Cars of the Future - Page 22 of 28

Influential designer sees an opportunity to rethink the whole UK transport system.

Designer Priestman questions carmakers and champions elegant public transport

Our Zenzic CAM Creator series continues with award-winning designer Paul Priestman, co-founder of PriestmanGoode

Famous for designing Virgin’s Pendolino train and the BT HomeHub, Paul Priestman is one of the UK’s 500 most influential people, according to The Sunday Times. Here, he describes three exciting connected and automated mobility concepts: 1) The Moving Platforms infrastructure network; 2) A modular electric car for autonomous network transit (ANT) company, Dromos; and 3) The Scooter for Life automated electric scooter.

PP: “I’ve always been interested in mass transit and its relationship with the city. Over 30 years, the company has grown and we’re now involved in all forms of transport, even space travel. We take ideas from one sector and transfer them to others.”

Moving Platforms

PP: “This was an idea that grabbed people’s attention: a tram that can move around a city, then go to the outskirts and join a high speed rail line, without stopping, and take you to another town or even country.

PriestmanGoode Moving Platforms animation

“First and last mile is the logjam. If you can crack that then people won’t need personal transport. The cost of private car ownership is astronomical – you have to park it, maintain it, it depreciates something rotten. But carsharing isn’t working yet because the cars themselves are not designed for it – they are designed to be personal.

“There’s an opportunity to rethink the whole system from purchase through leasing to shared ownership and public for hire models, alongside designing an interior which is appropriate for these variants of use. There are a number of disruptors in the market and just as we’ve seen other markets completely transformed through disruptors such as Uber or Amazon, so there’s an opportunity to look at the car industry in the same way.

“The car industry keeps forcing the same product on us, but the market wants change. For the majority of people, especially in cities, you can’t equate private car ownership with the open road, where you can do what you want, it’s just not realistic, but I understand that there are different needs for rural and urban dwellers.

“London is an example of a great public transport system, although most of our stations were designed 150 years ago and haven’t changed much. I use an app to see when the next bus is due and then walk up to the bus stop. The bus usually arrives on time and we fly down our own lane on the Euston Road, passing all the cars stuck in traffic.”

Dromos ANT

PP: “The system is important, not just the vehicle. It is elegant public transport designed around the passenger – the first autonomous system to deliver mass transit, and the infrastructure belongs to the city. The car we designed is half the width of a normal car, with space for two or three people, and it can be steam cleaned. It’s a personal vehicle which will come to you, wherever you are, and then join a dedicated track, becoming almost like a train, before peeling off to complete the journey.”

PriestmanGoode modular electric car for Dromos

At this point, Priestman refers to our interview with the arch critic of driverless cars, Christian Wolmar. PP: “The problem with some self-driving concepts is you still get traffic jams full of cars with no one in them. A lot of that congestion is caused by delivery vehicles – every time you buy something online you’re causing a traffic jam. Once you have a vehicle which has a dedicated highway you’re free from other traffic and can travel faster and closer together.”

Scooter for Life

PP: “The Scooter for Life was a special commission for the New Old exhibition at the Design Museum. We gave it three wheels, so it doesn’t fall over, and a basket for your bag or dog. It’s electric and can also be automated, so there’s a take-me-home button. People immediately think of autonomous vehicles as being car-sized, but I think they might be smaller. The only reason cars were that size in the first place was to fit in the huge engine, which you no longer need.

“People taking the tube for only a stop or two really slow things down, whereas bikes, scooters and walking mean you see more of the city. It’s a bit reclaim the streets and reminds me of the Walklines we designed years ago. The Covid situation, terrible as it is, has shown us a less congested London –an increase in the use of bikes and walking, a city moving in a much healthier way. For me, that’s much more beautiful.”

For more on these designs, and a prototype Hyperloop passenger capsule, visit priestmangoode.com.

Thomas Sors says connectivity is the essential foundation for autonomous vehicles.

