California is making driverless car permits available at its Department of Motor Vehicles but there isn't exactly a rush for the permits, which come with new regulations, the website TechCrunch reported Monday.
The DMV has three autonomous vehicle permits, one for testing with a driver, driverless testing, and deployment. TechCrunch said the majority of the new regulations, though, cover testing and deployment.
"State law requires the California DMV to develop regulations for the safe testing and deployment of autonomous vehicles on public roads," a California DMV representative told TechCrunch in a statement.
"With the adoption of regulations effective April 2, 2018, the DMV has the authority to issue permits for driverless testing or deployment of autonomous vehicles. When an application is received, it will be thoroughly reviewed. The department will not approve any permits until it is clear that the applicant has met all of the safe operation requirements set forth in law and in the regulations," the statement continued.
The permits come after Uber paused its driverless car program after a fatal accident involving one of its autonomous vehicles in Tempe, Arizona, when it hit a pedestrian walking a bike, KGO-TV noted.
Steve Shladover, a research engineer for the University of California, Berkeley's PATH Institute for advanced transportation technology, told KGO-TV that an immediate market for driverless vehicles is overblown.
He told the television station that researchers have not come up with a reliable way to replace human eye contact and other nonverbal communication that road drivers use behind the wheel.
"I think it's very unlikely that we're going to see significant fleets operating without drivers for quite a long time," Shladover told KGO-TV. "That's gonna be challenging when we have a vehicle without a driver. How do you, as the pedestrian or the bicyclist, know whether that vehicle actually sees you?"
The DMV representative told TechCrunch wrote that so far no company has applied for a deployment permit and just one company has applied for a permit to test fully autonomous cars. The representative did not disclose what company, TechCrunch noted.
"There is not a timeline on when the DMV approves a permit after receiving a complete application," the representative said.
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