A lot of carmakers around the world are working on self-driving cars and the technology behind it. Heck, if the rumors are to be believed, Apple could also be doing something behind the scenes. However, we expect that it might be years before self-driving cars become road legal, but that might not be the case for the UK.The UK government has announced that they are planning on allow “basic” self-driving cars on the roads as soon as the end of the year. Of course, since there aren’t actually any self-driving cars available for purchase yet, save for Tesla, this will be more about allowing carmakers and companies to trial their systems against UK’s traffic and drivers.
Having a bigger pool of data to draw from will no doubt help companies further refine their self-driving technologies, plus it would also allow the UK government to develop their own self-driving regulations and laws around the technology. That being said, the UK government will starting off this program small and simple, where the self-driving cars allowed on the road are those equipped with automated lane-keeping systems. This is a small step but we suppose it is still progress.
According to transport minister Rachel Maclean, “This is a major step for the safe use of self-driving vehicles in the UK, making future journeys greener, easier and more reliable. But we must ensure that this exciting new tech is deployed safely, which is why we are consulting on what the rules to enable this should look like.”
Filed in . Read more about Legal and Self-Driving Cars. Source: gov.uk