Texas lawmakers could regulate fleets of autonomous vehicles

(TNS) — Concerned about the potential for problems in the future as companies ditch human drivers in favor of autonomous vehicles, Texas lawmakers are taking a light-touch approach — but new requirements — for companies that operate self-driving cars and trucks.

“The state needs to be able to step in and have a set of rules,” said state Sen. Robert Nichols, R-Jacksonville, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee. “But we’re not going to sneak anything in here. We’re going to have a methodology.”

Nichols, with support from other senators, said he expects legislation in the upcoming session will require companies like Waymo, Cruise and Aurora to notify the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles when they remove drivers from their vehicles and allow vehicles to travel alone. The DMV would then handle licensing and registration of the vehicles, as well as some oversight of reported problems with the systems.

The new rules, which would require approval by the Legislature and Gov. Greg Abbott, would apply only to fleets of driverless cars and trucks, such as those used to haul trailers of goods or small robot taxis that carry people.

The regulations and registration would apply to privately owned autonomous vehicles. The exclusion is important for an industry that is moving — albeit slowly — toward selling privately owned autonomous cars and small trucks, said Nick Steingart, director of government affairs for the Alliance of Automotive Innovation.

Nichols and other lawmakers began talks this summer with companies involved in developing autonomous vehicles. His goal, he said, was not to rewrite or change trucking and tolling laws but to integrate autonomous vehicles into those laws. In the meantime, federal officials are regulating the technology and safety requirements related to the industry.

Nichols said the state needs to have a system in place that addresses issues related to autonomous vehicles and ensures companies are using Texas roads safely without limiting innovation.

“The industry is already working with us, we don’t want to disrupt that,” Nichols said.

Texas lawmakers in 2017 approved regulations for self-driving vehicles largely to get ahead of cities in the state that set their own regulations. After the debate over ride-hailing companies like Uber and Lyft — in which the state overrode city and county regulations that tried to regulate the companies much like the taxi companies the companies fought — state leaders decided to get ahead of self-driving cars. Rather than leave the changing technology and its regulations to cities, state lawmakers stepped in.

But the regulations that led to investment in autonomous vehicle research in the state left loopholes. When Cruise, a General Motors-owned autonomous vehicle company, debuted in Austin and Houston, the cars clogged up local streets, stalling in a line and causing traffic jams.

Federal law requires manufacturers of autonomous vehicles to report collisions but not other incidents, and state law currently imposes no requirements either. Nichols said he expects lawmakers will discuss establishing a system in which autonomous vehicles are registered with TxDMV, and then procedures could be established so that if there are ongoing problems, the company can limit use of the roads without a driver in place.

“I don’t want to get into the (autonomy) level,” Nichols said, noting that’s up to federal officials. “You either have a driver or you don’t have a driver. If you want to operate without a driver, we want to know about it.”

There have been fewer problems in the trucking industry on the autonomous side, with vehicles like Waymo and Aurora. Trucking is moving more quickly to driverless vehicles, with Interstate 45 and Interstate 10 being major testing grounds for the technology, in part because California has limited autonomous vehicle testing to vehicles under 10,000 pounds gross vehicle weight.

“The autonomous trucking industry left California and came here,” said Ariel Wolf, general counsel of the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association.

Lawmakers are trying to strike a balance by keeping innovation mostly in Texas, but also tracking it and its successes and failures.

“If you had stayed out of the newspapers, we wouldn’t be here today,” said state Sen. Kelly Hancock, R-North Richland Hills, referring to problems with companies that used self-driving cars as shuttles and caused traffic jams and complaints in Houston and Austin.