Lots of AV Reports, But Little on Accessibility

Automated vehicle (AV) development is not just about the technology that would allow for driver-free operation. AVs are partly advancing under the assumption that they will be electronic - EVs - and connected - CVs or CAVs. On the other hand, most of the legal studies and policy development is mode neutral and either gives lip service to, or ignores, people with disabilities. Accessibility embedded in the interfaces and the vehicles - whether for the benefit of people with disabilities, people with strollers, or people with luggage and grocery carts - is left out of the equation.

Considering that the touting of AVs highlights how wonderful they would be for current transportation-challenged populations, little ink or anything else has been spilled, so to speak, to guarantee that this promise will be fulfilled.

What do we mean by accessibility?

I will defer to the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities (CCD) about their standard for accessibility in the context of AVs, taken from the CCD Task Force Autonomous Vehicle Principles.

AVs have the potential to drastically improve access for people with disabilities, including members of the blind and low vision, Deaf and hard of hearing, intellectual, developmental and cognitive disability communities, people with physical disabilities, including wheelchair users, and people with neurological conditions including epilepsy and seizure disorders. However, the promise and safety of AVs will only be realized if the vehicles and the surrounding infrastructure are fully accessible, and the safety elements consider the needs of people with disabilities. 

The CCD recommendations that particularly pertain to people with disabilities include:

• Accessibility of human-machine interfaces,
• AVs with lifts, ramps, and wheelchair securements,
• No requirement of an operator on board who is licensed,
• AV transit and pedestrian infrastructure that complies with the "Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accessibility requirements must be strictly adhered to in order for cities and states to work towards meeting goals of zero traffic deaths and serious injuries,"
• An ADA or expansion that mandates "full accessibility for all types of common and public use AVs,"
• "[L]egislation requiring that, as a matter of civil rights, all new technology incorporate the needs of people with disabilities at the earliest possible point, and 
• "Congress should require that people with disabilities are part of the design and testing of new technologies in order to ensure the accessibility and usability of the technology." 

There is more, but you get the picture. Unfortunately, little or no mention of this sizable sector of the population and their needs is mentioned in reports about AVs. These reports, whatever they examine, are focused elsewhere.

Statements without supporting details

Two recent reports mention or refer vaguely to people with disabilities, but offer nothing more. These are the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (HFES) Policy Statement on Autonomous and Semiautonomous Vehicles (Approved Sept. 30, 2018) and the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Forum on Preparing for Automated Vehicles and Shared Mobility (Sept. 2018). The HFES policy statement says: "Fully autonomous vehicles should accomodate people with disabilities." The document, while brief at five pages, mostly looks at safety; accessibility is not one of its main concerns. The TRB forum speaks globally about research needs that go from data to safety to business models for AV deployment, but it never uses the word accessibility. It mentions a research need addressing equity and another addressing "[h]ow best to serve those with special needs."

The Idaho 2018 Report to the Governor (Nov. 2018) from the Autonomous and Connected Vehicle Testing and Deployment Committee, like the Wisconsin Report of theGovernor’s Steering CommitteeonAutonomous and Connected VehicleTesting and Deployment, never uses any version of the word accessibility. The Wisconsin report does mention "underserved populations" and both address all users of the roadway, specifically including bicyclists and pedestrians. The Washington State Transportation Commission Autonomous Vehicle Work Group, like its counterparts in other states, is looking at AV developments from such a mode-neutral perspective that there is no weighing or consideration of how to steer AVs to serve everyone better and how to include people with disabilities in the next iteration of our transportation system.

State and other AV-related task forces typically examine insurance, licensing, registration, definitions, liability, and responsibility for maintenance. Maybe they consider policing and roadway management.

A whole different approach comes from the Scottish Law Commission, which produced a comprehensive paper - Automated Vehicles: A joint preliminary consultation paper (Nov. 8, 2018). It discusses both fully and partially AVs in terms of operations, reaching minimal risk condition, and liability. It explores different ways transportation is and could be delivered, including Mobility as a Service (MaaS). BUT, in terms of accessibility and providing an equitable transportation system to people with disabilities, nothing in the report goes beyond bare statements. We are talking lip service.

And the private sector?

The private sector is not rushing to provide accessibility - with the exception of Local Motors and others that aim to provide transit shuttle vehicles. And that would be current ADA accessibility that is not self-enforcing (as many lawsuits to enforce it demonstrate). But for taxi-like ridehailing service, no one is jumping up with any promises. Take Uber; in its report, A Principle Approach to Safety (Nov. 2, 2018), the only words related to transportation-challenged populations were these.

More equitable than existing transportation options 

Shared, automated mobility can work to extend the reach of public transit and bridge the first/last mile gap in areas typically underserved by transit systems, and for certain populations like people with disabilities, youth, and seniors. 

