Self-Driving Carmakers: Let’s Remove Steering Wheels

The Verge reports:

The federal government should rewrite the safety rules for automobile manufacturing so self-driving carmakers can deploy vehicles without traditional controls like steering wheels and pedals, according to public comments submitted by top car and tech companies.

“We urge [the National Highway Safety Traffic Administration] to move ahead promptly to remove the regulatory barriers the agency has identified,” David Quinalty, head of federal policy and government affairs at Waymo, wrote in a letter posted online on Thursday.

At the link, you’ll see that reliable no-controls cars are surely years away, so this request is rather odd.