Putting the C in Connected and Automated Mobility

Our Zenzic CAM Creator series continues with Beam Connectivity CEO, Thomas Sors.

Having previously led Dyson’s Connected Vehicle programme, Thomas Sors launched Beam Connectivity in January this year. It might be one of the newest cogs in the UK automotive wheel, but its Connected Vehicle as a Service (CVaaS) product is already attracting interest from car, freight and public transport manufacturers.

TS: “When it comes to connected and automated mobility (CAM) and connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs), we see a lot of focus on the ‘A’ part, but not so much about ‘C’, which is our focus. Connectivity is the essential foundation for automation later on, but at the moment it often doesn’t perform very well. For example, OEM apps sometimes get two point something star ratings due to problems with the initial connection and latency.

“Our CVaaS solution provides a better user experience and can unlock the value of data generated by vehicle fleets. It offers a new way of getting data from vehicles to the cloud and back-end, or to send data into the vehicle. Because we’re brand new, there are no issues with legacy software – privacy by design and security by design are embedded all the way through our process, not an afterthought or a bolt-on. That starts with ensuring that we fulfil General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) access rights, including the right to be forgotten.

“I’ve seen quotes that by 2030 all cars will have some form of connectivity. eCall [the EU initiative to enable cars to automatically contact the emergency services in the event of a serious accident] is mandatory for new cars, and that’s just the start. It’s about transparency and explaining the benefits. If you give people the option to say ‘yes, take this data in order for me to get feature X’, then that builds trust.

“From the manufacturer or fleet operator perspective, prognostics is an interesting area – fixing things before they go wrong. Then there’s the ability to understand usage patterns and perform over the air (OTA) updates. Another thing we’re already seeing is support to improve the driving experience, for example, vehicle to infrastructure communications being used to reduce congestion. We expect that to build up quickly over the next 2-4 years.

“We’re only a few months in but we’ve already deployed an end-to-end system to several vehicles and we’re looking to do more and more. It’s not unusual for manufacturers to spend 12-18 months building a connected vehicle solution, so our platform can really speed up their development lifecycle. Why build a connectivity team when we’ve already done it very effectively?

“As to self-driving, the technology is leading the way and moving along quickly, so the focus needs to be on standards, legislation and public acceptance.”

For further info, visit beamconnectivity.com.

Kevin Vincent, Director at the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Automotive Research, says the UK is at the cutting edge of driverless car technology and business models.

The UK: probably the best self-driving roadmap in the world

Our Zenzic CAM Creator series continues with Kevin Vincent, Director at the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Automotive Research (CCAAR), part of Coventry University’s Institute for Future Transport and Cities.

CCAAR brings together expertise from both academia and industry, working in partnership with Horiba Mira’s engineering and test teams (Horiba Mira is a global leader in advanced vehicle engineering, research and product testing). With an impressive 150 Post Graduate Research (PhD) students, the centre plays a key role in addressing the skills gap as the automotive sector presses ahead with connected and autonomous vehicle (CAV) development. It’s an important hub for developing new connected and automated mobility products and services, covering everything from design and safety to human factors, such as trust and perception.

Right, let’s start with a big question: How is the UK doing in terms of becoming a world leader in self-driving?

KV: “In partnership with the government’s Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV), Zenzic has overseen the cost-effective creation of a complete ecosystem of testbeds. It has also delivered a comprehensive roadmap, probably the best in the world. We have great disruptive companies, such as Aurrigo, who are pushing the boundaries of both the technology and the business model. The UK is absolutely at the cutting edge.”

So far, so good. How do we build from here?

KV: “First, we have to get the right skills in place to push this at pace and scale. There’s an important challenge to understand the near-misses because, even if accident rates are down, we might not be getting the full picture. Growing trust is vital and harmonious regulation is key – from understanding the operational design domains, through safety case development, to vehicle resilience and cybersecurity, it all has to fit together. We have to get the MOT right too. Once you have fully connected vehicles with self-driving features receiving over-the-air (OTA) updates, the current test will not be fit for purpose. You certainly can’t leave it three years from new.”

