House Transportation Finance Committee3818

>> [Captioner on standby]. >> [Gavel]. >> Welcome to the meeting. Today I officially call the meeting of the transportation finance committee into order.

It is that time of the day. As you could see from the agenda; we have a very aggressive agenda today with six testifiers here. That's going to give us our first initiation into autonomous vehicles. And I'm expecting that we will have more discussions about this throughout this session here.

But we have over 22 states that have already started working on this. And five others that have executive orders. And so; you'll find lots of good information in your packet. Because of the aggressive state here; we are going to limit our testimony to a half an hour for MnDOT and the other presenters about 15 minutes.

And so; we will hold up a card at two minutes. If you will -- give you that time. If there are additional questions that we don't get to during this presentation; please submit them in writing. We'll get them out to the individuals and have them answered.

And again; we will try to have -- this is just our first meeting; but it will give us a really good start with that. >> So first we're going to welcome MnDOT representative Jane -- if I pronounce this wrong -- hip pas* as director. Identify yourself and present your presentation. >> Thank you; Mr.

Chair and representative of the committee. My name is [indecipherable] I'm the state traffic engineer for the mrn mn department of transportation. Thank you for* having us here today. I'm going to start out by giving you a little presentation overview.

Talk about what autonomous vehicle is so we're on the same page. A. Little bit of overview of activities to date that MnDOT and our partners and our sister agencies have conducted. And at the end kind of wrap it up with a review of the executive order that was signed by governor dayton earlier this week .

You hear the term connected vehicle; autonomous vehicle; automated vehicle -- these terms are sometimes used interchangeably; but they are actually different. You hear the term "autonomous vehicle;" it's a vehicle that can basically act by itself. So it's not relying on other cars to communicate with it; not relying on infrastructure to communicate with it; it's relike* on its own sensors to drive down the roadway. Connected vehicle is the opposite.* Connecting with other vehicles.

For example; vehicles may have technology where they're both approaching an intersection and they're communicating so they don't crash. Trucks* using short range radios to communicate with each other. So one vehicle accelerates; that vehicle accelerates automatically and they decelerate at the same time for fuel efficiencies. Connected vehicle also talks to infrastructure too.

So when we have these vehicles approaching a signal or stlgt; in the future they could be communitying with "I'm red. Turning green in five seconds."* Ideally these two worlds come together and you have an automated connected vehicle; where they're actually able to work independently yet communicate with other vehicles when needed. You hearing different ranges of awe fonmy. Basically they're* 0 to 5.

A level zero vehicle is basically where the human driver has to do everything. Lev 5 vehicle -- you can get in and say* take me to grandma's house; and it will take you to grandma's house. You don't need to do anything as a driver. A lot of these cars may not even have steering wheels and pedals....

That was actually a level 4 vehicle. So that vehicle; the guy inside had no steering wheel; no pedals. If you said take me to grandma's house; you didn't know how to get there; it will take you loop that's pre-programmed. [Talking too fast].

There are some vehicles on the roadway that have one's two's three's -- cruise control that's a level of automation. Adaptive... Commercially available adjust the speed automatically. Some high-level cars -- they're operating freeway system.

The driver can take the hands off the wheel the vehicle knows to stay within the lane. Accelerate; decelerate with other vehicles. Some of these vehicles are on the road right now. That's why we use the word automated and not autonomous [talking too fast].

And ultimately some day they do have a level 5 operating on our system. So we're talking about automated and connected vehicles. There's other items that we're looking to as a state. Struck tuning* we're also working with our neighboring states around us to make sure when we have truck tuning* laws they're consistent among states.

Intercommerce states -- truck tuning* is very beneficial from the industry standpoint. There's fuel efficiencies anywhere from 7-10% right now drive closer distance to the truck in front. We're also looking at impact of electrification of vehicles. Many vehicles are going to electric.

More impacts on our system. Automated delivery services is also one item we're considering. You heard about Amazon drones awhile ago. Many companies are developing vehicles that can...

This was a vehicle out in California. And it's basically a little cooler on wheels. And it can navigate pedestrians on sidewalks and knows where to go. Gets to delivery spot.

You type in a code and out comes your package. These are being tested around the country. Last one is mobility as a service. There's different models about what may happen with vehicles in the future.

Some say we'll all own cars. Others are haired vehicle and the vehicles will be* circulating tawltses. There's a wide range of possibilities that could happen. We're looking at what happens if we have different models in the future and what does that do to our infrastructure and capacity of our roadways [talking too fast].

How real is it and how fast is it going to come? It's difficult to predict when the technology is going to come for our roadways. They're doing a lot of testing in warm weather states but not in cool weather states. There's a whole another set of challenges when you come up north. Here are just some snapsheets of news* snippings.

When you see GM* saying... You know they're making some serious investments. This car is probably not going to be commercially available on the street; but they are investing in the research. Same thing for tuning he or or.* Platooning.* I.

Think there's pel ton and some of their tellnologies. Of course uber is getting* ready to buy a fleet at the same time. There's a lot what's being driven here by the private industry. In Minnesota; we just want to be ready; because we know the technology is coming at a very fast pace; but we don't know when it's coming here.

What are the impacts to Minnesota? Both opportunity and is threats. Safety is probably the biggest one for us. Each year we have over 300 people tragically killed on Minnesota roadways and over 90% of those fatalities are u due to some kind of human element. If you think about our automated vehicle; it doesn't drive drunk.

Doesn't drive distracted. We think we're going to really be able to turn the curve and zero death by adding automated vehicle toes our fleets in the future. We are fortunate last year to have our lowest* fatalities since World War II; but we still have a long ways to go. We also think there will be changes in operation.

We're not sure what the impact will be to congestion. If those models are true where circulating all day -- number of vehicles on the street. Congestion either increase or decrease with automated vehicles. There's also potential infrastructure changes.

If these vehicles are relying on better paift pavement -- signal systems exchange a lot of data; there's infrastructure implications for preparing with these vehicles. Our... We are starting to look at what our current legal framework is and what we can actually do for testing and employing these vehicles* in the future. [Deploying]*.

We've been working very closely with the disabled community; and they're very excited about automated vehicle. People who rely on others to have them transported can't wait for the day where they can have their own vehicle take them to where they want to go and not rely on others. Great opportunity for businesses not only attracting technology companies but overall business climate in Minnesota. Look at what Colorado did with their Amazon headquarters -- they addressed transportation and how connected automated vehicles and their vision may be a benefit for attracting that business to Colorado.

Things we need to be thinking about here that are competitive in a global environment. And I said earlier there's a lot of things happening in the south; but we have those big challenges of snow and sighs and salt. These are some of the* things we want to get interested. Things are happening on the national scale; international scale and federal policies being passed.

Minnesota needs to know how these vehicles operate in our winter weather conditions. We started looking at this about a year or so ago; one of the things we've been looking at recently is some guidance federal government put out. It's not just a Minnesota issue. It's a national issuen issue.

And many manufacturers* want to make sure states are not gopping laws that make it* difficult to develop vehicles or run vehicles on roadways.... Group that regulates vehicle put out guidance in September of dweiven. I just want to highlight -- two key areas that I thought the committee would be interested in. One of the best practices for state agencies -- and they recommended we form a jurisdictional committee made up of certain number of agencies look at our laws and regulations -- are they accommodating or not accommodating for testing and deploying of these vehicles? At the same time they had some best practices for legislators.

Do not place unnecessary burden on competition or innovation. They really want innovation to be spurred and not really hindered by unnecessary regulation or overregulation. And to support the agencies in the testing and deployment of these vehicles. So with that guidance from the federal government about a year or so ago we convened a group that included MnDOT; our partners at the department of safety; which include state patrol; department of commerce to address insurance; pech poll tan...

And Minnesota council on disabilities. We had a few meetings to talk about what we need to do; what our vision is for the short-term. If somebody did approach us to do tests and deployment. Long-term; "Who's able to drive a vehicle? Who's able to get a license? What do our traffic laws need to look like when we have a mixture of autonomous vehicles and non-autonomous vehicles operating in the same space?" MnDOT has started to do some early testing and deployments.

This is the shuttle project that we had. This is called easy mile shuttle. It is a level 4 electric automated... We also headed up mineral facility.

Earlier this year. We [talking too fast]. To actually do extreme cold weather test on these vehicles. We ran it through some pretty harsh conditions.

