Advocates get amendments to self-driving-vehicle bill

First-year test vehicles reduced by 35,000

Consumer and safety advocates apparently did a good job imitating salmon Wednesday in their effort to add a number of provisions to a U.S. Senate bill on self-driving vehicles.

At a national teleconference in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, a group led by Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety said they were “swimming upstream” with attempts to amend the American Vision for Safer Transportation through Advancement of Revolutionary Technologies Act because of strong lobbying from companies developing self-driving technology. The bill, similar to a House bill passed over the summer, would limit federal restrictions on road-testing self-driving vehicles.

But the groups were able to reduce the number of test vehicles on the road from 50,000 the first year to 15,000. That would increase to 40,000 the second year and 80,000 the third.

In addition, amendments approved Wednesday would require the federal Department of Transportation to review the results of safety tests before vehicles could be offered for sale.

“We’re certainly pleased about lots of the changes,” said Peter Kurdock, director of regulatory affairs at Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety. “We didn’t get everything. … It’s certainly a much better bill than it was [Tuesday].”

The bill is important in the Pittsburgh region because Uber, Delphi and Argo AI are testing self-driving vehicles here.

Other changes would require manufacturers’ safety evaluation reports submitted to the government to be available to the public;

make consumer information of capabilities and limitations of vehicles available when they are sold; have cybersecurity safeguards installed on all vehicles to prevent hackers from controlling instruments such as steering and brakes; and require an alert system so children can’t accidentally be left in a vehicle.

One item not added was more money to increase transportation department staff to oversee development of self-driving technology.

“Advocates believe that driverlesscars have the potential to one day make meaningful and lasting reductions in the death and injury toll on our streets and highways,” Jackie Gillan, Advocates’ president, said in a statement. “Nothing added to the bill will encumber the deployment of AVs, but will encourage safe development and introductionof driverless cars.”

The bill was approved Wednesday by the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. It has to be approved by the full Senate and the House before it becomes law.