The first line of autonomous collectives or self-driving of the United Kingdom will start working next week Edinburgh, Scotland. The vehicles are part of the project VOCForth from four companies, a university and the government, and will have personnel on board capable of taking control in an emergency, it was reported today.
The implementation is expected to begin with a 22-kilometre route, in the west of the Scottish capital. During it, it is expected to carry about 10,000 passengers a week.
How autonomous collectives work
These are five buses that will be able to drive at speeds of up to 50 km per hour and they will still have a driver on board to check that the technology works correctly, since British legislation does not yet allow the circulation of fully autonomous vehicles on public roads.
The vehicles will carry an artificial intelligence system on board, which will detect other vehicles on the street, while cameras and radars will scan the road to avoid pedestrians.
“The autonomous technology installed on the bus has already been tested in other vehicles, but this is the first time it has been used on a bus journey,” said Peter Stevens, head of the company. Stagecoach, during a demonstration of the new bearings.
In addition, another agent will check the tickets and answer questions from users, the AFP news agency reported.
According to Stevens, the service will be “safer and more efficient”, with fuel savings of up to 20%.
“The system can respond faster than human reaction time,” he said, explaining that the further the buses run, the more data they will collect to further “improve autonomous travel time.”
In this regard, the bus driver callum jones, told the AFP news agency: “Something new and exciting to see, part of our technological revolution.”
In 2021, an electric bus without a driver was put into service in the Spanish city of Malaga, a project considered a pioneer in Europe. Tests were also conducted in South Korea that same year and in Singapore in early 2023.
Source: Ambito