Both mother nature cooperated with us. And we had ability... So we entered this project with a few different goals. One to see how these vehicles react on snow and ice.

Infrastructure so we're able to support that and plan for infrastructure investments. How these vehicles operate on our roadways. One of the reasons why we picked a shult because it's not a MnDOT. Vehicle snowplow.

We learned a lot by having what a third party would be operating on our system. How do we increase those mobility options in the future. Ip crease Minnesota's influence.* We really concerned federal rules and regulations were getting passed and they were not considering the northern states. By having this project MnDOT is now at the table with partners from other states and we're able to influence national regulations.

We're also developing partnerships. This is nontraditional partners we typically don't deal with in terms of software vendors like VSI here today. We deal directly with automobile manufacturers. To have a better understanding; "What are the risks what are the challenges with implementing this technology?" And finally to give the public a chance to see the vehicles and get their reaction.

This is new. It's transformational. And the more input we can get from the pe blek and what they like and what their concerns are; the more we will be prepared when these vehicles arrive. In addition to our road test; we ran safety tests make sure it's safe to operate in a public environment*.

Weekend before the superbowel. We closed off a* this vehicle is actually not able to operate on a public roadway with other traffic unless you get federal government exemption. We pulled it down a block of Nicolette mall. Over 1300* people ride the shuttle.

We did it in six people increments. A lot of people were interested in coming down to ride the shuttle. We gave each person a car and asked them to comment on what their thoughts and perspectives were about the vehicle -- the demonstration. We had a relatively small sample size return.

82% Of people were excited about having this technology on the roadways. 11% Were kind of not sure and thought maybe we should have separate lanes for them in the future. Seven% were no. Some of the "no's" mostly relied around cybersecurity and what happens if somebody maced this seek and tries to take it over?* That's national international field too cybersecurity.

This chart kind of shows what the chairman was mentioning earlier regarding states with the legislation or executive orders. So bl ue worth states that are* actively have legislation. The* legislation varies anywhere from a direction to study automated vehicles to some states are allowing free testing and then operation of any vehicle. So there's a wide range of legislation out there right now.

And the green states are ones that have executive orders. There's wide range of those executive orders too on what they actually do forming committees to actually directing the testing and deployment. >> Just quick question -- I. Think the governor just created an executive order for this too.

Will we be turning into one of the blue states now? >> Yes; we will. >> Continue on. >> Green. Green.

>> [Laughter]. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair. So that leads into the ne xt piece is the overview of the executive order.

There are basically four pillars the governor wanted to emphasize with the executive order. Safety. He really thinks not only is it going to help us reach the goal of ze ro death; help improve the health of our transportation system. Some things are done around the country.

Columbus; Ohio spending enormous time and effort figure out how they can use it to help people get to facilities faster they don't need transportation right now. They also saw business as a second bill lar that we can help* grow our economy here in Minnesota business opportunities -- infrastructure support these vehicles. Transportation. And finally equity.

There's a lot of opportunities to make sure that these vehicles can provide that gap between the low income and the disabled to have additional transportation options. Just to give you an overview of what the expected outcomes of the advisory council are. Did the council main task -- prepare for [talking too fast]. Recommend changes in state law.

And submit a report to legislature by September first 2018. Those are the main paths of the advisory council. Recommendations on transportation infrastructure and networks; cybersecurity and data privacy; vehicle registration; training; licensing; insurance; and traffic regulations. Economic development; business opportunities and work force preparation and accessibility and equality for all Minnesotans.

These will be the core contents of that report. The advisory committee is made up of 15 members and ex officio officers and members. Charlie sly from MnDOT and Christopher cart* president of excel energy* from Dakotas and Minnesota. It was very important to the governor to have public private entities represented in the advisory council.

And excel energy and energy itself* is a great connection with how these vehicles may operate in infrastructure and in networks. The advisory council will be made up of representatives from finance; transit; higher education; work force training; insurance; public safety; local government; labor; rate advocacy; and the automotive industry. There are also the ex officio offices which are MnDOT commissioner sly; agriculture; commerce; deed;* IRRRB. MNIT; public safety; and revenue.

It also includes the metropolitan council; Minnesota council on disabilities; the ranking and minority member from senate and ranking majority and minority member from the House of Representatives. In addition; the executive orders also prepares Minnesota for connected and autonomous vehicles. In it about about; it talks about MnDOT; the department of public safety and other agencies. Moving forward with establishing programs for deployment -- piece of this too is safe deployment deployment.

So if we have opportunity to do a... We want to work* with other agencies to make sure it is safe and we have high confidence going into those demonstrations. Very importantly to conduct all data generated with our Minnesota government data practices act. In addition also forms interagency CAV team.

I. Apologize if I. Use that term a lot. CAV is connect automated vehicles.

This is a group led by MnDOT. This is a group that we have before with department of public safety and state patrol who just now expanded to include those other agencies who have an interest in it. So that group is called the Minnesota I. Cap team.

And we will be working together to make sure we're coordinating* among agencies. Many different agencies -- insurance; safety; and regulation; and economic development. Mention coordinating -- what's happening in Minnesota and support that advisory committee with recommendations and strategies for moving forward. Thank you; Mr.

Chair and representative of the committee. >> Thank you for presentation Mr. H. Ip pa*.

Is there any questions from the committee? Representative Bernardy. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair. And I do have a question -- well; actually I have three things.

And maybe they don't need to be answered now; because we're going to learn more about about these things in the future. One of the things is the outcomes* that you wanted to bring forward on page 17. It talks about economic development; business opportunities; and work force preparation. I'm just wondering; "does MnDOT -- is there any value or could you add it to the scope to look at economic development in a broader scope to look at economic prosperity for Minnesotans? Sometimes we have a sen ric on the business end of it* but people having access to jobs and those sorts of things and there's job shortages.

Coming from a person -- Minnesota perspective who's not a business owner; there's a lot of value in coming up with information about that as well. So that's something I don't know if you can answer that now or just -- >> Mr. Hip pa. >> Mr.

Chair* representative Bernardy -- I believe that was governor... Not just preparing businesses but our work force and reducing any equity gaps that may occur. I think that will be considered by the advisory council as we move forward. >> Two things that popped out at me.

I wrote this down; but I did see at the end about cybersecurity. That is an issue that I. Am definitely concerned about; and I'm sure that will be explored more. We don't clearly have to answer that.

And then the thing I was concerned about yesterday when I saw that in the mall. It was on a sidewalk; which made sense for our tour yesterday; but then when I saw you talked about these carts being on sidewalks. I mean; it's like -- our infrastructure right now that's being built is going to last for 50-100 years is going to impact whether that's even possible; because right now our trails and our sidewalks aren't even really meeting ADA needs a lot of times or multimodal transportation on them. So I just am really concerned about infrastructure we're building now is very minimal.

And yet we're seeing that there possibly could be the need for other types of motorized transportation on those things. Could you comment on that briefly? >> Mr. Hip pa. >> Mr.

Chair* representatives. MnDOT at the same time putting together connected and automated strategic plan. One of the things we're looking at is infrastructure. We recognize some of our long-term investments now; we may need to take a look at if they can accommodate these technologies in the future.

So we're looking at; "what are some of the things we need to invest in now to accommodate these potential transformational technologies?" Or something we need to st op doing now that can accommodate... Pedestrians and bikes we have to still be prepared for the future. It's a tough question to answer right now; because there are so many unknowns and so many uncertainties. But we're going to start making some of those strategic investments in the very near future.

>> Representative sell. >> * My question; Thank you; Mr. Chair; is kind of in regards to the issue of merger and phasing of regulation. And I think you probably mentioned there is a start -- you may not yet have an answer; but I was thinking; "are there elements of regulation that can be brought on quicker so that development can have a sense that regulation will be accommodating and/or welcoming as it were to move into a market?" >> Mr.

Hip pa? >> Mr. Chair; representative of the committee -- yeah; the biggest thing is safety. Safety would be the No. 1 Concern.

We don't want to maybe push too fast and have open regulation. There is a risk how these vehicles operate on snow environment. But there's probably some opportunities that we'd be looking at advisory counsel and team what could we do to make sure we have regulations that would invite early deployment some of those technologies that are being developed. That's one of the main tasks the advisory council -- how do we foster this through regulation but not hinder it? >> I think we have to tackle one more question from representative Miller.

