The U.S. House of Representatives just advanced a bill out of a panel which is part of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that would prevent states from passing laws regulating self-driving cars.

That legislation will now move on to the full House Energy and Commerce Committee and a vote could come as early as next week

The new proposed legislation would prohibit states and other local jurisdictions from adopting regulations related to cars’ design, construction, software or communication.

The individual states would still be allowed to regulate registration, licensing, liability, education and training, insurance or traffic laws.

The state of Michigan had already taken steps to be a state for self-driving car testing.  According to the Detroit News “the Michigan Legislature passed into law last year a measure that allows robotic cars to be operated on any Michigan road without a driver behind the wheel”.

For the first time I drove a car yesterday that had self-driving capability and I found it to be very interesting and not as scary as I thought it might be.  The Tesla I drove handled very well and did keep between the lines on I94, the car had software that also did not allow it to get closer to the car in front of my car by less than 4 car links.  The car did recognize when I came within that 4 car link distance and slowed down.

Could you allow a car you were operating or driving in to drive itself?

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