How long are we talking before Level4 and 5 autonomy is achieved? For definitions please see our glossary.

KV: “In some respects, under tightly controlled domains with vehicles where the fallback position is the system rather than the driver, Level4 is already with us (for example at Heathrow terminal five). For wider adoption, my opinion has changed over the last couple of years. I can now see highly automated vehicles at Level4 in numbers by 2030. There’s still a question mark over whether you go straight to Level4, or use Level3 as a stepping stone. It is important that the customer understands the capability of the vehicle and certainly doesn’t overestimate it, as that is very dangerous. Level5 in terms of anytime anywhere automation is very difficult; I sometimes wonder if it will be possible, and whether people will even want it.”

Which sectors will be first?

KV: “If the industry is smart it will focus on freight, buses, trams and last-mile solutions first. I expect robotaxis will get there about the same time, with more gradual adoption for passenger cars. There will be sea-changes in the automotive industry over the next 10-15 years. Rather than shifting metal, vehicle manufacturers should look to service level agreements like they have in aviation. Farming is interesting because of the defined areas and repetitive nature of the work.”

Is there anything you’d like to expand on?

KV: “Digital twinning is a key part of our activity through CAM Testbed UK projects such as Assured CAV Highway, Assured CAV Parking and Midlands Future Mobility. Because the physical testing of all CAVs, involving billions of driving miles, simply isn’t feasible. It has been recognised as vitally important that digital framework methodologies are developed to create simulated engineering and synthetic environments, with cybersecurity as an overriding consideration. We have to get to the point where you can have confidence in the results, to the extent that it will stand up in a court of law.”

… And there the interview wound-up and I mused on a near miss of my own that very morning. A red BMW flew down my local high street, engine roaring, prompting much shaking of heads. It didn’t get 50 yards before getting stuck in traffic.

“My background is safety,” said Vincent. “Years ago, I thought self-driving was a bit Big Brother, but there are 1,700 road deaths a year in the UK. Think about the vast cost in terms of grief for families and pound notes. Self-driving cars will get you where you want to go, by the most efficient route, and potentially you can relax or read your emails on the way. And the only compromise is not breaking the speed limit.”

As final points go, that’s quite compelling.

For more information: CCAAR is part of Coventry University’s Institute for Future Transport and Cities (IFTC). From accelerating the progression towards zero-carbon transport and developing inclusive design practices to ensuring the safe implementation of autonomous transport solutions, IFTC is central to solving global mobility challenges.

Autoura’s Bainbridge says China has won the self-driving engineering race and Level4 is near-term in the UK.

UK urged to concede the self-driving engineering race and focus on the business opportunity

Our Zenzic CAM Creator series continues with the CEO of Autoura, Alex Bainbridge.

Since selling online reservation service TourCMS in 2015, tourism entrepreneur Alex Bainbridge has been working on his next industry gamechanger: Sahra the sightseeing robot – a digital assistant, concierge and tour guide. Sahra is already available as an app for tourists on foot, but combine her with a driverless car and you get an AI holiday rep and your own personal tour bus in one, all completely human-free. Bringing a different perspective to our other Zenzic CAM Creators, the affable Bainbridge has words of wisdom and some brutal home truths for the UK self-driving industry.

AB: “Over the last 20 years we’ve seen web, mobile and social dramatically change the sightseeing industry. These inventions were forced upon us and we’ve had to grapple with them. Self-driving is next and governments around the world are rushing to legalise it. A lot of the focus here is still on engineering, but China has already won that race. The faster we all accept that, the sooner we as a nation can shift to winning the commercialisation race. We’re driven by the money-making opportunity.