While we're doing that; Dr. Dunner would like to strt preparing. That would be great.* [Start]*. Representative Miller.

>> May not be the time now; but my area of interest is how the liabilities and how the insurance industry will be reflected in this. Either -- if you can address it briefly here. Sounds like we're going to talk about more this session. >> Insurance will be a big deal.

>> Curious how we're going to address that or how you anticipate that's going to be addressed. >> Mr. Hip pas. >> Mr.

Chair; representatives of the committee. We have had many conversations with the department of commerce already about insurance regulation and also I was working on a national scale about a week or so ago with insurance regulators and manufacturers. One of the biggest challenges the insurance regulations have; we don't have data on automated vehicles. They don't know exactly what the risk is 16-year-old male in urban environment for setting insurance rates.

But they don't know what the risk is for automated vehicle. That's one of the challenges the industry is going to have. The automobile manufacturers recommended we don't go overboard and set limits that are kind of higher that are prescribed in law right now. So we don't hinder those innovations.

But this is a major topic that will be addressed to that advisory council for the recommendations. But it is being talked about here locally and on a national scale. It's a big question. >> With representative how*; did you have a quick question? Representative Rosenthal; did you have a quick question? >> Yes; Thank you; Mr.

Chair. And Mr. Hip pa* you give example of a car with no steering wheel or pedals -- sort of getting back to cybersecurity and technology failure. We know that technology in cars is very [indecipherable] but they still fail at quite a high rate.

Is there any way that override a car that does not have a steering wheel or brakes in a run away situation? >> Mr. Hip pas. >> Mr. Chair; representative of the committee.

The vehicle we had still has an operator on board. They're not physically driving but they're monitoring it; much like an airline autopilot. There is still someone there monitoring the system. The one we had had a button kill switch.

This is a big risk for the industry. So when they're developing their system; future adding a lot of redundancy. So when one system fails; there's multiple systems that can back it up to take its place. We need to work closely with the industry to make sure there is failure across all pieces that vehicle is able to safely slow down and be out of the way of other vehicles.

>> Thank you very much for your testimony. And if people have additional questions; please forward them off to Mr. Marble here* he will pass them on to the department as well. We'll move on to 3M presentation; excuse me; and Dr.

Duggar if you can* present yourself who you represent and continue on with your presentation. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair and members of the committee. My name is Andy dug ner*.

And I am the leader of the 3M connected roads program within 3M company. And I would like to thank you for the opportunity to testify today. For nearly 80 years; 3M has advanced its mission to improve road safety and mobility. We've done that around the world with a dead skated team that's focused on bringing families home safely*.

3M is a provider of roadway infrastructure materials. Things like road signs; pavement markings; vehicle [indecipherable] temporary traffic control material as well as license plates. And these materials improve the safety on Minnesota roadways by increasing the visibility for the motoring public. As we drive towards -- as jay described -- connected and automated vehicles -- and towards zero roadway fatalities; this will require an infrastructure that's now not only able to communicate to human beings but also able to communicate to these machines that are driving at roadways.

Due to 3M's historical involvement in safety of roadways; we believe we're uniquely positioned to bring new innovation to that area. If you think about it; we're on a continuing journey here from the human drivers and the human-driven vehicles of yesterday to the assisted vehicles that we have today to a future of connected and automated vehicles. We'll have a mixture of human-driven vehicles and more automated systems on the roadway for many many years to come. Since the invention of the automobile; human beings have sat between the roadway infrastructure and the vehicle itself.

They have cooperated -- they've been a system; but the human being has always been involved. Now; as we think about connected and automated vehicles; we're going to have to think about a slightly different kind of system. And we're going to have to innovate to enable that system to work reliably and consistently. I thank j.

Hip pas* sphr bringing this slide to the floor. And it is important [for]* to recognize that we will see a combination of technologies on these vehicles. We'll see automated systems; sensors; cameras; radar -- and we'll* also see communication systems like radios and other telecommunications devices. All of these things will be layered together as sort of a system of systems that will enable redundancy and simplicity and ultimately safety of these vehicles as they navigate the roadways.

But it's going to be a pretty complex environment that these vehicles are going to operate in. In fact; in this photo; it's pretty challenging even for human beings to identify the "no left turn" sign. So safety depends on simplicity and redundant systems and properly designed infrastructure with appropriate technologies that can provide consistent reliable data that enables safe operation. So I.

Have a few examples. The first example is pavement marking. There are very convenient navigational marker*. And they're used today in some of the level-1 level 2 vehicles that are on the roadways.

However; they can present challenges for these sensors in the same way they can present challenges for human beings. If the pavement markings are poor or worn; they can be difficult to detect. If they disappear at night or in the rain; that can be a challenge. Glare in the morning or in the evening can also present challenges for these systems.

And last but not least; if there are cracks or fields in the roadway; those* can be mistakenly identified as pavement marks. So 3M has been working on technology. And I'll show you video here in a moment; that can help resolve some of those issues. And we continue to work on technologies that improve the overallen can.

So we've all been* in -- and all of a sudden the pavement markings disappear. That's an unsafe condition and something we do not want to have happen for huge humans or machines.* So here's a vehicle driving in the rain at night and the pavement markings there; but they're barely visible. With technology that 3M has developed; wet retroreflectivity that allows the pavement markings to be visible is now possible. In this last segment you can see side-by-side the same section of roadway with the different pavement marking on it; and you can see those pavement markings.

So there are opportunities to improve the infrastructure to allow vehicles and humans for that matter; to navigate more safely on the road. The system should be designed to enable simple; reliable performance. And here's a second example where we're using infrastructure technology that simplifies detection; classification; and interpretation of the sign. And we're taking advantage of the optical characteristics of roadway signs and their performance in infrared light.

In this first segment; in the daytime you can see that left turn lane sign come by -- it's pretty fast. In IR. Light; it's much more easily detectable. Side by side you can see that the IR is a much easier for human and a machine.

The next step; of course; is then once you detect the sign; you have to classify it and you have to interpret what it means. And while machine intelligence is improving all the time; it's currently not capable of substituting for a human being. And in this example; errors like the ones shown at the bottom where the machine misclassifies this stop sign with a few August men taitionz into it as a speed limit sign --* that's an unacceptable failure. So we need to simplify and create more robust solutions for human beings and for machines.

And 3M has been working on a technology that not only enables human readable signs but also embedded smart codes that can be read by IR cameras on these connected and automated vehicles. This approach enables reliability; because it provides the machine information in a form that the machine is very familiar with. It's machine language. It also can enable additional information such as location and other things that can support the operation of the vehicle.

Similar technology can be used in work zones on temporary traffic control material. And this layered with other technologies such as mapping can help enable the safe navigation of work zones for humans and machine. We've tested this technology outside of Detroit on I-75 using construction work zone signs where we could detect and classify these signs at highway speeds. On the left-hand side is an image of the sign -- looks like a normal human-readable retroreflective sign on the roadway.

And the screen on the right shows several different images from a few different sources. In the bottom right-hand corner of that computer screen is the visible camera image. That's what the camera mounted on the front of the camera is seeing driving down the roadway in visible light. On the upper right-hand corner; that's what the camera that's an IR camera sees.

And on the left-hand side it's how the vehicle is interpreting that information as it goes by. This is a video -- moving vehicle of that installation. This is a video in the daytime. You can see the signs come by.

They're quickly interpreted what the sign says; where the sign is located; even in some cases additional information. And then the sign and the information can persist for several seconds after the sign has passed. >> Same thing. In fact the same corridor.

Now in nighttime. So even the light of the traffic don't interfere with the camera's ability to detect the sign; classify the sign; and then interpret what's on it as it reads that embedded bar code. The human being is still able to see that sign as they're driving down the road. Mr.

Chairman; as government stakeholders prepare for the future of automated transportation; the holistic strategy that includes changes to both vehicle and road infrastructure is required. Roadway safety devices such as pavement markings and road signs; temporary* traffic control devices should all be designed not only safe operation of these connected and automated vehicles but also to enable and maintain safety standards that have been set for human beings. In order to achieve uniformity; appropriate standards for these roadway safety devices must be developed. And connected and automated vehicles must operate in harmony with the infrastructure in order to achieve high safety standards that the public demand.

