes a really long time.”

In New York, getting a power hookup from ConEd can take years, Nelson said. ConEd typically won’t provide that much power on spec, so owners have to present it with a letter about what they are going to use the power for, and then ConEd has to see if it has capacity to provide it.

Companies may be avoiding publicizing real estate agreements because they don’t want landlords to raise asking rents during negotiation after learning that their prospective tenant is a deep-pocketed Silicon Valley company, Vestal said. Public backlash to the broader tech sector, including to data centers and artificial intelligence, may also be affecting the dynamic, he said.

“Blue-collar workers are honestly scared. Are we going to lose jobs? Are they going to drive up electricity costs?” Vestal said. “I believe that all those factors that I just listed there are the reasons why they're moving in stealth mode.”

Road safety is also a concern for legislators and for members of the public, creating another potential obstacle for self-driving vehicle companies trying to make real estate calculations as they roll out into new markets. Almost 60% of respondents surveyed by Gallup in April 2026 said they believed roads are safer when there’s a human behind the wheel.

But Waymo says its own studies show that self-driving cars are involved in 95% fewer crashes that cause serious injuries than if there’s a human driver. Autonomous Waymos in San Francisco, Phoenix, Los Angeles and Austin were involved in 68% fewer accidents than human drivers, according to a study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

Dan Keene, co-founder of autonomous vehicle infrastructure provider Aseon Labs, argued that perceptions will change over time and that robotaxis will become as common as ride-sharing vehicles.

“Initially, in that kind of trust-building phase, there is typically a bit of a public backlash,” he said. “But if you look at the statistics, they speak for themselves.”

Robotaxi companies likely see their entry into markets like NYC and D.C. as inevitable, Nelson said. They are trying to sign deals now so they already have the best real estate available to hit the ground running.

“I think they're trying to plant their seeds,” he said. “They want to get there ahead of people.”