Aspirational, yes, but, as my mother used to say, that and (now) $2.75 will get you on the subway. $3 if you buy a single ride ticket. Referring, of course, to NYC, my mother's sole frame of reference.

Anxiety, of course, because lip service is not enough

My worry, and certainly the fear of the disability community (and some in the older adult community), is that lack of a mandate and/or concerted effort to embed accessibility now - during development of AVs and infrastructure (virtual and real) to support them - will put us in the same situation we were in, and in some respects continue to inhabit, which is attempting to retrofit a very inaccessible transportation system for people who are not the norm. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was a good first step almost 30 years ago, but, in any place without fabulous transit and even there (think elevators to subways in New York City and San Fransisco), people with disabilities continue to be second-class transportation citizens.

With the current House, Senate, and Administration, no one is pushing for ADA 2.0. If anything, there is fear of accessibility retrenchment. At three weeks into a government shutdown, one begins to wonder whether the dream of bipartisan action on infrastructure and transportation can even happen. Any progress is happening in large cities, such as Boston and New York, which are taking to heart transit accessibility concerns and commitments. (Sorry for the lack of links here.)

From the Navy Yard - possible home run hit right before the shutdown

The USDOT building in Washington, DC, is barely a walk away from the DC major league baseball stadium. That US agency building, which spans two large city blocks, was, hours before the government closed up, the site of a hopeful development that AVs will serve everyone. I imagine a government employee, in the dark, hovering over his or her computer in a rush to click "upload" before the shutdown announcement to step away from the building and all government-funded devices.

The Notice of Funding Opportunity - or NOFO, in acronym land - issued from the US Department of Transportation just a few hours before the government shutdown, expresses a commitment to transportation-challenged populations in general and to people with disabilities and older adults in particular. One of the prime goals of the USDOT project - entitled Automated Driving System (ADS) Demonstration Grants - is to "fund projects that test applications with the greatest potential to service transportation-challenged populations, including older adults and individuals with disabilities.” Additionally, "Each demonstration must include input/output user interfaces on the ADS [automated driving system] and related applications that are accessible and allow users with varied abilities to input a new destination or communicate route information and to access information generated by the ADS.”

The deadline for proposed demonstration projects is Mar. 21, 2019 - assuming that the federal government is back to work by then.

Alternative Take on AV Legislation and Regulation

Sen. John Thune and legendary consumer and safety advocate Ralph Nader are duking it out in the South Dakota press over an automated vehicle (AV) bill pending in the US Senate. I am not sure that either gentleman has expressed himself well. Thune does not provide a reason for the lack of AV safety standards or performance measures in the legislation - or mandating that the US Department of Transportation develop - and only cites the large number of fatalities on America's roads each year, while Nader gets way into the weeds on every current standard without addressing that AVs might not need the same type of federal vehicle safety standards - FMVSS - as conventional vehicles.

I'd like to offer a reasonable rebuttal to both. Meanwhile, reports change every few days about the likelihood of an AV bill passing during this session of Congress.

Scope is a big issue

Neither Thune nor Nader mention that there is already partially automated vehicle technology on the road. This is a significant issue that Congress has completely failed to address and there are no federal standards for safeguards to ensure that drivers remain attentive when a partially automated vehicle is in AV mode because while the AV mode is on, the driver might, at any moment, be called upon or find it necessary to take over. Research has indicated that we humans quickly become complacent and stop paying sufficient attention when a machine generally does its job.

Slow is fine

First, to counter Sen. Thune, there is no reason to rush because we have at the very least a few years before AVs are widely available for transit or personal use. In the mean time, we have plenty of legislative approaches at the state and international levels that we can sit back and learn from. The benefit (and, yes, the disadvantage) of our constitutional framework for passing legislation is the high level of consensus needed. What this generally means is that when federal legislation passes - yes, generally, and not in all cases - there is compromise and consensus.

US technology is in the lead without a federal statute; there will be a market for AVs whether we sooner pass a federal statute or later, so why not allow states and other countries to be petrie dishes for regulation, insurance coverage, transit applications, etc. before Congress steps in?

Issues that the federal government should place more resources into studying and addressing are cybersecurity and privacy, emergency preparedness and management, a broadened scope of accessibility for people with disabilities, transportation equity, labor and business model implications (for drivers, car dealers, equipment supply chains, etc.), roadway safety for walkers, bikers, and other modes, and geographic coverage. And I did not want to mention whether every single person will be expected to carry a smartphone at all times.

At the very least, Congress should pay attention to the Transportation Research Board's Forum on Preparing for Automated Vehicles and Shared Mobility. This advisory group issued a circular in Sept. 2018 about the many concerns that we should address at the national level as we contemplate a rollout of AV technology on our roads. I'll write about that circular in a future post because I have not read the whole circular yet.

Yes, the USDOT's AV 3.0 is out on the street and USDOT is accepting comments. I am still making my way through the 80-page document. And ditto: I'll write about that document in a future post.

