DETROIT — Two horses, without intervention of their riders, would avoid each other if they met on a trail. Transportation has greatly evolved since the days of horse and rider, but is still honoring these most basic principles — technology is soon to come that will ensure two vehicles on the road will behave the same, without need for driver intervention.
Stephen Regan, Regan Strategies and CIC Government Relations Committee chair, spoke to CIC attendees on July 29 at the COBO Center in Detroit about the realities of a driverless future on the collision repair industry.
Three types of technology are impacting the industry: 1) in-vehicle crash avoidance systems and/or automated control of safety functions; 2) vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications supporting crash avoidance applications; and 3) self-driving vehicles.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has five levels of automation: (0) no automation; (1) function specific automation (brake assist, ABS); (2) combined function automation (two systems working together, such as parking assist and automatic braking); (3) limited self-driving automation (driver still has control, but the vehicle can navigate on its own); and (4) full self-driving automation.
Four states — California, Nevada, Florida and Michigan — and the District of Columbia have already passed laws governing self-driving vehicles, with dozens other in consideration, and they aren’t even being sold yet.
Legislation in some cases counteracts existing laws. For example, Nevada and Florida allow texting in automated vehicles, but not in a driver-operated vehicle. Laws are also addressing the OEM liability with autonomous technology systems.
NHTSA’s recommendations to states considering legislation include:
· Licensing drivers to operate self-driving vehicles
· Regulations governing testing of self-driving vehicles
· Principles for testing self-driving vehicles
· Operations of self-driving vehicles for purposed other than testing
Efforts are not limited to NHTSA. The US Department of Transportation Research and Innovative Technology Administration has been researching V2V communications since 2009, and more recently vehicle-to-infrastructure communications (V2I), Regan says. The FCC has already dedicated bandwidth to accommodate these V2V and V2I communications. The primary goal is reducing accidents and injury to people.
“But there is no legislative protection for those tasked with fixing these cars,” Regan says. “The collision repairer really doesn’t have the statutory protection that they need.”
Allstate’s Randy Hanson said autonomous vehicles are a step in the right direction, “but you still have a lot of issues associated with how these vehicles are repaired, who is trained and who will have the infrastructure to make these repairs. The liability element changes significantly. If the repairer has any culpability, how does that change that indemnification agreement? There are a lot of these topics of discussion on the table. I don’t know if there will be a preponderance of vehicles on the road in 5 years, but there will be some, and how do we handle claims properly on those vehicles?”
One of the main challenges is the data and who has access, Regan says.
“Anytime there is an airline event, you have to find the black box. I think there will be a lot of focus on what the vehicle did in terms of who pays, who is responsible and how it needs to be fixed,” Hanson says. “These are conversations that we need to be having. There is a lot of information we now gather just from the customer, so you don’t have access to speed, braking, points of impact. These black boxes may have the ability to really help us to access responsibility and how to repair these vehicles.”
Some of the concerns for OE manufacturers include the liability, data ownership and aftermarket and salvage parts considerations, Regan says.
Ron Reichen, chairman of the Society of Collision Repair Specialists said the use of aftermarket and salvage parts in repairing AVs remains an unanswered question. “The first decision isn’t ‘Can I do it?’ It is ‘What are the ramifications if I do it? What if it fails down the road. I didn’t manufacture it, but I installed it.’ What is the profit margin to take that risk? It is yet to be determined.”
Repairers need to consider liability; release of the ‘black box’ data; determining use of aftermarket, salvage, recycled, etc. parts for AV repairs; labor rates; costs of repairs; and tools and training considerations, among others.
Consumers need to be asking about driver liability, insurance cost changes, repair options, special licensing and AV costs.
Regardless of all the unknowns, AVs are coming, whether the industry fights them or not.
“This is going to be socially driven. The social benefits are too great, and these benefits to be seen are going to outweigh the risks. Everyone should be prepared,” Regan says.
