The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute plans to expand its use of public roads to test some new functions tied to self-driving cars.
The transportation lab’s upcoming work is aided by a bill Gov. Terry McAuliffe signed last month to help increase the acceptance of self-driving cars.
The bill allows the “viewing of a visual display while the vehicle is being operated autonomously” and the use of standard Virginia license plates for cars universities use for research.
The new research will be in addition to a state initiative launched last year that involved the VTTI using a retrofitted Cadillac SRX to perform a self-driving test on the Interstate 95 high-occupancy toll lanes just outside Washington, D.C.
