Attorney Christopher Callahan smoothly turns his Tesla S90 out of the Fennemore Craig parking lot in the Biltmore area. “Do you want to feel some acceleration?” He accelerates and the car zooms through a maze of cars on the street, passengers thrust back into their seats from the speed, before coming to an automatic, surprisingly graceful stop at a traffic light.
“If it perceives a 10-mile[-per-hour] or greater differential in the other lane, it checks to see if there are any other cars coming. You’ve got to keep your hands on the wheel, but it will automatically change lanes if it perceives a faster route of traffic,” Callahan says. “Which is pretty cool.”
Tesla is one of a handful of companies making their mark in automated automotive technology, which ranges from fairly common “assists” like lane departure warning systems (which beep or buzz if you stray beyond your lane) to the ultimate goal for visionaries like Elon Musk and the Google crew of completely driverless cars zipping around the country. Arizona has emerged this year as a hotbed – literally, thanks to our oven-like summer temperatures – for automated car activity, with the Google Self-Driving Car Project hitting the streets of Chandler in April, Ford testing its self-driving Fusion hybrid at its labyrinthine Arizona Proving Ground in Wittman (northwest of the Valley), the University of Arizona partnering with Uber in a research project focused on self-driving car technology (particularly optics and mapping challenges) and Governor Doug Ducey issuing an executive order to organize a Self-Driving Vehicle Oversight Committee.
Why the draw? Our extreme heat is a good weather test for vehicles, and we have a good mix of urban and rural areas for test-driving. “Also, in some communities, there are golf cart crossings, I understand,” Jennifer Haroon, head of business operations for the Google Self-Driving Car Project, told the Arizona Republic. Her remark may sound jocose, but the Valley’s grid-like street system, punctuated by oddities like golf courses, is an ideal test space for Google’s prototype vehicles and its Lexus RX450h SUVs. At this point, test drivers are behind the wheel just in case.
The scope of potential questions and concerns regarding automated vehicles is far-reaching, from practical safety concerns to legal ramifications of accidents to ethical and moral quandaries regarding personal and corporate responsibility, agency and even privacy – biometric readings in cars could be the ultimate Big Brother, effectively putting the kibosh on “he said/she said” arguments and proving culpability in accidents.
“What is the roadway going to look like when you have both automated vehicles and non-automated vehicles operating at the same time? Is there going to be a period where there’s going to be more danger?” wonders attorney Marc Lamber, legal commentator at Fennemore Craig, P.C. “We live in a world of automobile insurance, and it’s a way of offsetting risk and accounting for risk and the costs associated with a collision. Everyone has automobile insurance; it’s regulated by the state. What happens if there’s no longer a driver at fault? The claim becomes at least in part against the manufacturer. It could also involve the company responsible for the communication. It could be a governmental entity, it could be a city or a county that also is responsible for providing information that interacts with the vehicle.”
Though the Fennemore Craig team is not officially involved in Ducey’s oversight committee, the high-tech firm’s key players are watching the legal and technological developments with interest. “The law always plays catch-up,” says practice group manager and technology leader Andy Clawson. “When drones were coming out, everyone [was] like, ‘Where can I fly it?’ And the law was like, ‘Anywhere you want.’ [laughs] Now it’s highly regulated… When they were making state and federal laws for motor regulations, nobody said, ‘Oh, what if someone invents a car that has this feature that doesn’t even exist yet?’”
“It’s nascent,” Lamber concedes. “We’re in a global market right now, so it doesn’t matter as much what our opinions are because it’s going to happen. It’s the direction things are moving. You can resist or you can accept it… Also, think of what this portends. If you have driverless vehicles, what looms next?”
