BMW has scored a huge victory of sorts after the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) ruled to allow the automaker’s Park Assistant Plus feature to be included in the 2016 BMW 7 Series. The new exemption from the NHTSA clears the way for BMW to begin offering the feature in the U.S. market. A BMW spokesman confirmed to Automobilemag that the features will be made available in the US even though a clear timetable has yet to be established.

The Park Assistant Plus system is a remote driving feature in the 7 Series that essentially allows owners to drive the cars in and out of a parking spot using only the touchscreen key fobs. The automaker didn’t offer the feature in the U.S. market because of a federal law - FMVSS 114 - that requires all U.S. market cars to have a shift-interlock function, meaning a car’s brake pedal must be depressed before the transmission can be shifted out of Park. Knowing that the brake pedals in the 7 Series are not depressed when the system is activated, BMW didn’t even bother to include the feature among U.S.-bound models of the 7 Series.

The German automaker did do its due diligence and petitioned the NHTSA for an exemption to the rule. To its surprise, the government agency acquiesced to the petition, saying that the wording in the rule was vague enough to be subject to different interpretations. The rule, according to the NHTSA, meant to say that the brakes had to be “applied” before the transmission can be shifted out of Park. Since BMW’s computers automatically apply the brakes before shifting out of Park, the NHTSA deemed the Park Assistant Plus feature legal to be used in the U.S.

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