National; state; and local governments will play a critical role in whether the benefits we envision for these connected and automated transportation systems can actually be realized. Thank you for the opportunity to present to you today. And I'd be happy to answer any questions. >> Thank you Dr.

Dug ner*. I also been to 3 M; gone through a couple of your presentations there showing how the signs are being read through various images that the human eye can't see but the camera can. It's fascinating how that happens. We do have time for one or two questions.

I believe representative Howell has a question. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair.* And I guess -- I understand that this is going to have to be a national push; because otherwise some of these -- what your car does in one state and what it's capable of and what that vehicle is capable of in another state will directly depend upon these signs and these -- this technology that we're looking at. What is the cost difference between an intelligent sign like we looked at and the old sign that has none of that technology embedded in it? What's the increase in cost of that technology to put that sign up? Because I.

Could envision there's the local governments that are required to put those signs up; that's going to be quite an increase I. Would anticipate in the cost of maintaining those -- that infrastructure. >> Dr. Dug ner.

>> Thank you; Mr. Chair* and representative how*. I appreciate the question. It's something we think about a lot; because our customers are those road custodians all around the world at the national; state; and local level.

We want to develop systems that not only enable safety but are also effective and cost effective for those stakeholders. And we see that there are opportunities to not make these signs prohibitively expensive and decrease the adoption of these kinds of technologies for connected and automated vehicles. There are a variety of different ways we're considering doing that; but we -- I would like you to rest assureds that we're thinking about how to* the municipalities that need to pay for these; how to do that in a cost effective way. >> Representative Howell.

>> Just one -- very quick. And I know that with all the construction; we got two scenes -- lenner in construction. And when construction comes on; we have all these temporary sign companies that come out. That's quite an outlay of dollars they're going to look at to put all those temporary signs out that are going to have to be upgraded to this new technology.

It will be interesting to see how we move forward -- thank you. >> Representative Sundin. >> Thank you chair Torkelson. Oh; I'm sorry -- just to follow up up on the previous question.

With when I was a kid kid; you'd see vandalism on some of these signs. Obscure the sign. I'm just wondering with technological proficiency of some of the young people; could they actually alter some of these codes and throw a sticker on one of those signs and misdirect traffic one way or another? What's preventing the mod everyone day vandal from doing* such a thing? It will happen [modern]* day. >> Thank you; Mr.

Chair and Representative Sundin. 3M. Has had a long history in understanding how people try to mutate systems on the roadways and in ot her places. And we are anticipating the kinds of attacks that you're talking about.

Mr. Hip tas* talked about layers of technology that enable redundancy to ensure that hacking one system doesn't necessarily thwart the entire system. And that's part of the formulation we'll use here. I don't want to tell you that nobody can ever hack a sign.

We're putting technology in there that we think will make it exceptionally difficult. However; if someone is successful; we envision a system that will have fail safes and redundancy that will* allow the vehicle to continue to maintain a safe navigation down the roadway. >> Representative south. >> Thank you; Mr.

Chair. To that end; are you thinking; or is there a pathway by which you could give a local jurisdiction a sticker so they could merge over using old stock maybe updated in some temporary fashion so that then they can kind of mitigate their front cost and get additional use out of their inventory that they have? >> Dr. Dug ner. >> Mr.

Chair*. Representative Salk; I think you should come join 3M. That's something we have thought about to be able to retrofit with embedded code. >> Representative Rosenthal.

>> Thank you; Mr. Chair and Dr. Dug ner*. Obviously 3M is a wonderful company.

We want to see you succeed; but I'm concerned about competition from other companies and how that direction will work and car dealers; car manufacturers. You know; there's going to be competition I would think between these different technologies and how they will interact with each other. >> Dr. Dug ner* do you have a follow up or comment? >> Mr.

Chair and representative Rosenthal; I. Believe in the free market and those forces. And I. Believe that in the effort of public safety and other things that these companies will find ways to cooperate.

I. T's already happening. >> Representative Bernardy; I'm going to give you the last question from this testifier. >> Thank you; Mr.

Chair. And the question I had was regarding subcontractors you use and things like that. You contract out subcontractors work you do. Have you thought about the security issues with that; and would it be reserved for U.S.

Companies? Or what is your thinking on that subject? >> Dr. Dug ner. >> Mr. Chairman and* representative Bernardy; I'm not entirely sure I know what your question is.

>> So Mr. Chair; I'm concerned about security. And so; when you do business; I'm guessing you do business collaboratively with other people besides just employees of 3M. How would you do -- have you thought about how you would do business with people that you collaborate that might -- would they all have to be within the U.S.

For security reasons? Or could they be from around the world? We have a global economy. >> Dr. Dug ner. >> Mr.

Chair and representative Bernardy. 3M deals with that kind of an issue all the time with respect to other parts of our business -- intellectual property and protecting 3M's intellectual property and in some cases protecting particular jurisdictions or even countries. And so; we have thought through those kinds of issues. As this technology evolves; as we see there are needs to protect some of the security and perhaps fence off some of the access to the information; we are easily able to do that.

>> Thank you Dr. Dub ner * for your presentation. I remind everybody that; if you do have any further questions; please contact Mr. Marble* with those.

We'll get answers to them. We hear next from trucking association. And while they're setting up; I do now officially call -- we do have a quorum. I do officially call this meeting to order.

And we do have meetings March 6 in front of us. Representative Daniels; would you like to move those minutes? >> So moved. >> Motion been made to approve March 6. Aye -- aye.

Opposed? Motion prevails. >> And so we have a few testifiers from the Minnesota trucking association. I'm assuming they're going to be talking about platooning and some of the other things we've heard previously. As soon as they get their IT.

Equipment working; we will move forward. Do you want to get started now? That would be great. Introduce yourself for the committee and who you represent. >> Mr.

Chair; members of the committee; my name is Brent fois* president and owner of Calvin'den prairie Minnesota.* Also chairman of the automated vehicle task force for the Minnesota trucking association. I believe it's important to stress at the outset that there is and will be in the future a high demand for professional truck drivers. We believe the professional truck driver will remain in the cab. But the role will evolve as automated technology assists with certain driving tasks.

In some situations; the professional truck driver of the future may operate more like an airline pilot. Handling city driving and using automation to assist in the middle of the run. I believe driver assisted technology will generate numerous benefits in the area of safety; environment; productivity; efficiency; and driver health and wellness. I'm also excited about how emerging driver assisted technology holds promise to attract new digitally savvy women and men to the truck driving profession.

Minnesota trucking association believes the state of Minnesota should enact policies that enhance safety; foster creativity; and enable uniform adoption of driver assist technology. That includes passing legislation that opens up Minnesota for driver assist technology testing. This afternoon I am pleased to have with me today a key player in trucking technology world; Mr. Steve wile pel ton*.

He will provide an overview of driver assisted technology available now and in the future. >> Welcome to the committee. Please introduce yourself and continue. >> Great.

Thank you very much. Pleasure to be here today. Chairman petersburg and members of the committee; thank you very much. Great to be here in Minnesota particularly during the amazing state championship hockey tournament.

Hope to catch some games here later today. May change my schedule completely. So we're excited about our work with Minnesota trucking association. [Indecipherable] colleagues and Minnesota DOT and highway patrol with our work on these things [talking too fast].

Safety alliance. Good to see some friends from the Minnesota highway patrol* part of that work. >> Please for the minutes; introduce yourself. >> Yes; I'm sorry -- my name is Steve Boyd cofounder vice founder president of --* we're glad to be here today.

I like to say our focus in working with the DOT and highway patrol and the tweets here in this region* is about safety efficiency and driver assistance. Our company is focused on efficiency; safety; and driver teamwork improvement and freight trucking. And I'll run through some slides here and we'll be able to turn to some questions. The focus here will look at overview of where things exist with this type of technology.

Our system and then the sort of picture what's happening in other states. Our system involves and driver assisted truck platooning in general is a system that involves teamwork with drivers. It's not self-driving truck. It's not high automation.

It's driver assisted referred to by previous speakers and by Brent. Our trucks require best available safety systems on each truck. This includes state of the art collision avoidance. Disk brakes on all axles....

Additional connectivity information that improves the driver awareness of the road. And that serves these trucks to be safer individually wherever they go whether or not they're in platoon. So as part of this; our system uses connectivity between the vehicles to provide direct driver-to-driver communication on a dedicated channel. These drivers are able to community; work together in a new way on the road enhanced by having safety systems connected between those trucks.

