#DepartmentOfTransportation

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers on Thursday sent a letter to the heads of the Federal Communications Commission, U.S. Department of Transportation and U.S. Department of Commerce, urging the groups to keep dedicated a frequency spectrum for future car communication systems.

The spectrum, which is between 5.850 GHz and 5.925 GHz, was allotted to automakers for car-to-car communication and road-to-car communication. Telecommunications and Wi-Fi industry officials have asked to share the spectrum.

“Um, no,” in the nicest possible way, from the Alliance:

We are committed to finding the best path forward to protect the development and deployment of advanced automotive safety systems while also considering the need for additional unlicensed spectrum to meet the increasing demand for wireless broadband Internet services.

It would appear as though the price of admission to traverse the longest floating bridge in the world on a daily basis has had quite the impact on commuting patterns in Seattle. A study to be issued by the U.S. Department of Transportation this week – barring another tragicomic display by the powers that be, of course – has uncovered that use of the Governor Albert D. Rosellini Bridge – Evergreen Point (colloquially known as the 520 floating bridge) has gone down by half since tolling began near the end of 2011.

President Obama announced the nomination of Anthony Foxx, the current mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, as his choice to succeed Ray LaHood as the next head of the Department of Transportation.