According to Emirates News Agency WAM, the UAE is preparing to have the first country-wide regulations in place for autonomous vehicles.
That would mean we could be seeing driverless cars on UAE roads by 2021.
“We will announce the first draft of the standards and regulations for autonomous vehicles tomorrow (today) in the 5th International Conference on Future Mobility to be held in Dubai,” said Abdulla Al Maeeni, director-general of Emirates Authority for Standardization and Metrology.
The first step towards driverless cars will begin with draft legislation. If it is approved, the UAE would be the first country in the world to have standards around autonomous vehicles.
It’s expected the final legislation would be signed off next year in 2020, with driverless vehicles arriving around a year after that.
The UAE was the first country to create standards and regulations for hydrogen cell vehicles and electric cars, Al Maeeni said.
While there are some semi-autonomous self-driving vehicles on the roads (such as those that can park themselves, or effectively work as smarter cruise control), fully self-driven cars are still not allowed on roads.
Some manufacturers – such as Tesla – have built-in self-driving capabilities, but will only be turned on at the behest of the government.
Currently, similar autonomous cars like Tesla have appeared on roads within some US states, with country-wide regulations in the pipeline.
