Abstract
After decades of promise, self-driving cars are now becoming a meaningful reality on our roads. Yet not a single federal law or regulation governs autonomous vehicle operation in the United States—despite widespread agreement among policymakers, advocates, and industry stakeholders that a national safety framework is necessary. This article provides the first comprehensive legal analysis of what a federal safety regulation for autonomous vehicles can and should look like. It describes the current landscape of autonomous technology. It analyzes both the existing federal legal regime for vehicle safety regulation as well as state, local, and international standards that apply to autonomous vehicles. It also considers numerous concepts that have been offered as a model for regulation, identifying their respective legal and policy limitations. The Article concludes that federal regulators have the authority under current law to issue autonomous safety standards and proposes standards that would be useful, technology-forward, and legally sound. Specifically, successively effective safety regulation can be achieved through (1) the submission of a safety case, (2) a comprehensive set of objective performance requirements, and (3) required validation through extensive simulation.
Recommended Citation
Adam Raviv,
Rules of the Road: Toward National Regulation of Autonomous Vehicles,
2026
J. L. & MOB.
248
Available at:
https://repository.law.umich.edu/jlm/vol2026/iss1/7
Included in
Torts Commons, Transportation Commons, Transportation Law Commons