Sightseeing Autonomous Hospitality Robot by Autoura – Sahra

“50% of sightseeing is by vehicle and these new automated forms of transport will bring change, whether it’s an e-scooter for a city tour, or a self-driving car for a vineyard visit or road trip. I’m interested in the pure leisure uses and the customer experience, not deliveries or getting from A to B. We’ve built a digital platform that can work on any robo-taxi. Google, Apple, Amazon and Baidu will all run self-driving fleets, and they’re going to have to compete with Uber and Lyft. We want the customer experience layer.

“Most urban vehicle-based sightseeing is currently done by hop-on hop-off buses, but major cities are beginning to ban them – either directly, by closing roads, or indirectly, by not allowing them to park. The transition to autonomous will start with CAVs running routes like buses. This means we can get trading from Level4, and we only need a few vehicles to start. We’re a step away from the hardware but look at Waymo in Phoenix and Cruise in San Francisco – this is near-term and we’re going to see some big changes in the second half of 2021.”

For further info on Autoura’s “in-destination travel experiences”, see autoura.com.

Prof Nick Reed on how automated vehicles can bring safer, more sustainable transport and a better society for all.

Safety, air quality and accessibility: Professor predicts how driverless cars will change UK

Our Zenzic CAM Creator series continues with the founder of Reed Mobility, Professor Nick Reed.

Specialising in psychology and road safety, Professor Nick Reed is one of the UK’s leading experts on connected and automated vehicles (CAVs). His company, Reed Mobility, helps organisations and businesses in their understanding of risk and the effectiveness of mitigations for infrastructure, vehicles, drivers and road users.

What major changes do you expect in UK transport over the next 10-15 years?

I hope we’ve moved beyond the high point of hype and will start to see the commercial deployment of automated vehicles, delivering positive impacts on safety, air quality and accessibility to transport – all the radical transformations the AV industry has been promising. Over the last few weeks, with announcements from the likes of Waymo and Cruise, there are signs this might be happening.

The issue of air quality isn’t going away. We need to accelerate decarbonisation and encourage active transport. I hear people say we need to start designing cities around people rather than cars, but I don’t think that’s quite right. We have always designed cities around people, but for a long time we’ve seen cars as the best solution for moving people – now we understand that alternatives are required to achieve sustainable mobility in urban centres. Data will be critical in changing that thinking, in understanding mobility in cities and rural areas – helping us to understand who needs to travel, how best to serve those needs, and the social, environmental, safety and economic impacts of meeting that demand.

Can you expand on the likely development of self-driving vehicles within this timeframe e.g. freight platooning, robotaxis and privately owned driverless cars?

We have converging strands of automation. The likes of Waymo and limited operational design domain (ODD), the car doing everything in restricted circumstances, and then the manufacturers of traditional privately-owned cars, including Tesla, introducing more ADAS features and increasing the level of automation.

That convergence, where automated cars can do everything everywhere, is a long way off, but over time the boundaries of the ODDs in which vehicles are capable of operating in an automated mode will expand, encompassing more roads, more traffic situations and more weather conditions.

Automation in which control shifts from human drivers to vehicle systems present a challenge and, again, data may play a critical role in resolving this issue. To have this functionality, drivers may have to accept much greater driver monitoring than is typical in cars today. There’s also the concern about how extended use of automation over time may potentially result in deskilling the driver. Cars may decide that, based on their observations of driving behaviour, the driver is not sufficiently capable to have automation! The evidence on achieving safe sharing of responsibility for driving with automation systems is mixed, to say the least.

An additional route for road automation that has a lot of promise is for the movement of goods. With no passengers on board – and fewer concerns over vehicles operating at low speed or achieving passenger comfort – companies may be more willing to launch automated freight vehicles (like Nuro). This may open up new business models for delivery services that would be impossible with human driven deliveries.

With reference to your six key perspectives (safety, environment, prosperity, productivity, technology and joy) what benefits will these vehicles bring?