Still Looking Like State/University vs. State/University

Despite proposed national guidelines and lots of talk about how a national approach is needed so that driverless vehicles will be licensed, for want of a better word, to travel across jurisdictional and state lines, we continue to see a vacuum at the federal level in terms of legislation. That is to be expected because the United States Constitution established a system where it would be difficult, not easy, to pass legislation. Presently, there is no fire under Congress, no immediacy, for consensus to propel the enactment of a law. So the decision making remains with the states, which police and license motor vehicle travel and road design, building, and maintenance.

And in that vacuum, more and more states are seeing opportunity or, at least, they are attempting not to be left behind. Last week, I reported on Maryland, Texas, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Ohio. Here are a few more, plus a sales tour for a driverless transit-like shuttle.

Nevada and transit?

Who would have thought that Nevada would be a leader in the testing of driverless transit? Or that Nevada will be the first state to have driverless transit-like shuttle pilots going on in multiple cities? Well, count me in as someone who is surprised because with my East Coast glasses on I did not look into a crystal ball a year or two ago and proclaim Nevada! And I did not read anyone else predicting this either.

Las Vegas is already a location for driverless experimentation and soon Reno, Carson City, and Sparks (a city I have never heard of) will be hosting driverless shuttles as part of a project out of the Regional Transportation Commission (RTC). This project is a collaboration among the RTC, the University of Nevada (link to Reno campus), transit, and others.

Sales tour for driverless transit-like service

Speaking of transit or transit-like, Transdev and Easy Mile are taking their cute driverless shuttle across the country to market it for providing transportation for events and on private campuses, basically off of public roads. Right now, the shuttle is in Florida, but they will be showcasing the vehicle in Atlanta, New Orleans, LA, San Jose, and Arlington, TX. 

Riding easy in the Sunshine state

Florida Polytechnic University is, perhaps, taking a first step to follow Carnegie Melon University and a few other universities, to train students in driverless vehicle software and design, except that the Florida course - only one course - is not growing out of anyone's research, but rather is an intentional move by the university. What remains to be seen is whether a program will grow out of the course, now being taught by a retired Air Force colonel, who has a background in computer science and drone technology. The course is based on one taught at MIT (that's Massachusetts Institute of Technology).

The Florida university is located right near the testing ground recently picked by the US Department of Transportation.

MIT spawn

It is not only Carnegie Melon and Stanford with spawn in the driverless world, MIT's offspring nuTonomy is doing pretty well in Asia and in its extended hometown of Boston, crossing over one of the bridges from Cambridge for its driverless testing and, hopefully, pilot project. The linked article is a nice update and summary of the nuTonomy Boston project. No doubt the very progressive and innovative MassDOT secretary, Stephanie Pollack, will make sure there is a welcoming environment in Massachusetts for driverless. She gave some great talks at the recent TRB (Transportation Research Board) conference. I am a big fan.

By the way, nuTonomy has lots of job openings in engineering, cybersecurity, and mapping.

And out on the Northern Plains

To show how popular it is for states to attract driverless testing, research, and industry, even very sparsely-populated states are trying to get in on the action. Here's an article from North Dakota about consideration of legislation and driverless testing possibilities. The state hasplenty of space, weather, and open roads. Not much congestion.

10 chosen sites

Just so I have this somewhere in my blog-file cabinet of driverless stuff, here is a link to the 10 chosen proving ground sites in the US. 

Time Off for Family Stuff

I was aching to make breads and cookies and to cook for all of the family who will be around for the next few weeks. But a fly in that ointment was the worry about my older daughter driving for several hours to home and back on roads that could have ice or snow. She promised to be careful and I trust her; I just do not trust the other drivers to care about her well-being. That worry and the reality of the loss of a dear friend's son in an auto crash a couple of years ago sat like hard, heavy rocks in the pit of my stomach. My daughter, thankfully, arrived home safely, but, as you can see, the safety promise of autonomous transportation is quite personal to me.

I love reading, writing, and researching driverless developments, especially those about business models, laws, and regulations. Well, definitely add to that pilot programs and how many get autopilot/partially-driverless confused with autonomous in toto.

BUT ...

The past few months of work and life have been stressful. We lost a family member, we had a surgery, we had children traveling, and now my sister is not in great shape. Work was a total bear. Is that an expression? Well it is now.

So I need a break. I really need a time for reflection. I will continue to read each day about driverless developments, but I might not post for the next few weeks.

Find me in person at Transportation Camp in DC on Jan. 7. I may or may not show up at TRB, but I will be at a related meeting or two. By TRB, I mean the Transportation Research Board conference, held each year in January serendipitously during the coldest week in DC, which, for those of you from Chicago, feels somewhat balmy.

TRB, by the way, does interesting transportation research studies, generally about the US, since it is federally funded. Some are quite useful.