The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) announced a public meeting to seek input on planned guidelines for the safe deployment and operation of automated vehicles. The intent of the operational guidance is to encourage innovative and safe deployment of automated vehicle technologies.
NHTSA will hold the public meeting on April 8 in Washington, DC. The meeting will start at 9 a.m. and continue until 4 p.m., local time. Check-in (through security) will begin at 8 a.m. A second public meeting will be held on the West Coast later in the year.
NHTSA is seeking public input on those aspects of automated vehicle (AV) systems that would benefit from operational guidelines. For example, of high importance to the agency is information on the roadway scenarios and operational environments
highly automated vehicles will need to address and the associated design and evaluation processes and methods needed to ensure that AV systems can detect and appropriately react to these scenarios such that a high level of safety is assured when these systems are deployed on US roadways.
Also of interest would be input on aspects of automated vehicle technology that may not be suitable or ready for guidelines. For these areas, information would be useful on alternative approaches to assure safety.