Safety – it’s about tackling human error as a contributory factor in road crashes. No one is claiming that automation will solve everything, but it may start to reduce the prevalence of common factors like excess speed, intoxication and fatigue.

Environment – it’s about the whole model of transportation. If we can shift to shared, on-demand vehicles, then maybe we need fewer of them. Also, active travel might feel safer if vehicles are more predictable.

Prosperity – mobility is a key factor in success for communities and individuals. AVs might help tackle issues of equality in transport provision.

Productivity – it’s about reclaiming time. If the AV is driving you can spend time doing other things, whether that’s being more productive for work or gaining a better life balance.

Technology – most people agree that technology has brought huge benefits, but we can do better, for example, in terms of poor air quality or the number of people dying in crashes. To achieve this, we need to break out of the transport model we’ve been using for 100 years – and we may need new technologies to help us do that.

Joy – our transport systems should be a source of happiness. Let’s create environments that are aesthetically attractive. If we want our children to play in the streets we need transport that’s compatible with that, not lorries thundering past.

What are the potential downsides in the shift to self-driving and how can these be mitigated?

Of course, there’s a utopian and dystopian version of a future with automated vehicles. People often raise the issue of unemployment for professional drivers but the widescale deployment of automated vehicles is going to have a long transition period. Automation might address a shortage of drivers in the freight sector and may also create new jobs in remote vehicle monitoring and fleet maintenance. Although the transition may be long, it is something we need to be thinking about now to ensure that it is a smooth process.

There’s also a challenge coming around how we see crashes from an ethical point of view. Unfortunately, 1.3 million people die on our roads globally every year, of which there’s about 1,800 in the UK. Automation may reduce that number significantly but we need to be prepared for the discussion about fatalities caused by the actions of machines rather than human drivers.

Another concern is that models of automated vehicle deployment could further embed personal car use into society, when active travel is more sustainable. Automated vehicles have the potential to change our mobility ecosystem radically – so it’s important that we have a clear vision about how that change can bring safer, more sustainable transport and a better society for all.

For further info, including more detail on the six key perspectives, visit reed-mobility.co.uk

California-based Xona Space is working on new generation Low Earth Orbit GPS for self-driving cars.

Next generation: self-driving GPS is out of this world

Our Zenzic CAM Creator series continues with the Co-Founder and CEO of Xona Space, Brian Manning.

Compared to the familiar British reserve, California-based Xona Space is from a different planet. This self-declared “group of space ninjas, engineers, GPS nerds, motorcycle racers and adventurers” has helped to put over 50 vehicles in space and published over 50 scientific papers on navigation technology. That’s handy because today’s sat navs are creaking under the sky high requirements of self-driving cars. Brian Manning says his company’s new Pulsar positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) service will provide the necessary security, availability and accuracy.

BM: “We’re primarily working on new generation GPS from Low Earth Orbit (LEO) – something much more secure, precise and resilient. It will sure-up a lot of issues. GPS has been phenomenal, it has given a lot of value for a long time, but people are now trying to use it for applications it wasn’t designed for. It’s tough to get where you’re going when you don’t know where you are.”

A reference perhaps to the GPS spoofing incident at the 2019 Geneva Motor Show, when cars from a host of manufacturers displayed their location as Buckingham, England, in 2036! Apparently Americans also do sarcasm now. We swiftly move on to realistic timescales for the SAE levels of driving automation.

BM: “Ubiquitos Level5 is probably still far off, but personally I think we’ll start seeing deployments in contained environments within five years. I came from SpaceX so I know that with the right team you can get an amazing amount done in a very short time. A big part of Xona’s focus is to get Level5 tech out of the contained environments and also to work in bad weather and more rural environments, where current systems struggle. Rather than which sectors will be early adopters, I look more geographically – to highways with autonomous lanes. That said, it will probably be more on the freight side first because there’s more safety standards involved when you have passengers on board.”

