Back in April of last year, the National Highway Traffic Administration (NHTSA) officially finalized a new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard – FMVSS No. 127 – that will make automatic emergency braking – including pedestrian AEB – standard on all passenger cars and light trucks (U.S. light vehicles with a gross vehicle weight rating of 10,000 pounds or less) by September 2029. This decision is expected to save at least 360 lives a year, but still drew criticism from the Ford backed lobby group known as the Alliance for Automotive Innovation (AAI), which asked the NHTSA to reconsider that decision, though it didn’t take long for the agency to effectively deny that request. Now, it’s taking the matter to court.
AAI has initiated litigation in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit against the Department of Transportation (DOT) as it seeks to repeal the NHTSA’s rule on automatic emergency braking. However, the organization was quick to note that this “should not be interpreted as opposition to AEB, a lack of confidence in the technology, or an objection to AEB’s widest possible deployment across the U.S. vehicle fleet. Rather, this litigation is about ensuring a rule that maximizes driver and pedestrian safety and is technologically feasible.”
AAI has long noted that the automotive industry has invested over $1 billion developing AEB technology, and in 2016, automakers voluntarily agreed to deploy that technology on all new vehicles by 2025 – a commitment that has indeed been met. AAI previously stated that “the final rule mandates technology that is inconsistent with regulations implemented in other parts of the world and likely to result in aggressive and unpredictable braking that will frustrate drivers. After a decade of shared and substantive work on AEB and a billion dollars invested, NHTSA inexplicably changed course and issued a rule that automakers indicated was not feasible with widely used braking technologies.”
Now that the Department of Transportation has been alerted of this legal challenge, the agency has 40 days to submit the administrative record to the D.C. Circuit. The court will then set a briefing schedule.
Comment
There are emergency driving situations where slamming the brakes is not the best action and is even the worst action.