78% of people ‘broadly support’ the idea of using driverless vehicles on urban streets – providing they are safe and resistant to cyber attack.
That’s the headline news in a summary of feedback published to mark the conclusion of the ‘ground-breaking’ three-year GATEway research project.
Led by TRL, the GATEway Project ‘focused on people rather than technology’, and invited the public to experience prototype autonomous vehicle technologies in a real world setting, complete with pedestrians, cyclists, rain and snow.
More than 31,000 members of the public engaged with the project, including an exhibition exploring vehicles of the future staged by the Royal College of Art at London’s Transport Museum.
More than 5,000 people signed up to participate in the self-driving shuttle service trials which were also open to residents and visitors to Greenwich, while 1,300 members of the public were interviewed as part of the research.
The project will now feed into the Smart Mobility Living Lab (SMLL), a ‘world-leading’ £19m test bed for connected and autonomous vehicles (CAV).
Based in the Royal Borough of Greenwich and nearby Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, the SMLL is designed to help transport manufacturers and operators to develop new mobility solutions and test them in a wide variety of complex city environments.
Richard Cuerden, academy director, TRL, said: “This is just the beginning of the journey towards connected and autonomous vehicles.
“Thanks to the GATEway Project’s research, the UK is in a prime position to build upon the lessons learned and experienced gained in trialling a whole range of driverless vehicles in urban environments.
“We see driverless vehicles as a practical solution to delivering safe, clean, accessible and affordable mobility and we are proud to be part of creating our future transport system.”
“Provided they are safe” is a nebulous concept without quantification. Do people mean ‘no accidents’? People should have been asked to define what they mean by this by way of options to choose from.
Richard Walker, london
0
Good logic Trevor!
I wonder what the opinion of the residents of Arizona would be, if surveyed now.
Hugh Jones
+2
Is that the same as saying 78% of people do not ‘broadly support’ the idea of using driverless vehicles on urban streets – because they are not safe and not resistant to cyber attack…
Trevor Baird
+7