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Driverless cars — with nobody behind the wheel — could be on California roads and highways by June 2018.

That doesn’t mean you’ll be able to buy a completely driverless car next year, or even hail a ride in one. The technology is still being developed. The driverless cars that may begin appearing next year will be test vehicles. They’ll be allowed to pick up passengers, but only if the passengers don’t have to pay.

The timeline was revealed Wednesday, when the state Department of Motor Vehicles proposed a new set of streamlined regulations along with a 15-day public comment period.

The regulations are expected to be set by the end of the year and approved by the DMV early next year. The department had not previously set a date, approximate or otherwise, for the deployment of fully autonomous cars. The go date could be sooner than June, depending on how fast the rules are approved, the DMV said.

Read the full story on LATimes.com.