To break an impasse in connected vehicle tech, transportation leaders call for a federal policy framework

Because experts worry there will not be enough spectrum for vehicle-to-everything communications in the long term, the FCC needs to do a complete analysis of the transportation industry’s spectrum requirements, said Jon Peha, an engineering professor and expert on information networks at Carnegie Mellon University who previously served as the FCC’s chief technologist.

The agency initially dedicated 75 MHz of spectrum in the 5.9 gigahertz band for intelligent transportation systems, but the new policy slashed that figure to 30 MHz, effectively making DSRC obsolete, Peha said. Now the only technology that anyone can use in the band is cellular vehicle-to-everything, or C-V2X, “which means any infrastructure that had already been deployed will no longer be useful,” he said. “You have to change your plans to adopt the current technology.”