Cybercab shuttles for hotels, airports and events
A hotel courtesy shuttle, an airport transfer and a convention run are the same trip: one or two people, a few miles, over and over, paid for by a property rather than the rider. That is the trip a two-seat robotaxi was built for. This page explains how a Cybercab shuttle service would work, what it costs a property to run a driven shuttle today, who already has robotaxis at airport curbs and stadium doors, and what DockDuty is building for it in Orlando. No Cybercab shuttle is operating anywhere yet, ours included.
Last reviewed
Definition
A Cybercab shuttle service is a contracted, repeatable ride service run with two-seat driverless Tesla Cybercabs between a property or venue and the places its people go: a hotel and the airport, a convention center and its hotels, a stadium and its parking. It is bought by the property rather than the rider, and the cars are parked, charged, cleaned and dispatched by a fleet operator out of a depot.
It replaces the fixed shuttle loop with on-demand pairs of rides. It does not replace the larger or accessible vehicle a shuttle line still needs for groups, checked luggage and wheelchair users.
- Cybercab shuttles operating
- None, anywhere
- Robotaxis with airport access today
- Waymo at four airports; Zoox at Las Vegas
- DockDuty’s status
- No depot open; Orlando targeted Q4 2026
- The constraint
- Two seats, 20.2 cu ft of cargo
What a shuttle looks like with a robotaxi
A driven hotel shuttle is a 14-seat van on a loop. It leaves on the half hour whether two people are on it or twelve, it stops running when the driver’s shift ends, and it costs the property the same on a dead Tuesday as on a sold-out Saturday. A robotaxi shuttle is the same route sliced into two-seat trips that leave when a guest asks. The guest requests a ride in an app or at a desk, a car is dispatched from a pool staged at the depot or at the property, and the car goes back into the pool when the trip ends.
Three things change and one does not. The trip is on demand rather than scheduled. The vehicle is sized for the common case, a couple with carry-ons, rather than for the busiest half hour of the week. And the labor moves from a driver to a depot, where one crew parks, charges, cleans and inspects a fleet of cars between rides. What does not change is that a shuttle line serves everyone who arrives, so the two-seat car has to sit alongside something that carries the family of four, the group with checked bags and the guest in a wheelchair. Federal rules require a hotel, resort or theme-park shuttle to give wheelchair users equivalent service when the system is viewed as a whole (49 CFR 37.171), which in practice means a mixed fleet or a fallback vehicle in the contract.
The car itself is the constraint and the advantage at once. Tesla’s rider guide lists two seats, 20.2 cubic feet of rear cargo space and a 220-pound cargo limit; Tesla’s own answer for riders who need more room is a Model Y on the same network. The design logic behind the two seats, and what it costs on airport trips, is in why the Cybercab has two seats. The owner’s view of every use the car fits, shuttles included, is in what a Cybercab can be used for.
The three use cases
Each has its own page, because each has a different buyer, a different curb and a different thing that goes wrong.
Two ways to run it
The cars in a Cybercab shuttle line can be owned by the property, or they can be privately owned cars that a depot operator dispatches on the property’s behalf during hours the ride-hail network does not want them. DockDuty is building for both, and they are at different stages.
| Property-owned cars on our dock | Owner cars on DockDuty’s off-peak line | |
|---|---|---|
| Who owns the cars | The hotel, venue, hospital or employer | Private owners with a stall at the depot |
| Who dispatches | DockDuty, against the property’s contract | DockDuty, during hours the owner has switched the car off Tesla’s network |
| Who pays whom | The property pays DockDuty a per-stall retainer and a per-ride fee (the volume tiers) | The property pays DockDuty for the line; the owner is paid for the trips their car ran on it |
| Status | Sold now through the operators page, to run out of depot #1 once it opens | Planned for the depot’s second year; the dashboard switch exists, the line does not run |
| Best for | A property that wants its own fleet and its own branding on the door | A property that wants a shuttle line without buying cars |
In both cases the property never touches the operations. Neither case exists yet; both depend on Tesla delivering Cybercabs to buyers other than itself, which it has not announced a date for.
Who does what
The depot operator
DockDuty
Parks, charges, cleans and inspects the cars. Stages them near the property or the curb. Dispatches the line, answers the phone at 3am when a car is stuck, and sends the property a per-trip statement.
The property or venue
The buyer
Owns the guest relationship: the app or desk where a ride is requested, the signage at the curb, the fallback vehicle for the trips a two-seat car cannot take, and any permit the curb requires.
The manufacturer
Tesla
Builds the car, writes the software that drives it, and sets the terms, still unpublished, on which a car sold to anyone else may be operated at all. DockDuty has no relationship with Tesla.
The one thing on that list that a depot operator cannot supply is airport access. Airports control their curbs through commercial ground-transportation permits and per-trip fees, and Florida’s preemption of local for-hire rules for autonomous vehicles carves airports and seaports out by name (Fla. Stat. 316.85(6)). A shuttle line to MCO would run under whatever permit the dispatching party holds, on the airport’s terms. The full picture is on the airport page.
