THE California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) will miss a Jan. 1, 2015 deadline for regulations regarding future cars, as regulators are still determining how safe driverless units are.
Until the safety of driverless cars is verified, officials at the DMV say they will not approve self-driving cars for the public.
However, there are currently no guidelines in place to verify the safety of such vehicles.
Issues of concern include whether these vehicles can reinstate control to human drivers if necessary and if they abide by traffic regulations.
At the moment, the DMV can select from three options in certifying the safety of these cars: continue the system in place, which allows automakers self-certify their cars; hire third-party companies to rule on how safe vehicles are; or pave a way for the state to get involved in the certification process.
“It’s a huge undertaking,” Bernard Soriano, who oversees the DMV’s regulatory process, told Associated Press. “There are all of these issues that need to be adequately answered.”
The department sent out a request for independent companies interested in participating in the testing process, although this type of certification is non-existent for autonomous vehicles. It received responses from four businesses, none of which were immediately prepared to carry out such a procedure.
California’s deadline for these new rules was set in 2012 by a state law mandating it to release regulations on criteria for automakers to follow so autonomous cars could be sold to the public.
Ron Medford, Google’s driverless car safety director and former federal transportation official, proposed at a March hearing on DMV regulations that the agency should administer the tests.
“I would be cautious not to make some of these things more complicated than they are,” he said.
Automobiles such as Toyota Priuses and Lexus SUVs already possess some automated features, such as cameras, laser sensors and radar. Google spokeswoman Courtney Hohne said these models have been involved in a few accidents, though the incidents were not caused by these features, according to Associated Press.
(With reports from Associated Press)
(www.asianjournal.com)
(LA Midweek December 24-26, 2014 Sec. A pg.5)
