Legislative Report - June 2026

Steve Panten

Autonomous Vehicle Technology – Are We There Yet?

Finally! We hit June and the weather is cooperating for great motorcycling weather. Enjoy it! Ride safe and ride free!

Last month was a busy one for finding an avenue to protect motorcycling and the motorcyclists’ future in Wisconsin, and also for building alliances. Let’s start with the big one.

Senator Tomczyk invited John Reblin and I to visit UW Madison and look at the progress they are making with their autonomous technology development. If you recall, Senator Tomczyk is the current Chair of the Senate Transportation Committee in Madison who heard our testimony against Senate Bill SB 831. This bill would have allowed drafting guidelines to allow testing vehicles with Level 4 and Level 5 autonomy. Now I say he heard our testimony but if you recall, he also allowed a vote and passed it out of his committee with his vote of support. He said that even though he supported it to get it out of committee, he would vote against it on the floor. Fortunately for us, the Senate never brought it to the floor for a vote, so I guess we won’t know if that was true.

Back to our visit to UW-Madison. We met with the Director of the Program who testified in support at the hearing, and he was joined by members of the team that is developing the technology. We watched a PowerPoint presentation about why this technology is important (safety of course, which we don’t argue against that point) and then they showed us slides and videos of their vehicles operating on closed courses and parking lots. It is strange to see someone in an office drive a vehicle around in a parking lot, but I guess that is where the technology is going.

Then they showed us a video of their vehicle with all the sensors, lidar, radar, and cameras in real time what the sensors were “seeing.” Each technology was a different color so we could compare which one was picking things up, and then there were arrows showing how the software is anticipating what the object was going to do. If it was a light pole, as the vehicle was moving past it, the arrow would point in the direction that that object would pass. For the most part, we were getting a better understanding of how these sensors pick things up and then follow their anticipated path of travel.

But then the random arrows showed up. As we were watching this video, we noticed that occasionally a red arrow would cut right through the center of the vehicle, and nobody was talking about what that was. We stopped their presentation to ask what that was and asked them to back up the video for clarification. As expected, there was no straight answer. Could be a manhole cover that it is picking up, or a bird. Really? The arrow ran through the center of the vehicle, and it never slowed down! What else would it block out as “noise” and not react to?

Overall, it was a great experience to see how advanced this technology is, but it is not ready to allow on the roads without human control behind the wheel. We are not arguing about the point that someday this technology will be safer than human drivers, but not yet. We probably offended the person in the room that was developing the software as we said right to him, this technology is not safe. If statistics show that Tesla’s are running over motorcyclists on the freeway at freeway speeds, Tesla says this technology is not safe, and the State of California DMV says this technology is not safe….it’s not safe.

Folks, this is just the start. Senator Tomczyk told us that the push to allow testing of driverless technology on Wisconsin roads is not going away. We need to educate our friends and family about what this technology is capable of, but more importantly, of what it is not capable.

Moving on. Last month, we had a good turnout for our Future of Motorcycling Summit for motorcycle club members and riding clubs. It was a closed meeting, just for those groups and we limited it to two members of each club even though we had requests to send more. We needed to limit it due to the space we had available. We are never sure how many people are coming and we want to get the message to as many different clubs as we could. We had presentations about what we are learning from the State DOT, what the MRF is working on, as well as what we are doing in the State. Then we had Paul Landers from the Texas Council of Clubs and Independents speak about how important it is for the clubs and riding groups to work with ABATE. He spoke highly of what we do and reinforced that we are the best motorcycle rights organization in the country, but we need their help. He also spoke about what happened in Waco, Texas when law enforcement opened fired from rooftops and concealed locations on motorcyclists gathered for a meeting similar to what we were holding. He was there when it happened. He was a great speaker, and I appreciate him taking time out of his life to join us.

So that was last month. Next up, more ABATE meetings, a trip to Washington DC for Bikers Inside the Beltway, and a meeting with The Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) on how we can work together to be successful in passing Right to Repair language, and then of course, The Summer Hummer. I will be there, will you?

That’s it.

Steve