National Highway Traffic Safety Administration January 2007 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) announced a two day Brain Injury Symposium to be held in Washington, DC (Federal Register/Vol. 71, No. 217/ Thursday, November 9, 2006/ Notices). This notice supplements the agenda for the symposium (see the previous announcement for further information, NHTSA-2006-26249:1).

This document announces receipt by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) of a petition for a decision that 1996 BMW K75 motorcycles that were not originally manufactured to comply with all applicable Federal motor vehicle safety standards (FMVSS) are eligible for importation into the United States because they have safety features that comply with, or are capable of being altered to comply with, all such standards.

This notice announces that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is holding a public hearing and is seeking comment on a report titled, ``The New Car Assessment Program Suggested Approaches for Future Program Enhancements.'' The report, published by NHTSA, outlines both near and long-term approaches that the agency is considering to further enhance its New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) crashworthiness and crash avoidance activities to encourage additional safety improvements, and to provide consumers with relevant information that will aid them in their new vehicle purchasing decisions. NHTSA's objective with these approaches is to improve not only overall vehicle safety but the quality of the information that it provides to consumers, especially with the emergence of advanced technologies. This notice requests comments on the possible approaches contained in the report and any additional actions that could be taken to improve motor vehicle safety information for consumers. Additionally, this notice announces the agency's intent to hold a public hearing on its suggested approaches for enhancing the program.

On August 18, 2005, NHTSA published a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) proposing to amend our certification regulation to require that, in addition to the vehicle identification number (VIN), a suffix that identified attributes about the bus body be recorded on the certification label of each bus manufactured in two or more stages. The NPRM also proposed a new regulation to require manufacturers of buses manufactured in two or more stages to obtain a manufacturer's identifier and to submit information to NHTSA about the bus bodies manufactured. NHTSA has identified an alternative approach to obtain accurate bus accident data for analysis and safety improvement that it believes is more efficient and less burdensome. Therefore, we are terminating this rulemaking.

This document grants in full the Mitsubishi Motors R&D of America (Mitsubishi) petition for exemption of the Mitsubishi Eclipse vehicle line in accordance with 49 CFR Part 543, Exemption from the Theft Prevention Standard. This petition is granted because the agency has determined that the antitheft device to be placed on the line as standard equipment is likely to be as effective in reducing and deterring motor vehicle theft as compliance with the parts-marking requirements of the Theft Prevention Standard (49 CFR part 541). Mitsubishi requested confidential treatment for some of the information and attachments it submitted in support of its petition. In a letter dated June 26, 2006, the agency granted the petitioner's request for confidential treatment of most aspects of its petition.

This document grants in full the Nissan North America, Inc.'s (Nissan) petition for exemption of the Versa vehicle line in accordance with 49 CFR Part 543, Exemption from the Theft Prevention Standard. This petition is granted because the agency has determined that the antitheft device to be placed on the line as standard equipment is likely to be as effective in reducing and deterring motor vehicle theft as compliance with the parts-marking requirements of the Theft Prevention Standard (49 CFR Part 541). Nissan requested confidential treatment for the information and attachments it submitted in support of its petition. In a letter dated November 2, 2006, the agency granted the petitioner's request for confidential treatment of most aspects of its petition.