WASHINGTON—Automakers came to Congress seeking relief Tuesday from a growing patchwork of state laws surrounding self-driving cars.
Executives from automakers Toyota, General Motors and Volvo and an executive at ride-hailing app Lyft urged lawmakers to use their constitutional authority to preempt state laws on self-driving cars.
In testimony before a House subcommittee, Lyft government relations vice president Joseph Okpaku said a thicket of varying regulations at states, cities and counties threatens to hold back innovation. Legislators in more than 20 states have proposed nearly 60 bills to regulate autonomous vehicles since Jan. 1, Okpaku said.
Enacted laws range from a restrictive framework in California, which has sparred with businesses over self-driving car tests, to a fairly wide-open environment in Michigan.
The answer, says Michael Ableson, a General Motors vice president, is for Congress to grant authority to the Transportation secretary "to grant specific exemptions for highly automated vehicle development." GM is currently testing 50 self-driving Chevrolet Bolt sedans in states that include California and Michigan, and plans to roll them out first in Lyft fleets.
Among the vexing issues for lawmakers is how regulations can keep pace with self-driving vehicles. At present, motorists can buy cars that are, at best, partially self driving. Automakers say that within five years, they could have models that are fully self driving.
Members of the Congressional subcommittee largely expressed bipartisan support for the development of autonomous vehicles, though there was little indication of whether they were inclined to adopt uniform legislation on self-driving cars.
It's "exciting on a personal level," said Rep. Gregg Harper, R-Miss., who said his "special needs" son could benefit from access to self-driving cars. "The possibilities are so good here for people in the disability community."
Auto executives expressed concern that well-intentioned efforts to protect consumers will undermine development.
One of the key challenges is, "how safe is safe enough" to allow self-driving cars on the road, Toyota Research Institute CEO Gill Pratt testified.
Pratt said it's unlikely people would accept a significant number of deaths attributable to autonomous vehicles.
"Society tolerates a significant amount of human error on our roads. We are, after all, only human," he testified. "Humans show nearly zero tolerance for injuries or deaths caused by flaws in a machine."
Lawmakers said there needs to be a balance between safety and technological development.
"Nobody wants to let unsafe technologies on the road, but we also don't want to prevent vehicles that improve safety from reaching consumers easier," said Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Michigan. But Dingell said crash fatalities would be a "public health epidemic" if it were any other industry.
More than 35,000 people were killed in U.S. auto crashes in 2015. About nine of 10 of crashes are caused by human error.
The Obama administration's Transportation Department embraced autonomous vehicle technology as a key catalyst for its goal of eliminating roadway deaths within 30 years. The Trump administration has said little about the matter so far, though President Trump has pledged to reduce regulations in general.
For now, states are leading the way on regulations, with California taking a particularly proactive approach.
Anders Karrberg, vice president of government affairs for Volvo, said certain aspects of California's standards are "onerous."
U.S. Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., defended her home state. "I always believe that states should be a testbed for regulation," Matsui said.
Nidhi Kalra, co-director of the RAND Center for Decision Making Under Uncertainty, said a "lower threshold of safety might be OK" in controlled environments. She said Washington needs to develop a "flexible, adaptable regulatory framework" reflecting that autonomous vehicles are entering the equivalent of a teenager's years in driver's education.
"We may need similar policies for autonomous vehicles in their teenage years," she said.
Follow USA TODAY reporter Nathan Bomey on Twitter @NathanBomey.
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