Self-driving cars that break traffic laws won’t receive tickets in California: Report

Self-driving vehicles that fail to abide by California traffic laws will not receive a ticket, a recent NBC News report revealed.

According to the news outlet, artificial intelligence-powered autonomous cars have been seen running red lights, crossing into construction zones, and failing to move out of the way of emergency vehicles. However, current California law prevents law enforcement officials from writing traffic tickets when no driver is in the car.

“[N]o citation for a moving violation can be issued if the [autonomous vehicle] is being operated in a driverless mode,” according to an internal memo from San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott, obtained by NBC News.

“Technology evolves rapidly and, at times, faster than legislation or regulations can adapt to the changes,” Scott noted.

State law prevents autonomous vehicles from receiving any moving violation tickets. However, the self-driving cars can and have received parking citations, the report stated.

Along with California, Texas and Arizona have become testing grounds for driverless vehicle technology. However, in Texas, autonomous cars are “considered the operator” and can receive a citation without a person inside the vehicle. Arizona law states that the vehicle’s owner “may be issued a traffic citation or other applicable penalty if the vehicle fails to comply with traffic or motor vehicle laws.”

Waymo’s product management director, Chris Ludwick, told NBC News that self-driving vehicles are “being held to the highest standard.”

“Whether the police department has the jurisdiction to cite a driverless vehicle, we certainly do everything we can to ensure the car’s behavior is good,” Ludwick stated.

Neither Waymo nor Cruise vehicles have been involved in a traffic-related death, the outlet reported. Waymo’s autonomous cars have logged over seven million miles of drive time, while Cruise has traveled over 5 million miles.

Despite the technology companies’ claims that their vehicles are safer than human drivers, in October, California suspended Cruise’s testing permits, banning it from operating on public roads over safety concerns, Blaze News previously reported. The decision followed an incident where a pedestrian was dragged under one of its vehicles after being struck by another car that was operated by a human.

Cruise was allowed to continue testing with a safety driver behind the wheel. However, the following month, the company announced it would recall its entire fleet, Blaze News previously reported. Cruise is currently facing two separate investigations.

“We recently announced a pause of all our driverless operations while we take time to examine our processes, systems, and tools and improve how we operate. During this time we plan to seek input from our government and agency partners and other key stakeholders to understand how we can be better partners,” Cruise stated in a November blog post.

California Democratic state Senator Dave Cortese is pushing for the state to form a new regulatory agency to focus on autonomous technology.

“Like when we got the [Federal Aviation Agency] years ago, we’re going to have to do that here,” Cortese said. “And in order to do that here, we need to get started yesterday.”

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