Senators on Wednesday grilled the nation’s top transportation safety regulators over their efforts to approve rules for the growing self-driving car industry.<\/p>\n
Despite the immense promise of automated vehicles (AVs), which the lawmakers on the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee acknowledged, the technology has been plagued by accidents during testing.<\/p>\n
Committee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) praised the new technology, which he said “has the ability to save thousands of lives” that would be lost in traffic accidents and provide “new found independence” for the elderly and people with disabilities.<\/p>\n
Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), who has introduced federal legislation on self-driving car safety, pressed regulators to show urgency over the issue.<\/p>\n
A “public safety risk, in the absence of clear federal rules, or a federal statutory framework, to guide safe deployment and testing exists now and we need to close that gap as quickly as possible,” Peters said.<\/p>\n
Much of the hearing also highlighted divisions between regulators and the watchdog tasked with investigating transportation accidents.<\/p>\n
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chairman Robert Sumwalt cited a report from his agency calling for a tougher review process before companies are allowed to test self-driving vehicles on the road.<\/p>\n
Sumwalt said the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), which approved self-driving tests, was too lax and needed to force autonomous vehicle developers to prepare and submit a safety review.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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