The numbers, with assumptions
DockDuty does not publish a shuttle rate; a line is priced against what the property pays today, and the depot rate card behind it is public on the pricing page. What the property pays today is the number that decides the conversation, so here it is, with every input labeled.
- Driver wages (known figure, assumed hours). The average hotel shuttle driver earns about $19 an hour (Salary.com, September 2026). A line staffed 16 hours a day, 365 days a year, is 5,840 driver-hours, or roughly $111,000 a year in wages before benefits, overtime and the second driver a 16-hour day actually needs.
- The vehicle (reported). One shuttle-outsourcing vendor puts a new 14-passenger shuttle at about $50,000, with insurance of $3,360 to $6,000 a year and maintenance of $2,110 to $2,500 a year. Fuel is on top.
- The contracted alternative (reported, one operator’s price list). A 12-to-14-passenger Sprinter with driver at $125 to $160 an hour, with a five-hour minimum. Sixteen hours a day at the low end is $2,000 a day.
- The rider-paid alternative in Orlando (known). Mears Connect, the service that replaced Disney’s Magical Express, charges $16 one way per adult from MCO to the Disney area, plus a 3% fuel surcharge, as of September 12, 2026.
Add the assumptions a real line carries, benefits and overtime on the wages, fuel, and the van financed over several years, and a mid-size property running its own 16-hour line is spending somewhere between $125,000 and $150,000 a year on one vehicle, most of it labor, to move people two and three at a time. That is the budget a Cybercab line competes with, and it is why the pitch is not “a robot is cheaper than a driver” but “you are already paying for a 14-seat vehicle to carry pairs.” Whether the arithmetic closes for a given property depends on its trip count, its hours and its fallback needs, which is what the inquiry form asks.
Why Orlando first
DockDuty’s first depot is targeted for Orlando in Q4 2026, a target rather than a date, and the shuttle case is part of the reason. The visitor numbers are the argument:
- 76.7 million visitors in 2025, including 5.8 million meetings and convention visitors (Visit Orlando, May 2026).
- 57.7 million passengers through MCO in 2025, the seventh-busiest airport in the US (GOAA figures via Orlando Weekly, July 2026).
- One of the three largest convention centers in the country, the Orange County Convention Center, with 2.05 million square feet of exhibit space and 1.75 million attendees in its 2023–24 fiscal year.
- More than 120,000 hotel rooms, the figure our homepage FAQ carries.
- A Tesla Robotaxi zone since July 24, 2026 that hugs the Semoran and Lee Vista corridor next to MCO and, as of this writing, excludes the airport terminals, the theme parks and downtown. The Orlando guide tracks the zone.
- The Magical Express gap. Disney’s free airport shuttle for its resort guests ended January 1, 2022 and was replaced by paid services. Every Disney resort that lost that feeder, and every other hotel that never had one, has been solving the airport trip on its own since.
Autonomous shuttles are not new here either: Beep’s Move Nona service has run fixed-route autonomous shuttles in Lake Nona since 2019, free to riders. Those are ten-seat, low-speed loop vehicles, the opposite design from a Cybercab, and they show the local appetite rather than the competition. DockDuty has no relationship with Beep, Disney, Mears, the airport or any hotel named on this page.
What is known, and what is not
- Known. Robotaxis already serve airports, stadiums and resorts under property-specific approvals: Waymo at Phoenix, San Jose, San Francisco and San Antonio airports and as Allegiant Stadium’s official ride partner; Zoox at Harry Reid International since September 3, 2026 and as Resorts World Las Vegas’s official robotaxi partner. Every one of those is a fleet the operator owns.
- Known. Tesla’s fleet interest form, opened September 3, 2026, asks would-be fleet buyers whether they are interested in “event collaboration” and “mobility hubs and infrastructure,” and says a submission is not a purchase order.
- Known. The Cybercab seats two, carries 20.2 cubic feet, and began paid public rides in Austin on September 3, 2026 in Tesla’s own fleet.
- Not known. When Tesla will deliver a Cybercab to any buyer other than itself, and on what terms a privately owned car may be operated outside Tesla’s network. Both DockDuty lines above depend on those answers.
- Not known. What any airport would charge a robotaxi shuttle per trip, or whether it would permit one at all. MCO charges ride-hail companies $7.00 per trip today; no robotaxi has been permitted there.
- Not known. What a Cybercab shuttle line earns per car. No such line has run a paid trip. Every figure on this page is either a published cost of the driven alternative or a labeled assumption.
DockDuty’s role
Stated plainly · September 2026
DockDuty is building a third-party depot for privately owned Cybercabs, targeted for Orlando in Q4 2026 as a target rather than a date. Shuttle lines for hotels, airports and events are the captive-fleet contracts we sell to properties through the operators page and would run out of that depot, and the hotel line is one of two we plan to dispatch ourselves, with owner cars, in the depot’s second year. No depot of ours is open, no shuttle of ours has carried a passenger, and no rate for a shuttle line is published.