We were wondering which might come first, Level5 or a winner in the Presidential election, but that’s all sorted now, isn’t it?

For further info, visit Xonaspace.com

Bold predictions about our driverless future by petrolhead Clem Robertson.

Meet the maverick radar expert of UK drones and driverless

Welcome to a new series of interviews with our fellow Zenzic CAM Creators. First up, Clem Robertson, CEO of R4dar Technologies.

As a keen cyclist who built his own Cosworth-powered Quantum sportscar from scratch, it’s no surprise that the founder of Cambridge-based R4dar takes a unique approach to self-driving. Indeed, his involvement can be traced directly to one shocking experience: driving down a local country lane one night, he had a near miss with a cyclist with no lights. He vividly remembers how a car came the other way, illuminating the fortunate rider in silhouette and enabling an emergency stop. It proved to be a light bulb moment.

What does R4dar bring to connected and automated mobility (CAM)?

CR: “I’d been working in radar for five or six years, developing cutting edge radar for runways, when the incident with the cyclist got me thinking: Why could my cruise control radar not tell me something was there and, importantly, what it was? This kind of technology has been around for years – in World War II we needed to tell the difference between a Spitfire and a Messerschmitt. They placed a signal on the planes which gave this basic information, but things can be much more sophisticated these days. Modern fighter pilots use five different methods of identification before engaging a potential bogey, because one or more methods might not work and you can’t leave it to chance whether to blow someone out of the sky. The autonomous vehicle world is doing similar with lidar, radar, digital mapping etc. Each has its shortcomings – GPS is no good in tunnels; the cost of 5G can be prohibitive and coverage is patchy; cameras aren’t much good over 100 metres or in the rain, lidar is susceptible to spoofing or misinterpretation; digital maps struggle with temporary road layouts – but together they create a more resilient system.”

How will your solutions improve the performance of self-driving cars?

CR: “Radar only communicates with itself, so it is cyber-resilient, and our digital tags can be used on smart infrastructure as well as vehicles – everything from platooning lorries to digital high vis jackets, traffic lights to digital bike reflectors. They can tell you three things: I am this, I am here and my status is this. For example, I’m a traffic light up ahead and I’m going to turn red in 20 seconds. Radar works in all weathers. It is reliable up to 250-300m and very good at measuring range and velocity, while the latest generation of radars are getting much better at differentiating between two things side-by-side. We are working with CAM partners looking to use radar in active travel, to improve safety and traffic management, as well as with fleet and bus operators. We are also working with the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) industry to create constellations of beacons that are centimetre-accurate, so that delivery drones can land in a designated spot in the garden and not on the dog!”

What major developments do you expect over the next 10-15 years?

CR: “Fully autonomous vehicles that don’t carry passengers will come first. There are already little robots on the streets of Milton Keynes and, especially with Covid, you will see a big focus on autonomous last mile delivery – both UAVs and unmanned ground vehicle (UGVs). You never know, we might see delivery bots enacting a modern version of the computer game Paperboy. More and more people in urban areas with only roadside parking will realise that electric cars are tricky to charge, unless you put the chargers in the road, which is expensive. If you only need a car one or two days a month, or even for just a couple of hours, there will be mobility as a service (MAAS) solutions for that. Why would you bother with car ownership? E-scooters are one to keep an eye on – once they’re regulated they will be a useful and independent means of getting around without exercising. Town centres will change extensively once MAAS and CAM take off. There will be improved safety for vulnerable road users, more pedestrianisation, and you might see segmented use at certain times of day.”

Do you see any downsides in the shift to self-driving?

CR: “Yes! I love driving, manual gearboxes, the smell of petrol, the theatre, but you can see already that motorsport, even F1, is becoming a dinosaur in its present form. People are resistant to change and autonomous systems prompt visions of Terminator, but it is happening and there will be consequences. Mechanics are going to have less work and will have to retrain because electric motors have less moving parts. Courier and haulage driving jobs will go. Warehouses will be increasingly automated. MAAS will mean less people owning their own cars and automotive manufacturers will have to adapt to selling less vehicles – it’s a massive cliff and it’s coming at them much faster than they thought – that’s why they’re all scrambling to become autonomous EV manufacturers, it’s a matter of survival.”

