Automated Vehicles Comprehensive Plan; Request for Comments

Thomas Finch Fulton
U.S. Department of Transportation
21 January 2021

[Federal Register Volume 86, Number 12 (Thursday, January 21, 2021)]
[Notices]
[Pages 6410-6411]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2021-01115]


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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

[Docket No. DOT-OST-2021-0005]


Automated Vehicles Comprehensive Plan; Request for Comments

AGENCY: Office of the Secretary (OST), U.S. Department of 
Transportation (DOT).

ACTION: Notice of request for comments (RFC).

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SUMMARY: The Office of the Secretary of Transportation (OST) invites 
public comment on the document, Automated Vehicles Comprehensive Plan 
(Comprehensive Plan). The Comprehensive Plan describes how the United 
States Department of Transportation (U.S. DOT) is working towards the 
safe and full integration of Automated Driving Systems (ADS) into the 
surface transportation system. It explains Departmental goals related 
to ADS, identifies actions being taken to meet those goals, and 
provides real-world examples of how these Departmental actions relate 
to emerging ADS applications.

DATES: You should submit your comments within 60 days after the date of 
publication in the Federal Register. Written Comments: Comments should 
refer to the docket number above and be submitted by one of the 
following methods:
     Federal Rulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. 
Follow the online instructions for submitting comments.
     Mail: Docket Management Facility, U.S. Department of 
Transportation, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE, West Building Ground Floor, 
Room W12-140, Washington, DC 20590-0001.
     Hand Delivery: 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE, West Building 
Ground Floor, Room W12-140, Washington, DC, between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. 
ET, Monday through Friday, except Federal Holidays.
    Instructions: For detailed instructions on submitting comments and 
additional information on the rulemaking process, see the Public 
Participation heading of

[[Page 6411]]

the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document. Note that all 
comments received will be posted without change to http://www.regulations.gov, including any personal information provided.
    Privacy Act: Anyone is able to search the electronic form of all 
comments received into any of our dockets by the name of the individual 
submitting the comment (or signing the comment, if submitted on behalf 
of an association, business, labor union, etc.). You may review DOT's 
complete Privacy Act Statement in the Federal Register published on 
April 11, 2000 (65 FR 19477-78) or at https://www.transportation.gov/privacy.
    Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or 
comments received, go to http://www.regulations.gov or to the street 
address listed above. Follow the online instructions for accessing the 
dockets.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 
    Please contact us at automation@dot.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 
    The Comprehensive Plan document is available at: 
www.transportation.gov/av.
    Development of ADS technology is occurring along multiple paths and 
significant uncertainty still exists around what form ADS applications 
and vehicles will take in the future. Even with the progress the 
industry has made over the last decade, no vehicle equipped with an ADS 
is available for purchase in the U.S., to date. Technologies are still 
under development, and the deployment of ADS-equipped vehicles--outside 
of small-scale pilots--remains years away.
    The Comprehensive Plan addresses clear near-term needs while laying 
the groundwork for longer-term changes. This plan does not attempt to 
predict the future forms of ADS-equipped vehicles or the services they 
may provide. U.S. DOT will periodically review its activities and plans 
to reflect new technology and industry developments and stakeholder 
feedback, eliminate unnecessary or redundant initiatives, and align 
investments with emerging focus areas. Comments received to this 
Comprehensive Plan will assist the Department in planning and 
prioritizing its future activities, but comments directed at any 
particular action contained in the Plan, including the ongoing 
rulemakings, are outside of the scope of this request and should, 
instead, be provided in the relevant docket for that action during its 
open comment period.

Public Participation

How do I prepare and submit comments?

    Your comments must be written and in English. To ensure that your 
comments are filed correctly in the docket, please include the docket 
number of this document in your comments.
    Please submit one copy (two copies if submitting by mail or hand 
delivery) of your comments, including the attachments, to the docket 
following the instructions given above under ADDRESSES. Please note, if 
you are submitting comments electronically as a PDF (Adobe) file, we 
ask that the documents submitted be scanned using an Optical Character 
Recognition (OCR) process, thus allowing the agency to search and copy 
certain portions of your submissions.

How do I submit confidential business information?

    Any submissions containing Confidential Information must be 
delivered to OST in the following manner:
     Submitted in a sealed envelope marked ``confidential 
treatment requested'';
     Accompanied by an index listing the document(s) or 
information that the submitter would like the Department to withhold. 
The index should include information such as numbers used to identify 
the relevant document(s) or information, document title and 
description, and relevant page numbers and/or section numbers within a 
document; and
     Submitted with a statement explaining the submitter's 
grounds for objecting to disclosure of the information to the public.
    OST also requests that submitters of Confidential Information 
include a non-confidential version (either redacted or summarized) of 
those confidential submissions in the public docket. In the event that 
the submitter cannot provide a non-confidential version of its 
submission, OST requests that the submitter post a notice in the docket 
stating that it has provided OST with Confidential Information. Should 
a submitter fail to docket either a non-confidential version of its 
submission or to post a notice that Confidential Information has been 
provided, we will note the receipt of the submission on the docket, 
with the submitter's organization or name (to the degree permitted by 
law) and the date of submission.

Will the agency consider late comments?

    The U.S. DOT will consider all comments received before the close 
of business on the comment closing date indicated above under DATES. To 
the extent practicable, the agency will also consider comments received 
after that date.

How can I read the comments submitted by other people?

    You may read the comments received at the address given above under 
COMMENTS. The hours of the docket are indicated above in the same 
location. You may also see the comments on the internet, identified by 
the docket number at the heading of this notice, at http://www.regulations.gov.

    Issued in Washington, DC, on January 13, 2021 under authority 
delegated at 49 U.S.C. 1.25a.
Thomas Finch Flton,
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Transportation Policy.
[FR Doc. 2021-01115 Filed 1-19-21; 8:45 am]
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