Testifying before a recent meeting of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, American Trucking Association (ATA) President and CEO Chris Spear spoke on the importance of including commercial vehicles in deliberations on automated vehicle technology.
“While some people use the terms ‘autonomous’ and ‘driverless’ interchangeably, ATA believes the world of automated vehicles will still have an important role for drivers,” Spear said.
He noted that more than 3.5 million professional drivers move approximately 70 percent of goods that are delivered by truck annually and that an increase in automation would not likely change.
Spear then stated that as the framework for how automated vehicles will be overseen, commercial vehicles must be included in the same way passenger vehicles are.
“We are at a critical moment in the development of autonomous technology,” Spear said. “There are many questions to be answered – including those about cybersecurity, about the impact on trucking operations and how vehicles will interact with one another, and about infrastructure. What is clear is that those questions should be answered for commercial and passenger vehicles at the same time.”
Spear provided a number of recommendations to the committee, including that Congress set uniform national rules of the road for automated vehicles without suppressing innovation in the sector.