The trucks have their active safety systems -- look-ahead radar; and object recognition video connected so front truck looking at the road ahead and the drivers work together as well. So you have double layer brake the truck to a stop if there's an obstacle that arises as well as there's driver working being in the loop best informed. We also limit platoon to just two trucks; not longer chains of trucks. This is only being done within the same fleets and with new trucks this is not something that's going to be deployed on hundreds of old trucks and it's not going to be occurring with multiple fleets together -- at least in the initial phase.

We're working with the fleets on this.... And our partners include all of the major truck OEMs. So everything we do has to be backed fully by them; full safety validation process; warrantee by OEMs. And* that is a major challenging gate for any of these technologies.

As a result of that you can't have... Rolling them out to fleets. That's not possible. It has to go through the big OEMs.

Five or six of them in the U.S. They're not going to deploy anything in the industry that doesn't meet their rigorous existing safety systems for these approaches. Same way with fleets. They're not going to use anything that doesn't meet those standards.

So there's already industry-driven approach that prevents misuse of technologies. We're excited about deployment... And we're excited to talk to Minnesota about how they may become part of that picture. A big factor as certainly mentioned earlier certainly weather and construction.

Barts of the northern part of the U.S.* And our system limits -- actively limits use of the system to only appropriate roads -- multi-laned divided highways and under appropriate weather conditions. Driver can't make a mistake on using it; buzz we're going to be preventing* use of it outside the appropriate condition. So moving on to the next slide here picture locally all six manufacturers in Europe have truck platooning systems. They've already demonstrated them last couple of years.

In the U.S. All the truck OEMs here have systems varying degrees of progress. Ourselves and freight liner; which is dimer truck North America are the t wo coming to market first. Both of us have two truck systems; driver assisted; not high automation; not belt driving.

These are some of the branches locally involved with this. It's the fall space -- full set of industry both here in the U.S.* Many companies active here in Minnesota and involve Minnesota jobs and also globally. And we're going to go here to a video. And let's see how well this plays.

Here we go. >> [Video clip]. >> How's em ma doing? >> Identify sief. >> I'll be home soon.

>> * [Truck engine starting]. >> [Music] >> [video clip]. >> Proceed at 15 miles per hour. >> Proceed at speed limit.

>> [Indecipherable]. >> [Music]. >> Ready to platoon. >> [Music].

>> [Video clip]. >> Now platooning. >> How is going up front? >> They're clearing up a [indecipherable] at grand junction. It should be good by the time we get there.

How's it going back there? >> We got a challenge coming up on [indecipherable]. >> [Indecipherable] detected. >> All right. The [indecipherable].

>> [Video clip]. >> Where are you headed? >> I'm going home. It's my daughter's fifth birthday. Before you know it; she'll be running.

*. >> I'm going to stop for fuel up ahead. >> Sounds good. I'm going to keep going.

>> Stay safe out there. >> Thanks; I will. >> Platoon ending. >> >> [Video clip].

>> [Music]. >> Great. So as you can see there; it's a driver teamwork system. Drivers remain in full command of the vehicles at all times.

And they communicate on the road there. The systems provide safety on the individual truck at all times and connected safety between the trucks. You can also see that notably the system provides a view of the road ahead for the driver in the following position. So it's a window through that truck.

And obviously when we're all driving one of the biggest blind spots we face is vehicles in front of us. We open that up where trucks are often backed up manually without safety systems and without additional view and this teamwork. So this slide shows kind of the full picture summarized of vehicle to vehicle connectivity between these trucks; shared safety and the additional layer which I mentioned is that oversight of the trucks. So using cloud-based management we're monitoring these trucks and making sure they're only used in the appropriate roadways and environments.

Many of the auto makers that have been developing automated near automated systems or driver assisted solutions have found they need to do this as well. They geofence prevent their car systems being used on the wrong types of road. Couple of years that driver was using that on inappropriate road. Since that time Tesla and other companies have put in systems...

We're also managing where do you use this driver assist solution appropriately? We think that's the right robust way industry needs to handle these kinds of solutions. So the way we get to closer following distances we're eliminating the perception and reaction time you normally need; a professional driver often needs two seconds or more to perceive and then react to something changing in front of them. Using this advanced safety system looking ahead; we're able to handle the perception and the reaction eliminating that necessary headway you normally have to allow. We also eliminate brake lag.

Obviously trucks have air brakes lag after you engage the braking. We eliminate that because the connectedness provides instantaneous connection. As soon as the front truck is sensing and reacting; the back truck has begun slowing already. This is ability to get that closer following as a result of those changes to the way trucks normally operate.

So our approach again -- drivers fully engage in vehicles at all times. They're driving the whole time. They're steering at all times. So we're only managing the forward motion of the trucks.

The steering is always engaged by the drivers. We'll be glad to provide the committee with additional videos that show system in use. Obviously that video has -- it was more of a marketing-type video. But we have videos showing our truck in operation today; including 1200 miles we just ran in Florida under the direct supervision of the Florida highway patrol DOT.

Where they were understanding more about the system. We have a video that shows the view from the driver -- as the driver remains in command of the vehicle and coordinates teamwork fashion with the driver ahead. Allows them to change lanes when they need to and overtaking and passing. Generally speaking these trucks are operating jazz trucks do today.

Operating in the* left lane or whatever lane they're supposed to be in a different roadway. And working together in a fashion that's better than trucks backed up today without safety without connectivity. So foundationally our approach is to improve that safety on all trucks; raise the safety spec op on every truck. Almost no* truck thod has disk brakes on all axles* whatever number they have.

G. Iven configurations. And no trucks -- almost no trucks have these advanced safety systems. We're trying to raise the spec on all these trucks to higher standard and help the industry be safer as a whole.

The other thing we mentioned is control of use of the system in the right environment. And I'd love to take any questions you have. But that's a core part of our approach it happen. The focus is improving efficiency.

Improving costs. And move ahead here to the last thing. Nationally; we have a situation where ten states have now approved full commercial deployment of truck platooning. And the green pictured states here are those that have already done so.

Orange states represent those where they're testing. And they're moving towards deployment approval. For example; Utah has now passed a bill going to the governor allowing full commercial deployment. The same is true for a number of ot her states there.

A number of states in this region are moving right now to act on this. For example; Wisconsin now is a bill going to the governor approving full commercial deployment. Indiana has a bill on good track now and like some of the other states Kentucky; Missouri; and others. So right here in the region in the great lakes central region in the country in the Midwest we have a lot of progress in the technology.

And our companies based in the region like Nava star and others.* So with that; I'll wrap up and look forward to your questions. Thank you; Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. >> Thank you again nor your testimony from both of you.

We really appreciate it. I have one question while the lines for mobile manufacturers setting up. Take one question. Representative Salk.

>> Thank you; Mr. Chair. Can you talk about the channels the vehicles are communicating on. For instance; is that channel then available or open to law enforcement? Because I.

Could just see a platoon of six trucks or three or two in your current case going down the road and appearing to be driving recklessly and they are extraordinarily close relative to the normal standard of traffic. So is there some way that the law enforcement people will know these are controlled conditions that are enhanced because of the technology? >> Yes; there's a couple of ways. >> Go ahead. >> Thank you.

Thank you for the good question. Couple of approaches we use to identify the vehicles for the purpose of law enforcement. If initial deployment not large numbers of trucks. It's going to be small numbers working with some of the major fleets.P so our approach is to -- and this is in place in Michigan; Ohio; also approve commercial deployment.

We provide a list to the DOT and DPS highway patrol of the equipped fleets with starts out with a small number. And then the list of vin numbers of the trucks that are equipped with the system and the route they're running on and rough times of day of operation. So there's an awareness of where the systems are; where they're going to be operating; which fleets which are distinctively branded. In addition; we are working with the fleets to -- and the OEMs to do a marketing system that's on either side of the tractor that identifies platooning equipped truck.

Now; we're just collaborator; of course. We're working with the OEM and fleet. We don't suppose to impose a marketing approach they don't agree with. So there's a die hog with them now about the markings would make sense*.

And early phase of working this out. That marking is something that's been approved and approach approved by highway patrol in number of states along with the listed fleets and equipped trucks. >> Thank you very much for your presentation. We appreciate that.