So, to sum up….

CR: “Fully autonomous, go-anywhere vehicles are presented as the utopia, but there’s a realisation that this is a difficult goal, or at least a first world problem. There might always be a market for manned vehicles in more remote locations. A lot of the companies in this industry specialise in data, edge processing and enhanced geospatial awareness, and that will bring all kinds of benefits. How often have you driven in fog unable to see 10m in front of you? Self-driving technology will address that and many other dangers.”

Hearing bold predictions like these from a petrolhead like Clem, suddenly Zenzic’s ambitious 10-year plan seems eminently achievable.

For further info, visit the R4dar website.

Aside from recognising Cars of the Future as a CAM Creator, Zenzic’s new Roadmap features other notable developments…

Zenzic unveils updated UK Connected and Automated Mobility Roadmap

On Tuesday 20 October 2020, Zenzic unveiled the latest (second) version of its UK Connected and Automated Mobility Roadmap to 2030.

Bringing together government, industry and academia, Zenzic is tasked with establishing the UK as a world leader in self-driving.

Aside from the headline news that Cars of the Future was recognised as an official CAM Creator (sorry, had to get that in), there were notable developments in relation to regulation, safety and public perception.

During a virtual launch event (due to the ongoing Covid plague), Daniel Ruiz, CEO of Zenzic, outlined the “phenomenal progress” made in the 12 months since the launch of the first Roadmap. For instance, the fact that the first self-driving vehicle testing safety standards milestone is on track to be reached by end of this year.

He also highlighted the increased support for local governments on connected vehicles and emphasised the “need to continue to invest”.

Ruiz then handed over to Mark Cracknell, head of technology at Zenzic and architect of the Roadmap, who praised the UK’s collaborative approach over that of other countries where tech companies push the agenda.

“The Roadmap details the route to delivering the vision,” he said. “We are only one year into a 10 year plan and we are in a great position, with activity and progress reflected in the real world.”

Cracknell then joined a panel discussion, moderated by Alex Kreetzer of Auto Futures, with Imogen Pierce, head of experience strategy at Arrival (formerly of Jaguar), and Dr Richard Fairchild, operations director at Aurrigo. Given the participants, it understandably focussed on mobility as a service (MAAS) and first and last mile transport solutions.

It was unfortunate that this event coincided with Bauer’s Virtual Smart Transport Conference. Surely the driverless highway is not yet so congested that organisations have to tread on each other’s toes?

Anyway, if you’d like to explore the new Roadmap, you are very welcome to do so here.

In an explosive exclusive interview with Cars of the Future, transport expert Christian Wolmar presents a devastating critique of the self-driving dream.

Are driverless cars the future? Don’t believe the hype says Wolmar

As an arch critic of the UK’s autonomous vehicle plans, transport commentator Christian Wolmar sums up his views in the title of his book, Driverless Cars: On a Road to Nowhere.

“The problems are almost too great to list, but my primary concerns are two-fold: technological and environmental,” he says. “There are huge worries about rushing into it, cutting corners which might result in accidents and deaths, as they already have.

“Then there’s a bigger issue: what is the positive outcome? I just don’t see it. People are not asking for it, it doesn’t solve problems such as congestion or pollution, yet huge amounts of money are going into it with almost no return.

“The technology can be hacked. There’s the risk of deskilling drivers with the adoption of more automated driving aids, then expecting them to take over in the event of an emergency. The more you look at the driverless vision, the more dystopian it appears.”

At this point, Wolmar casually mentions a host of other potential pitfalls concerning legality, privacy, practicality. You get the picture. He’s not a fan. Following this initial brutal attack on the foundation stones of the self-driving dream, he quickly covers off some popular retorts.

