A friend of mine was saying the other day, “I want to be able to go to my car, type something like New York City , take a nap, and have the car wake me when I get there.” My friend lives in California; barring supersonic auto 2 [*] transportation, it would be a long nap. But the technology is there or will be soon. The question is—will the laws be able to keep up? About a week ago, the U.S. House of Representatives unanimously passed H.R. 3388, the “Self-Drive Act”, aimed at removing regulatory barriers to the development of self-driving cars. The act represents a “surprisingly bipartisan approach” to regulation, said Stanford University researcher Bryant Walker Smith. “This is a reasonable and flexible approach that gives the National Highway Transportation and Safety Agency (NHTSA) more authority, gives serious developers more flexibility, makes it a legal priority for the NHTSA to more closely regulate these systems and then doesn’t remove other potential regulatory tools,” he said. Everyone agrees that auto 2 is coming, even more surely than winter [†] . The Old American Questions The problem is this: generally, the federal government regulates the vehicle, while states regulate the driver. Autos 2 don’t fit neatly into this current regulatory structure. The Department of Transportation dictates how vehicles are built (airbags, seat belts, crumple zones), but states regulate their operation (licensing, insurance, traffic laws). That division of labor doesn’t work when the design of the car governs how it is operated. So sure, my friend could program “New York City” into his auto 2 , but he’d have to pick up a police escort on the way to meet all of the state requirements from here to NYC. This kind of confusion has led to stumbling blocks to moving forward with making self-driving cars ubiquitous on American roads. This legislation approved by the House subcommittee prioritizes “preemption”—in other words, the federal rules would supersede state and local regulations. Under the House package, that authority probably would fall to federal regulators, but it’s not clear what data might be made public. (This may be most annoying for us in California, where we have worked with automakers and tech companies to require companies to submit public data on what their cars are doing and when they crash.) What it boils down to is that this act prevents states from having laws on the design, construction, or performance of self-driving vehicles, ending the patchwork quilt of laws over auto 2 that we have dealt with until now. Just as the Constitution was written vaguely on purpose because those early lawmakers didn’t know what the future holds, so the details of this legislation are also nebulous. As Aarian Martial of Wired magazine said: The problem is no one knows how this tech will shake out, or the best way to regulate something that doesn’t really exist yet. That’s why it all remains so vague—and why everyone finds the rules so tricky to write. But there’s an upside to that: There aren’t too many details to fight over. In fact, the legislative process thus far has mostly been the picture of old-school Washington bipartisan politics. Kumbaya Auto 2 is good for tech, for driver safety, for the disability community, for public transit, for smart city planning, for people looking for profit. This package would also require Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao to convene advisory councils on disability, underserved populations, seniors, and cybersecurity, to determine how auto2 can best serve all Americans. Again, quoting Aarian Martial: “It’s the rare topic about which federal lawmakers can hold hands across the aisle as they sing “Kumbaya.” In an era of governmental discord and in an environment not known for unanimity, this legislation is shooting through each stage of American law-making. Other Details of the Act This legislation also allows companies to become exempt from current vehicle laws, and in the first year put onto the roads up to 25,000 vehicles that don’t meet safety standards for regular cars. That cap would climb to 100,000 over three years. To get exemptions, companies would have to provide a detailed analysis showing that an auto 2 or auto 2 feature is as safe as a traditional vehicle or feature, even if it doesn’t meet existing standards, such as a vehicle having a steering wheel. “What you want is performance standards,” says John Simpson, a consumer rights advocate with Consumer Watchdog. He says federal regulators should skip the interim period and establish firm safety rules now, even if they don’t yet fully understand the technology or where it might go. “You don’t say: ‘This is how you make the car stop within so many feet of having the brakes applied.’ All you say is, ‘It has to be able to stop.’” Moving Forward Members of the Senate Commerce committee are also working on self-driving car legislation, but a bill hasn’t been introduced. If a measure passes the full Senate, the two versions would have to be reconciled before the president could sign it into law. —Meera [*] autonomous automobiles [†] A little Game of Thrones reference. Come on, you know you watch the show.![]()
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