We look forward to m ore information later. We are now onto alliance about automobile manufacturers I. Should say. Again; if you have additional questions for the trucking association; please let Joe marble know and we will get that information to you.*.

>> Mr. Yates please* introduce yourself and who you represent. >> Yes good morning Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

Senior manager for government alliance of automobile manufacturers. Today I'm here to speak to you about the auto industry's intef on autonomous vehicles and* where we see them going [perspective]*. We're a trade association that represents 12 of the world's leading car manufacturers. Together we represent 70% of the cars sold in U.S.

Each year. Today what I'm going to get down to is to answer some of the questions around these -- the how's; why's; where's; when what's and when's*. So first we get to; "How do we get here?" When I think first thing came to mind future of the jetsons. Sitting in my car with my wife on a road trip where we can watch a movie have a conversation have a bi te to eat at the same time.

Believe it or not clips were having these same conversations. Clip from a popular science magazine from 1958. And you'll see they mention some of the things I was talking about. Playing a game with their family in the car while the car is on the road.

Having a meal. Smoke cigarettes; you can give your loved one love eyes and not have to steer anything. So these ideas aren't new. See them actually come to fruition on the roads coming soon is very exciting not only to myself but also to our members.

We're spending a lot of time and money making sure these things are safe and on the road in a timely manner. So you think about cars now. Many people have described them as a computer on wheels. But that would be a wrong classification.

It's really multiple computers on wheels. Cars now; they have; you know; anywhere from 60 to 100 sensors all doing 100 to 60 different jobs. In the future where we see these cars going with more sensors automation; they could have upwards to 200 sensors on any given car. And when I talk about these sensors; what am I talking about? What are these technologies? This diagram kind of gives you an example of some of the you may have ron your car now.

Lane change assistance. Blind spot detection. Some of these cars can parallel park themselves. F.

Ront rear-view mirrors. Those are the technologies we're talking about. Together they make up the system which is the automated driving system. And those features -- those are the eyes and ears of the car.

The previous gentleman mentioned trucking is 2-second reaction time. These systems will be able to react faster than the fastest human with the fastest reactions on the planet and do it in an effective manner. And the way of doing it is through multiple types of technology. Radar; lane keeping camera abouts with light R; you might be wondering what light R is -- if you've seen a test vehicle -- most of them have the spinning top.

Gives a car 360 digital view of what's happening around it. Is that a tree? Is that a building? Is that a bike? Is that a dog? And stay in the lane. Light cameras GPS. Important with mapping not only for passenger cars but commercial applications as well.

As well as wheel-mounted sensors. But the real answer to that we got here is the money. You can always follow the money to find out what someone's intentions are. Just to put it in perspective; the aerospace industry and defense globally in 2015 spent $21 billion; which is a lot of money.

But in that same year auto makers spend over $100 billion on R and D for automated technology. So you can tell that's where the membership is going. The other big issue is electrification of vehicles; which is also the number is pretty close to $104.7 Billion number. And many believe in the next ten years our industry will change more than it has in the last 50 years all the way back to that 1958 magazine clip that I showed you earlier.

But the bigger question is; "Why do we come here?" There's many rng reasons. Safety; environmental; land use; road use. But the real crux of it is safety. Our members are building these cars; because; as you all know; there are too many fatalities on U.S.

Roads today. And the number is already increasing year by year. And it's pretty unique; because; as you see here from 2015 -- 1.25 Million people die on roads globally. 35 And change happen here in the U.S.

So the number keeps going up. This graph here shows vehicles amount traveled on top of deaths over the years as well as the fatality rates. Cars undeniably have gotten more safe as the years have gone by. But different factors of whether it's economy or [indecipherable] whether it's war or gas prices; it makes people drive more or less.

And as more people drive; unfortunately that's more instances where folks are getting into accidents. Some of those are fatal to the point where in 2016 the number got up to... 491 And that is a staggering number. But it is 5.6% From the previous year.

The goal of autonomous vehicle automated technology is to get that number down to zero as close as possible year after year. Going on to the benefits. Environmental. These cars are expected to be able to travel closer similar to how platooning technology works.

Via communication and sensors. And when that congestion goes down; it makes fuel efficiency go up. You don't have to speed up on your gas; hit your brake. There also isn't the angry driver inteeding around everyone cutting lanes.

Everyone should be* in a perfect autonomous world insync and employing evenly together*. With that comes less emissions which helps everyone and the environment as well. Next is infrastructure. As these cars as I.

Mentioned trafling closer and more succinctly;* you're able to use more of your roads. And that could be used for public transit. That could be used for integrate public transit*. Super Bowl was used for* integrating...

Airport shuttle pilots happening across the country as well as bus pilots as well. One that hits close to home is mobility. My grandmother; she hits 90 in two months. She lives in a retirement community.

She's pretty limited to where she can go; whether it's the new restaurant in downtown Jacksonville. Or the beach. This technology is expected to be able to give not only elderly but the disabled as well the freedom to move ab out their communities and really be a part of their community -- feel like they're able to experience the same things you and I are able to who can drive ourselves or even walk down the road. One area that some folks don't really think of is land use.

Some studies have shown that autonomous cars will be able to park as close as four inches on each side of each other. I. Know now some very capable humans leave about five feet of clearance on each side to not hit the car next to them. So the fact they'll be able to park so much closer -- >> Don't you have to open the door? >> Well; in a parking garage setting essentially your car will park itself.

You would pull up to the parking garage. It would go to its spot. And you could go about. Once you come back; it will come back to you.

And that's just one scenario. You'll be able to have greater land use for not only your... But your stacked parking garages as well. Which could be used for green space or businesses or mixed development.

>> So next is; "Where are we going?" And I have a quote here from the previous US DOT. Secretary Anthony fox. "We're on the cusp of... With enormous potential to save lives; reduce greenhouse gas emissions and transform ability for American people." And that really is consensus across anyone involved in this industry.

But what it really needs is a baseline. What we have now is SAE levels of automation. SAE. International or SAE.

Represents automotive engineers that are working for companies like the members that I represent as well as the tech companies and folks in the automotive states. And what they've come up with is essentially common language for folks like myself speaking to policymakers as well as just normal American citizen to describe the types of automation. And what they've come up with is SAE levels. And it goes from zero to five.

And as you can guess with zero -- you have zero automation in your car. You're responsible for everything in the driving task from getting point A to point B. And while you may have some help; many of you have the mirrors that will tell you if the car is passing you on the right or left and not to change lanes. You may have features like that.

For majority of the trip; essentially all of the trip you're responsible for moving the car and reacting. As you get up to level 1; these features have -- these cars have some features; but they're minimal aspect. Usually they'll have a technology that will help you keep your lane or adjustable cruise control that you can adjust without having to actually physically push on the steering pedal or brake pedal. Moving on to level 2 -- there are actually some level 2 vehicles on the road now.

GM. Has Cadillac TT6 that has very high level 2 automated driving system. But what it essentially does is combines singular features into your car like lane keeping and adjustable cruise control that will augment driving experience*. You are spearing pedaling and so on and so forth.* When we get to level 3; this is when we're talking about autonomous vehicles everyone is talking about todays.

Uses high levels. Level 3 caveat here is; while the vehicle would be able to perform many aspects of the driving task; in instances where it's not -- whether that's weather or construction or geofence typesetting where it's not permitted; the human is expected to take over in those situations and the vehicle will have a safe manner transition over to the driver or taking it over from the driver. Level 4 is most likely the largest capacity AVs that we'll see. You've heard some of the previous speakers mention about it; but usually what we expect to see is campuses or transit type projects level 4 where you don't necessarily need a steering wheel or brake pedal.

But these cars won't be on the highways in widespread across -- they'll be usually gee yo sensed cur fewed and have* limitations to them. But they will be able to get you from point A to point B without you having to control the vehicle. And level 5 is the holy braille of automation. It's what* everyone talks about when they say driverless cars.

And it should be a true driverless car where you can program it from point A to point B and it will do everything for you whether it's change lanes; slow down; community to you for entertainment* purposes or road purposes. And this is not expected to have [indecipherable]. And the biggest question I. Get is; "when are they coming?" Unfortunately that is not aen easy question; does not have an easy answer.

