Looking Back: The NHTSA’s Preliminary Statement on Autonomous Vehicles
The Department of Transportation and the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently unveiled a nearly $4 billion plan to accelerate autonomous vehicle development. At the same time the NHTSA released a policy update to its Preliminary Statement of Policy Concerning Automated Vehicles, which was originally issued on May 30, 2013. In the Preliminary Statement, NHTSA outlined the significant benefits autonomous vehicles technology could provide: a reduction in fuel consumption, traffic congestion, and greenhouse gases; greater mobility for those with disabilities; decreased overall societal cost associated with lives lost; fewer and shorter hospital stays; lower amounts of property damage; increased investment in technology; and job growth in the industries that create, manufacture and maintain these new technologies.
