Self Driving Gets Rolling in Florida

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With the passage of House Bill 311, Florida becomes the next state to give self-driving cars the go-ahead, reports Cheddar.com. “The future of transportation is shared, electric and self-driving and we want to take the lead on a policy front of all of those different areas,” said State Senator Jeff Brandes, who co-sponsored the bill.

 Beginning on July 1, level 4 and level 5 autonomous cars will be allowed on public roads without a safety driver on board.

 Level 5 cars are fully automated and are presumed to be able to drive anywhere a human could drive. Level 4 vehicles are largely self-driven and can navigate on programmed mapped routes but may require a human assist.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis supports the measure, saying the aim was to reduce, “barriers to the advancement of autonomous vehicles.” All parties agreed that safety and liability concerns were ongoing and adaptable.  

 A few states are already on board with self-driving cars and legislators are convinced that Florida offers the next frontier. “Florida is a hotbed of innovation as it relates to self driving cars,” said Senator Brandes. “We have a number of self-driving companies that are already here in Florida, including Voyage that just deployed down in the Villages, Starsky Robotics operating semi tractor trailers, Argo AI down in Miami, and Transdev in Babcock Ranch which is a retirement community developed specifically around self-driving cars.”  

July 1, 2019

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