New Federal Govt Tool Helps Track Self-Driving Vehicle Testing Efforts Across US

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) on Wednesday released an online tool to let improve the availability of public information surround the testing of self-driving vehicles.          

What Happened: The NHTSA launched an AV Test Initiative, which stands for Automated Vehicle Transparency and Engagement for Safe Testing.

Through this interactive tool, users can access information about on-road testing of electric vehicles in 17 cities across the United States that the companies have chosen to share voluntarily.

The tool will also include information on safety performances, vehicle count in the fleet, routes taken during testing, and policies and legislations for electric vehicles in specific states.

Why It Matters: The AV Test was first announced in June, as noted earlier by TechCrunch.

Since it is in the pilot stages, the NHTSA has decided to restrict the number of participants that submit the data. At the time of roll-out, the online tool had signed in ten companies which include Uber Technologies Inc. UBER, Alphabet Inc GOOGL GOOG subsidiary Waymo, Toyota Motor Corp TM, and Lyft Inc. LYFT.

Elon Musk-led Tesla Inc. TSLA doesn't yet feature on the NHTSA list of companies volunteering to share the information.

NHTSA Deputy Administrator James Owens commented that although the automated driving systems aren't yet sold to the public, the initiative could provide a lot of insight about its market potential and limitations.

A week ago the California state government approved a $437 electric vehicles charging infrastructure project in association with an Edison International EIX subsidiary.