“The argument goes that driverless cars will help the blind and others who can’t drive, but logically this must mean more cars on the road and therefore more congestion,” he says. “The response is “ah, no, because there will be shared use”, but there’s no evidence that people want that. It isn’t a realistic concept, but even if we get there it will not be a good place.”

So why are governments, vehicle manufacturers and tech companies so obsessed with it? “The proponents of driverless have managed to create a climate in which the public and politicians think it is inevitable, but it isn’t,” he says.

“After 12 years of testing robotaxis in sunny climates on nice wide geofenced highways you still have to sign a nondisclosure agreement to get in one! The developers are driven by fear that someone else will make the technology work and become the market leader, but everything points to the fact that this is a technological dead end. Like Concorde, lots of great ideas have floundered.”

Finally, Wolmar relents briefly from his devastating critique. “There may be some limited uses such as airport transit,” he admits. “It’s a bit like the moon landing, some great technologies will come out of it. Indeed, if you speak to people at trade shows, a lot of them are very skeptical about driverless ever becoming a dominant technology. They already have successful businesses supplying cameras or software or lidar, and that’s where their interest lies.

“Outside of the industry, many think driverless cars are already available to buy. It is pure hype. They don’t exist. Headlines in the media claim driverless cars can do this or that, and then in paragraph five it says there’s a safety driver.

“You saw it with covid and the supposed benefits of driverless delivery. If anything, the impact of the pandemic on driverless was to completely undermine the shared use argument, which is vital to the business case. Coronavirus, and whatever comes after it, is as much a problem for shared use as it is for public transport.”

So, what’s Wolmar’s preferred solution? “The approach must be different for each town or city, but urban areas are not suitable for the unregulated use of private cars,” he says. “You have to recognise that road space is a limited asset, to do otherwise is bad economics. This is not a war on the motorist. There will be cars of the future, but cars in their proper place, particularly rural areas.”

Driverless Cars: On a Road to Nowhere second edition (2020)

For more detailed analysis (and scathing criticism), the second edition of Wolmar’s book “Driverless Cars: On a Road to Nowhere” is out now via London Publishing Partnership priced at £9.99. Alternatively, email [email protected] or visit www.christianwolmar.co.uk.

Opening of the Smart Mobility Living Lab in London and the Darwin SatCom Lab in Oxfordshire

UK increases driverless vehicle testing capability with new centres in London and Oxford

Last week saw the UK expand its driverless vehicle testing infrastructure with the opening of two impressive new facilities: the Smart Mobility Living Lab in London and the Darwin SatCom Lab in Oxfordshire.

On 30 September, Zenzic officially opened its Smart Mobility Living Lab (SMLL) with an online event featuring Paul Campion, CEO of TRL, and virtual ribbon-cutting by Danny Thorpe, leader of the council in the Royal Borough of Greenwich.

Described as the place to go for real-world connected and automated vehicles (CAV) and connected and automated mobility (CAM) testing, the SMLL will use public and private roads in London “to develop and validate new mobility and transport technologies in a real-world connected environment”.

The following day, O2 opened its new commercial 5G and satellite communications lab at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire.

Part of Project Darwin, a four-year programme supported by O2 and the European Space Agency, it will “explore and trial next-gen connectivity solutions for connected and autonomous vehicles”.

Derek McManus, chief operating officer at O2, said: “We’re delighted to announce that the Darwin SatCom Lab is now open for business. It’s the next step in getting autonomous vehicles on the road and making the UK’s transport network greener.”

Amanda Solloway MP, Minister for Science, Research and Innovation, added: “I am incredibly excited that O2’s first of its kind driverless car lab will enable our most innovative businesses to test these technologies and bring us another step closer to putting self-driving vehicles safely on our roads.”

Typical, you wait months for a significant development and two come along at once.