DockDuty is not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by, or partnered with Tesla, Inc., and has no relationship with any airport, hotel, venue, transit agency or shuttle operator named on this page. What a depot is and does is on the Cybercab depot page.
Related concepts
Frequently asked questions
Which use case fits my property?
Match the trip, not the industry. A hotel or resort with a steady airport and attraction run is the hotel case. Anything that starts or ends at a terminal is the airport case, and it depends on the airport’s permit rather than on the car. A venue, organizer or convention hotel with demand that spikes on a schedule is the event case. A hospital, employer or master-planned community with a closed loop is closest to the hotel case and is covered on the operators page.
How is a Cybercab shuttle line priced?
Against what the property pays for its driven shuttle today. DockDuty publishes its depot rate card, a per-stall retainer plus a per-ride fee, but no shuttle rate, because a line’s price depends on its hours, its trip count and the fallback vehicle the property needs for groups and wheelchair users. The inquiry form asks for the route, the hours and the current vehicle so the comparison is made on the property’s own numbers.
Can I hire Cybercabs for an event?
Not today; no Cybercab is available to hire and no privately owned Cybercab is in service. Robotaxi operators already serve events with their own fleets, including Waymo at Allegiant Stadium and, reportedly, Zoox at Las Vegas venues, and Tesla’s September 2026 fleet interest form asks about event collaboration. DockDuty takes event and venue inquiries now for lines it would run out of its planned Orlando depot.
Who owns the cars in a Cybercab shuttle service?
Either the property, which buys its own Cybercabs and contracts a depot operator to run them, or private owners, whose cars a depot operator dispatches on the property’s line during hours the owner has switched the car off the ride-hail network. DockDuty is building for both: property-owned fleets are sold through its operators page now, and the owner-car line is planned for the depot’s second year.
Is DockDuty running shuttles today?
No. DockDuty has no operating depot, no vehicle in its care and no shuttle line running. Its first depot is targeted for Orlando in Q4 2026, a target rather than a date, and every shuttle arrangement described on this page would run out of that depot once it opens and once Tesla delivers Cybercabs to buyers other than itself.
What happens after I send an inquiry?
A founder reads it and replies within two business days with the questions that decide the comparison: hours, trip count, destinations, fallback needs and timeline. Nothing is sold as available today. A property-owned line would run out of DockDuty’s first depot once it opens, and an owner-car line is planned for the depot’s second year; both depend on Tesla delivering Cybercabs to buyers other than itself.
Sources
- Tesla, Cybercab rider guide (two seats, 20.2 cu ft, 220 lb cargo limit); Not a Tesla App, Q2 2026 earnings call summary, July 22, 2026 (Model Y for riders needing more space).
- TechCrunch, Tesla is asking people if they want to buy and run Cybercab fleets, September 3, 2026 (the fleet interest form and its four interest checkboxes).
- The Motley Fool, Cybercab paid rides begin in Austin, September 4, 2026.
- Waymo, airport service page (Phoenix, San Jose, San Francisco, San Antonio); TechCrunch, Waymo at San Antonio International, March 31, 2026; Waymo, Allegiant Stadium partnership, August 13, 2026.
- TechCrunch, Zoox expands to Las Vegas airport, September 3, 2026; News 3 Las Vegas, Resorts World names Zoox its robotaxi partner, June 2, 2025.
- Orlando Weekly, Tesla robotaxis now running in Orlando, July 24, 2026 (the zone and its exclusions); Orlando Weekly, MCO raises rideshare fees, July 24, 2023 (the $7.00 per-trip fee); Greater Orlando Aviation Authority, Commercial Ground Transportation Permit Office.
- Florida Legislature, Fla. Stat. 316.85 (subsection 6, the airport and seaport carve-out) and 627.748 (subsection 17(b), airport pickup fees).
- US Department of Transportation, 49 CFR 37.171 and 37.37 (equivalent service for demand-responsive private shuttles).
- Visit Orlando, 76.7 million visitors in 2025, May 7, 2026; Orlando Weekly, MCO 2025 passenger count, July 29, 2026; Orange County Convention Center, economic impact, and PCMA, OCCC profile, January 21, 2025.
- Salary.com, hotel shuttle driver salary, September 1, 2026; Kevin Smith Group, shuttle ownership cost estimate (undated vendor page); Metropolitan Shuttle, charter pricing, August 2026.
- Mears Connect, fares, checked September 12, 2026; TouringPlans, Sunshine Flyer and Mears Connect merge, July 14, 2023.
- Lake Nona, Move Nona autonomous shuttles (Beep, since 2019).
- DockDuty’s own facts: what is and is not live, the rate card, and the operator tiers.
Running a shuttle today? Tell us what it costs you.
Hotels, resorts, venues, hospitals and employers: send the route, the hours and the vehicle you run now. A founder reads every inquiry and replies within two business days.
No depot is operating yet. Orlando is targeted for Q4 2026, and that is a target rather than a date.