Really what it comes down to is the time. The time is hard to predict; because it's such a competitive space. Some of our members are part of development relating to level 3 vehicles. Some are going straight to level 4.

So it's a little bit staggered. But Ford announced for 2021 to have a vehicle. VW in 2019 will have level 3 vehicle. GM has announced level 4 vehicle.

Next year with many more manufacturers behind them. And this is my mention of level 4 as far as where we can expect to see them. And those are the closed campuses. Geosense.

To give you somewhat of a projection -- internal projections. Obviously these roads aren't being sold yet really ubiquitous across roadways. We expect 20 years from now these cars will be common on the roads. 40 To 60% of cars on the...

Sales will be pretty significant if not all. Getting down I'll get to this pretty quickly -- the challenge from legislators. Most of these deployments will be limited and not on the road; meaning you're not going to see these on car dealership lots really any time soon. We're speaking of really high levels of automation.

But there's many challenges. Whether it's transition; laws that are on the books now; how they can relate to these new laws; security as well as public education. But [indecipherable] done a few things. What it really does is gives taits clear delineation who's responsible for what*.

DOT is responsible for how the car is built; design; performance. And states stick to licensing; registration; as well as law enforcement. There's also federal legislation pending now that will likely affect all 50 states and have some provisions to it. And that's something that we expect to happen as early as this summer.

But where does it start? [Indecipherable] to look at your current laws. To look at your infrastructure that previous speaker from 3M did a really good job showing the importance of infrastructure on AVs as well as convenient stakeholder groups which is achieved from the executive order from yesterday as well as identifying lead agency. And this personally for me is what I. Think is really important for state.

You really need someone to be a clearinghouse for AV; whether they can speak to lower levels of government and also submit information to higher levels. Minnesota is also a good start with executive order as well as some of the testing from Super Bowl. And with that I. Will wrap up.

I wanted to thank you for the opportunity and [indecipherable] to be resource on this issue and many more. I'd be happy to answer any questions. >> Thank you. Appreciate your presentation as well.

VSI labs is next. Andy -- communication we do have two quick questions. Otherwise please present them to Joe marble. Representative ric.

And then representative Hausman. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair*. Just one quick question from industries viewpoint.

Heard earlier some testimony about about reading signs and such.* Do you see that as being big part of it in conjunction. Right now cell phone and is cars have these mapping systems that instantly comes up; "Hey; this area is 45 miles per hour. Stop coming up." Do you see that as being a big part of how they'll work rather than having to read the signs? >> It's an important part. I mentioned with some of these sensors.

There's many sim lus they can take on whether that's* signs or GPS or just [indecipherable]. They don't necessarily need to be connected to work properly; but it will make them work better. Better signage better lane will make them work better. More easily detected; which helps [indecipherable] even better.

>> Representative Hausman. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair. One comment members around the table; because there is one legislator who is using autonomous vehicles in the belief they're going to happen so fast that right now we can stop investing in public mass transit; because this is -- so I think this paragraph; challenge for legislators; insurance level 4 and 5 technologies mandated today it would take 25 years for 95% of the U.S.

Fleet to rollover. Just observation. But the question I guess is; "have you talked about what happens to the congestion on roadways when all those seniors who now can no longer drive now get back into these autonomous vehicles and we have vastly more cars on existing roadways?" >> Mr. [Indecipherable] do you have a crystal ball there? >> I'll give you a short answer.

Part of that is collaboration for multiple stakeholders. DOT; manufacturers; law enforcement. But two -- looking forward many of these cars are expected to be almost a car sharing fleet. We expect many people to have less cars.

Shared cars -- ownership cars. That's pretty far off once you get to that point it's something that is very possible. >> Thank you again for your testimony. And if you have further questions; please get them to Joe marble and he will get them on.

Next we have VSI labs. And Danny Kim is starting the presentation. So welcome to the committee. And once you get set up; you may start with your presentation.

Thank you. >> Please introduce yourself and who you represent. >> Thank you; Mr. Chair and House of Representatives.

Hello; everyone. Thank you for having me and VSI. For this hearing. My name is Danny Kim and I am a parsonner and* director of VSI's advisory services.

VSI is a technology research company specialized in autonomous driving technology. And we are actually located in St. Louis park Minnesota. We do functional evaluation for building blocks of automaif driving systems under our lab.* We are actually building our own car and testing components.

And we provide AV. Industry and technology insight to our automotive [indecipherable] and suppliers [indecipherable]. This automotive industry; I. Would like to give you more perspective from industry and technology and what's really happening right now in AV.

Community; especially this extended ecosystem; automated video in demand. In short AMAD*. Relatively new consent AMAD* changes in personal mobility and what the main drivers of these changes are. After defining what AMOD* is and who are actually deploying such services in limited environments; I will talk about technology gaps between where we are right now and automotive mobility at scale.

Finally I'll talk about the new extended ecosystem players who's driving the innovation and commercialization. Mobility transportation. Published a model that peak car ownership in the United States will occur around 2020. And will drop rapidly after that.

It's pretty soon. According to [indecipherable] report by 2030; 95% of all U.S. Passenger models will be served by transport as a service provider. And it will cost up to ten ti mes cheaper than today's vehicles.

So for consumers; transportation via automated mobility on demand is widely expected to be much cheaper than today's on-demand mobility model; which is basically uber and Lyft model. Because it's taking out the human driver; and it will lower the cost for operation. Bar clay research estimated* in 2015 that shared autonomous vehicles will increase [indecipherable] per vehicle from 12;000 to 64;000 miles. And the cost per mile to consumers will be less than 50 cents.

Under uber's current mobility model; about 50 to 60% revenue stays with the car owners. But driverless vehicle would diverge much of that revenue back to the service providers. So row bow taxi will increase* the opportunity for shared mobility by taking the human driving vector out. By pulling [indecipherable] Lyft can further decrease total cost of ownership making the service more effective to users.

Very interesting economy benefits are well understood by traditional automotive [indecipherable] and their suppliers. Beyond strong consumer demand; there is a really powerful economic incentive to the participant. [Indecipherable] of research institute who actually 3 billion in t wo years just for R and D automotive technology. He basically said billions of dollars are being spent on autonomous driving only for critical reasons.

Safety; congestion; accessibility; traffic and environmental issues. But actually the reality behind their motivation is also increasing mobility as a service provider; part of productivity is major motivation. And then CES earlier this year Tera introduced e po la concept equal reflecting for automated mobility as a service application. [Indecipherable] GM.

GM so-called plan for transportation as a service; it's actually meant to complement the auto maker's core vision as well. GM. Says* -- [indecipherable] per mile in a city such as San Francisco is more than $3 a mile. $2.50 For the passenger.

But GM expects that the cost per mile of autonomous driverless vehicle to be under $1 by 2025. By reducing the vehicle cost; including components and [indecipherable]. And then improving the duty cycle and maintaining -- maximizing the utilization rate of AVs. So here's the definition of the A mart as part of all mobility service industries.

What is mobility on demand? It's a transportation that can be scheduled for individual use via smart phone app for example whereby the user can summon the vehicle to his or her current location. Basically uber and Lyft model. And then AMAC -- automotive mobility on demand strsh* is also called Robo taxi or driverless taxi*. And it's autonomous car operated in mobility on demand service.

So car sharing or bike sharing services are actually under all these mobility service or transportation as a service. But technically not mobility on demand. Because users need to go to a certain location to consume the transportation mode as a service; not as efficient as automated mobility on demand. So Mr.

Yates and other speakers talked about this SA level. Here the automotive industry has been focusing on producing these low-level [indecipherable] on the roads. And then incrementally enable higher level systems. That's what auto industry is doing.

On the other hand; public transportation industry including those transportation [indecipherable] like uber and Lyft; they are starting right at level 4 or immediately aiming at level 5 automation. Doesn't make sense to develop a partially automated transportation where a human or passenger has to take over the control of the vehicle when it needs to; which is level 3. What that also means is that public transport offers the prettiest development path to full autonomy; because it can start operating in a limited area. If it's fundamentally different path from automotive industry where public transport industry focus should be different from automotive industry.

Several studies highlight that Robotaxi operated in AMAD* model to be one of the most rapidly adopted applications of autonomous cars at scale. First; public pilots of Robotaxi was done by autonomy; which is MIT skin out*. Ride hailing company in Singapore then with Lyft in Boston area. In France; Navia; common cab November last year* has no disweel or pedal and it is capable of speeds up to* 55 miles per hour.

