A couple of days ago it was suggested that one of the things the Obama administration was planning on doing was to hasten the development of self-driving cars. Right now many companies are creating self-driving cars, but understandably given that it is new technology and there are lives at stake, there are various rules and regulations that need to be complied with.
That being said, it seems that in an effort to hasten the development of such vehicles, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has announced at an event in Detroit that the US Transportation Department will be waiving some safety rules in a bid to make it easier to carmakers to test their cars.
The report from Reuters notes that safety regulators will be establishing guidelines for carmakers in the next six months, and for up to two years, an estimated 2,500 vehicles will be exempt from safety standards. In addition to that, President Barack Obama is expected to ask Congress to approve $4 billion over the next 10 years to help speed things up.
Of course this doesn’t mean that carmakers get to throw caution to the wind, but with the relaxed rules, carmakers will be able to focus on actually creating the technology and fine-tuning it, as opposed to having to worry about other regulations, which we’re sure will come back into focus once there are plans to make it commercial.