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FCC commissioners voted yesterday to approve a Public Notice that seeks comment on how to test and accommodate spectrum sharing in the 5.9 gigahertz band between the auto industry’s vehicle-to-vehicle communications and advanced Wi-Fi, an FCC spokesman said (via Politico). Michael Calabrese and the Wireless Future Project at ������Ƶ’s Open Technology Institute have been extremely active in this space, publishing the  policy paper earlier this year.

The following statement can be attributed to Michael Calabrese, Director of the Wireless Future Project:

“It is very encouraging that the FCC is moving ahead with its pending proposal to allow gigabit-fast Wi-Fi to share the completely vacant spectrum band that has been languishing in auto industry hands for more than 15 years.

 “Only a portion of the band is needed for time-critical auto safety signaling.  We are confident that reorganizing the band is the most effective way to facilitate both real-time auto safety applications and faster and more affordable wireless broadband access for millions of Americans.

“We also strongly agree with Commissioner O’Rielly that subsidizing the auto industry with free spectrum to compete with non-safety applications already being delivered over more efficient general purpose cellular and Wi-Fi networks is bad policy that contradicts FCC policy dating back to the Spectrum Policy Task Force.”