It has ten sensors; six cameras; four radars; a lot of sensors. That's very different from what you are seeing in the world at the production [indecipherable]. Nadia says* current plan is to begin services in the second part of 2018. In the state way mod Google company way mouse* has been in operation in chandler Arizona since last April last year.

November also they announced that it made its first commercial deployment of on-demand driverless service within phoenix Detroit area. Very sense thif like 20 days ago* the state of Arizona approved this commercial service. They granted a license; and Google is going to start the rear consumer commercial service for the first time. It is already happening.

Initially there will be no AT. Driver and it's going to -- AT driver keeping in the back of the car; but as soon as the technology becomes complete; the safety driver will be taken out also. Perhaps in a few months. Uber and GM.

Cruise -- [indecipherable] they're developing together. They announced that similar deployment plans in 2019 in urban cities. These are actually public commercial [indecipherable]. Robotaxis are going to use a lot of cloud access; which will be hosted by many different Robo systems other cars.

Many players are demonstrating minimum viable systems and kind of rushing into bring them out into the market. The problem is whether such different systems would scale to hold all different suppliers technology's; services; and [indecipherable]. Necessary to enable Robo taxi operations at scale. So; if you go look at China -- Baidu; the Google of China; they developed a development platform called Apollo 2.0 Last year.

Since then the [indecipherable] developing their solutions and [indecipherable] common platform exponentially increase. It is showing that the Chinese companies are open to celebrating and working together and sharing data in China for autonomous driving. It is much harder in western world. Baidu [indecipherable] exploding with all the benefits China provides.

The open source strategy they also call the China feed. Even Chinese government has endorsed Apollo project as official autonomous vehicle program for China. Another part of work is open autonomous activity growing as well among these 80 development companies. Because it becomes very clear that one company can't do it all.

And will be advocating for modular approach in developing self-driving vehicle. So [indecipherable] earlier this year at CS -- it yeah and har month a xar company now both previewed their development platform with really modular development hardware and software. Their hardware platform is designed to have swappable components to work with different chip sets from many different suppliers. They also highlighted how their platform is open and modulated to all kinds of software and algorithms coming from different sources.

While uber is actually -- their system is vertically integrated. Lyft on the other hand has opened their self-driving system platform and hosted many developer partners so that they can utilize Lyft operating data. Now in talking about self-driving cars and operating Robo taxi s; the transportation* network companies uber; Didi; [indecipherable] at the center. TMCs are partnered with many self-driving companies.

New robo car manufacturers and even traditional automobiles. Uber; Lyft; Didi; all have their own driving centers. They test vehicles from all these [indecipherable] and self-driving software companies to make better choices. Eventually for their own* global operation.

On the other hand; the traditional auto companies -- you can see Toyota; GM here. Traditional auto companies are hedging their bet in Robo tech businesses to complement their core businesses which is selling their cars to privately owned purposes bp but not knowing exactly what this is shaping up to. But they can't afford not to partner and invest. If the previous slide was all about R and D strategy partnership; this slide is about production partnership and timeline.

One used to be gaming efficiency process N vid yeah*.... These two are motion players; because computing power of automated driving system is getting more important ever. These two chip makers basically quarter backing the development of autonomous driving systems*. They are splitting L3 level 3 highly pilot production partnerships.

These L3 production programs are targeting 2019-20 timeline. They are -- these are mostly personally owned; partially automated vehicles from traditional automakerser. But in terms of row bow taxi* they are coming in 2019. Including uber.

Envied yeah partners --* powerful computer Pegasus; which is basically two times more than the computer for the personally owned vehicle manufacturers. So just to give you my summary here. The key take-away are the personal car ownership will definitely change and many consumers will use ro bo taxis for efficiency and economy*. [Indecipherable] to bring these automated cars for safety and social benefits.

TNCs and [indecipherable] are seeing the economy incentives to make and operate ro bo taxis*. As I. Said; we are immediately seeing all these deployment way more. And other ro bo taxi companies*.

And you know in different states. This I see is very significant momentum; because we are talking with all the suppliers; academia; government [indecipherable]. Definitely there's momentum going on. From technology companies perspective; we are very excited about the momentum.

[Indecipherable] going to be a [indecipherable] operate automotive vehicles. Challenges for AV technologies increment; but also opportunity for -- and we need to solve the problem; and it's being developed by many suppliers. I believe Minnesota is pretty good place to test out and validate the system. Thanks for listening.

>> Thank you Mr. Kim. We had run out of time with you and I know Joeny will shire has asked for last five minutes*. Thank you very much for your exciting testimony nuance about exciting venture.

Will shire nn will please come forward*. Again; if you have more questions from VSI or Mr. Kim; please contact Jill marble and he will get that information to you.*. >> .

>> Thank you Ms. Will shir.* Please identify yourself. >> My name is Joan will shire nn ebbing xtive director of* Minnesota city council on disability. I'm going to make this quick.

I'm a short person and even shorter version. You're lucky. The handout that I give you -- I'll just go over briefly at the end here. Self-driving cars will change the world for everyone.

But the most dramatic impact could be people with disabilities and for people who are aging provided that their needs are understood and technology solutions are paired to meet with such needs. It's all about level 4. You heard from previous speaker. And if anything you leave from today's meeting it's level 4.

That's what Minnesota needs to implement into their autonomous vehicle legislation as we move forward. That is what's going to be helpful for people with disabilities ranging from intellectual disabilities; people [indecipherable] all different types of disabilities and aging. As we age; that is going to be imperative. So you as legislators and other government powers have an opportunity here to guarantee that autonomous vehicles contribute to a more inclusive economically stable and independent life for people with disabilities; seniors; and veterans as well.

So the handout before you much of the information came from national council on disability. And they did a report back in 2015; and it's still very very relevant talking about -- I like the quote in the beginning there from a Google representative talking about what do you do as you get older? Daughter takes away your keys. Life keeps going downhill vibrant individuals out there that could certainly use this. It talks about the current st ate of technology.

And again; level 4. That's -- we've got to get to. And the rest just talks about some of the potential barriers that might be -- we might be looking at. Certainly driver licensure we'll have to take a look at that issue down the road and so forth.

And discrimination potential I think is something that the language will have to be looking at. National council on disability; they have recommendations that they are urging states to follow. And over; it looks like we're doing a good job doing just that. Do you have any questions? >> Thank you so much.

And the report that director will shire nn talked about is in your packet if you need to look through that. We have time for one minute's worth of questions if somebody has a question. If not; thank you so much. Sorry; representative Bernardy has one.

>> Thank you; Mr. Chair. The question I have for you is regarding the fleet of the vehicle. The one model that was about -- one-minute demand that people would be able to get a vehicle.

Do you see that as being a service that would help people with a disability to be able to get into those cars? Or will it be a different model for people who have a dibility that need accessible devices to be able to get into the car? >> Ms. Will shire. >> Mr. Chair; representative.

Absolutely*. I see fleets of autonomous vehicles being the way it's going to be. I don't really see us owning these per se. So the fleet of vehicles for individuals with disabilities; seniors; et cetera; would be ideal for someone when they need it to do something almost on demand; which they don't have right now.

Uber and Lyft -- they don't have accessible vehicles. So again disabilities are locked out. Because they sit on all these wonderful communities in the state -- non... Transportation.

Aging disabilities are constantly left out. We don't always get the best services. And I see a tremendous cost savings for the state of Minnesota for the non-medical transportation. Medical service you get when you're on Medicaid and medical assistance.

The driver whether it's a taxi or paying for a bus will get you to your appointment. And there's quite a bit of fraud still in there. They're cleaning it up. This would certainly take care of that immediately.

Because the car would just come up to your place. You'd have to jump in to go to your appointment. There wouldn't be a opportunity for [indecipherable]. So I see great savings.

And so many ends from the state along to individuals finally getting where toe need to go. >> Representative south; you have a 30-second question? I'll let you be the final. Thank you for all your testimony. Thank you for yours coming here.

This meeting is adjourned -- oh; before we go -- the next meeting next Tuesday will be back in our own room down in the basement on Tuesday at 1:00. Owith that the meeting is adjourned. >> [12:46 P.M. PST].

>> [End of session]..