Autonomous Vehicle Testing Guidance for State & City DOTs

Once in a while I'm contacted by a city or state Department of Transportation (DOT) to provide advice on safety for "self-driving" car testing. (Generally that means public road testing of SAE Level 3-5 vehicles that are intended for eventual deployment as automated or autonomous capable vehicles,) The good news is that industry standards are maturing. Rather than having to create their own guidelines and requirements as they have in the past, DOTs now have the option of primarily relying upon having AV testers conform to industry-created guidelines and consensus standards. And ... in September 2021 NYC DOT blazed a trail by requiring the self-driving car industry to conform to their own industry consensus testing safety standard (J3018). Kudos to NYC DOT! (check it out here ( link ); more on that in the details below. The #1 important thing to keep in mind is that testing safety is not about the automation technology -- it is about the ability of the human safety driver