#AutonomousCars

U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx on Thursday said his department would seek nearly $4 billion over the next 10 years to standardize rules for self-driving cars and make it easier for carmakers to offer more autonomous vehicles.

The plan was mentioned Tuesday by President Barack Obama during his final State of the Union address and detailed by Foxx at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit.

The plan would create a uniform autonomous vehicle policy for states to adopt and would allow more exemptions from current safety regulations for self-driving technology.

Only a few states currently allow autonomous vehicles on their roads, including California, Nevada and Michigan.

Speaking to the Automotive News World Congress on Tuesday, Toyota North America CEO Jim Lentz said the automaker doesn’t plan on making fully autonomous vehicles any time soon.

“We don’t see a day coming soon when you’ll just hop in the back seat, open the newspaper and scan the headlines while the car drives you to work,” Lentz said. “Instead our focus is on building cars that can actually enhance a driver’s operation of the vehicle while helping to reduce or mitigate serious and fatal accidents.”

So, how does that “driver’s” Toyota Camry sound?

Nissan-Renault announced Thursday that it would have 10 cars on sale worldwide with autonomous features ready by the end of the decade.

Considering the photo provided by the automaker is of a Nissan Leaf, we can begin there.

One.

Started in New York City in 1967 as an offshoot of the Chicago Music Show, the Consumer Electronics Show has grown to capture the interest and intrigue of automakers. Las Vegas now has two auto shows.

That, Volkswagen’s unending stream of German-accented apologies, why Ford might not be hitching itself to Google and how you can become an automotive journalist* … after the break!

Ford CEO Mark Fields just wrapped up his Consumer Electronics Show keynote speech Tuesday morning and mentioned the word “Google” exactly zero times. Nada. Zip. Zilch.

So, um, where does that leave the current planned partnership between the global automaker and Google to build self-driving cars and let them roam free at a 1,000-acre North Carolina ranch?

Not dead, maybe — just not fully baked, apparently.

It certainly sounds like Ford is close to selling a self-driving Fusion real soon.

That, Matthias Müller finally comes to the U.S. to ask “You mad, bro?” Nissan has no love for Takata, and business is hot south of the border … after the break!

“What do I gotta do to get you to drive out of here in a brand-new 2016 Chevrolet Malibu today?”

That, Ford and Google are moving to the country, Hyundai halts in China and Volvo’s wagon spied in some guy’s garage … after the break!

The fine, fine reporters at Yahoo Autos have learned that Ford and Google will announce next month a joint project to build self-driving cars.

According to the report, Google and Ford would spin off a separate company for the project, and Google would still shop around its technology to other automakers.

Both Ford and Google wouldn’t comment on Yahoo’s report, which said three sources familiar with the plans divulged the relationship ahead of their announcement at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas next month.

On Wednesday, Dehli, India banned the registration of diesel SUVs and luxury cars with larger (over 2,000 cc) engines.

That, and a judge in Australia is really confused about Volkswagen’s “defeat device,” the Federal Reserve interest rate hike and California not doing exactly what Google wants, after the jump.

Probably not.

According to a study by the National League of Cities, only 6 percent of future city plans consider the potential impact autonomous vehicles will have in the next few years, including driverless car lanes and scaling back parking as ride-share services become more popular.

The study collected transportation plans of the 50 biggest U.S. cities, as well as the most-populous cities in every state. In all, 69 city plans were amassed and studied for future traffic and road plans.

Despite automakers rushing to put autonomous cars on the road by 2020, the study suggests that many cities won’t be able to adequately accommodate those cars, nor will they adapt fast enough to changing transportation modes that may challenge conventional public transportation and infrastructure wisdom.

It’s not quite “Vanilla Sky,” but Ford is testing its autonomous vehicle tech at the University of Michigan’s Mcity, a 32-acre fake city with weirdly placed fire hydrants and fake hipster bookstores, and no one around.

The automaker announced Friday that its Fusion Hybrid was managing the testing grounds’ lanes, turns, roads, intersections, lights, without one artificial bumper bent or curbed wheel — allegedly.

On Thursday, Google’s autonomous car development team reported that Mountain View, California police pulled over the robot car for traveling too slowly. No ticket was issued.

According to the team’s Google Plus page, officers pulled over the car because they “want to know more about the project.” According to Mountain View police, the officer wanted reminded the car’s human passengers that impeding traffic is against the law. Tomato, potato.

Nissan unveiled its next Leaf IDS Concept, a semi-autonomous EV complete with a glimpse of Nissan’s coming “Intelligent Drive” features that may be equipped on some of its cars by the end of the decade.

The IDS Concept boasts an autonomous piloted driving mode for conversationalists (the seats rotate inward to invite dialogue!) a movable dash with “Minority Report” pre-cog abilities (probably) and a submarine-style style steering wheel.

But those aren’t the best concept-ish features.

In wonderful Bob Lutz fashion, the former General Motors head told entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley that making cars is hard.

“I think, like so many Silicon Valley techies, that they believe they are smarter than the world’s automobile business, and that they will do it better,” Lutz told The Associated Press. “No way.”

His argument, in a Readers Digest version: Cars are more dangerous than Walkmen and when you make things that can explode it costs money so beat it, nerds.

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said Thursday that in the future, self-driving cars may be forced into the moral quandary between saving its driver or saving the public in massive, horrific crashes.

We already know that.

What researchers are now looking at is whether people would be interested in buying cars that would knowingly sacrifice their drivers in order to serve the greater good.

(In our best Richard Dawson voice) “Survey says … “