Germany takes step toward autonomous driving on public roads

German lawmakers agreed to allow some driver-less vehicles on public roads, a first step toward enabling autonomous driving in Europe’s biggest economy. Lawmakers in the lower house of parliament adopted legislation enabling automated driving under some conditions. “This is the world’s first legal framework for autonomous driving in regular operation,” Ulrich Lange, a deputy leader of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s bloc in parliament, said in a statement Friday. Germany is keen to catch up in the field of autonomous driving, a technology that could reshape the transport industry but is enormously complex and costly. The upper house of parliament still needs to approve the legislation.