News – Page 5

A taxonomy of potential impacts of connected and automated vehicles

November 25, 2019 swov News

LEVITATE is currently building tools to help European cities, regions and national governments prepare for a future with increasing levels of automated vehicles in passenger cars, urban transport services and urban logistics. The project is preparing a new impact assessment framework to enable policy makers to maximise the benefits of connected and automated transport systems (CATS) and utilise the technologies to achieve societal objectives.

Deliverable 3.1: A taxonomy of potential impacts of connected and automated vehicles

Recently several reports have been published within the LEVITATE project. Deliverable 3.1, A taxonomy of potential impacts of connected and automated vehicles at different levels of implementation focuses on the identification of potential impacts of CATs and indicators that can be used to measure these impacts.

D3.1 provides an inventory and classification of impacts of CATS at different levels of implementation and on different topics such as road safety, mobility and efficiency, environment, economy and society. A distinction is made between direct, systemic and wider impacts. Direct impacts are changes that are noticed by each road user on each trip; Systemic impacts are system-wide impacts within the transport system; and wider impacts are changes occurring outside the transport system, such as changes in land use and employment. Furthermore, a distinction is made between primary impacts and secondary impacts.

The report highlights that the actual impacts of connected and automated transport systems are unknown and will remain so for a long time. However, potential impacts can be identified, and preliminary estimates can be developed. Most analysts believe that a wide implementation of CATS will improve road safety and possibly the efficiency of traffic operations. However, the reliability of automation technology is currently unknown, and there will most likely be unforeseen and rare events that we cannot be taken into account. With regards to policy making, the report points out that highly uncertain estimates of impacts may serve as the basis for identifying policy interventions to increase the likelihood that impacts will be in the desired direction (e.g., policies that can help prevent the urban sprawl that CATs are expected to increase).

The findings of this deliverable will be key in the further development of the use cases and provide the foundation for subsequent work to look at short-, medium- and long-term impacts.

You can access all the publications and learn more about the project here.

Launch of EC’s CCAM platform

August 20, 2019 swov News

The inaugural meeting of the EC’s Connected, Cooperative and Automated Mobility (CCAM) platform was held on 25 and 26 June 2019 in Brussels.

The purpose of this EC platform is twofold: (i) to coordinate efforts related to the open road testing of connective, cooperative and automated mobility in Europe; and (ii) to identify research needs for the imminent European partnership on CCAM research and innovation.

The platform is made up primarily of Member States and approximately 30 associations, including LEVITATE partner Polis.

The plenary session took place on 25 June whereas the kick off meeting of the 6 platform working groups took place the day after on 26 June. The working groups are:

WG1: EU agenda for CCAM testing
WG2: R&I project coordination
WG3: Digital & physical infrastructure
WG4: Road safety
WG5: Cyber security & in-vehicle data
WG6: Connectivity

The membership application process remains open. Click here for more information.

The next meeting of the working groups will take place on 9 September 2019.

What do policy makers want to know about the impact of connected automated vehicles?

June 11, 2019 swov News

On 28 May, Gothenburg hosted 45 experts from Europe and Australia to discuss which societal impacts connected and automated vehicles will have. The workshop (PDF) marked the first meeting of the LEVITATE Stakeholder Group, which meets several times until the completion of the project in 2021.

The stakeholder group facilitates a continuous dialogue with experts, users and the consortium about the impacts of connected and automated transport (CAT). Through the stakeholder group, LEVITATE provides a European platform for knowledge sharing and discussion about automation in transport.

Workshop participants included local, regional and national authorities, agencies, services providers, OEMs, researchers and networks representing user groups such as cities, pedestrians, automotive or road research. The experts shared their thoughts about the contributions of CAT to the future of passenger cars, urban transport, and freight transport. They also stated their perspective of long-term goals with respect to safety, society, economy and environment, along with relevant indicators and conflict potentials between these goal dimensions.

Listen to what participants had to say about connected and automated transport:

Digitalisation and Road Safety Research Workshop in Athens

June 10, 2019 swov News

The LEVITATE project was presented at the scientific workshop organized by the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) on ‘Digitalisation and Road Safety Research’, which took place with great success on 17 May 2019 in Athens, within the framework of the Fifth UN Global Road Safety Week.

Special focus was put on future impact of automation on safety with LEVITATE project findings in key presentation, followed by a vivid Expert Panel discussion regarding new perspectives and horizons of road safety in the digital and automated era in Europe and worldwide with focus on the future of automation related safety policy interventions.

Download the LEVITATE project presentation (PDF).

LEVITATE partner in the spotlight: interview with Rune Elvik, TØI

June 9, 2019 swov News

The Institute of Transport Economics (TØI) is a national institution for transport research and development. It was set up in 1958, and in 1986 the TOI became a private, independent research foundation. Rune Elvik is senior research officer at TØI. He has obtained four doctoral degrees in the fields of political science, philosophy and road safety. Rune Elvik is known for his work on TØI’s Traffic Safety Handbook that has been published in five languages and is a benchmark on current knowledge about the effect of road safety measures.

What is your key question on the impact connected and automated transport systems will have?
Rune Elvik: Based on my background, I feel best qualified to deal with road safety impacts, but in Levitate we aim to cover all societal impacts of CATs.

How do you contribute to LEVITATE?
Rune Elvik: Our job in LEVITATE is to develop methods for forecasting impacts of connected and automated vehicles. We need the contributions of all partners to be able to do so. At a later stage, we will deal with cost-benefit analyses, which our institute has a long experience in doing.

Human error is made responsible for the vast majority of road crashes. Will full automation of vehicles make road traffic safer than ever by eliminating the human factor?
Rune Elvik: Ah, well, you will not eliminate the human factor. You will simply transfer it to a different arena. The future errors will be software and hardware errors in the computers running the vehicles. But yes. These errors are likely to be few and yes, I do think road safety will be improved.

Do you expect to witness a highly automated road transport system in your lifetime, and how should that look like?
Rune Elvik: I don’t know. We already see small automated buses. There is one running in the city of Oslo. I probably ought to take a trip with it soon. But I think there is a long way to go before fully automated passenger cars can be used everywhere. Prototypes, on the other hand, will emerge very quickly, I think.

How I wish it will be? Well, obviously, free of accidents and free of pollution. Get rid of all the bad things associated with traffic.

Stakeholder Reference Group workshop in Gothenburg

May 28, 2019 swov Events, News

Gothenburg is hosting experts from Europe and beyond today to discuss which societal impacts connected and automated vehicles will have. The workshop is organised within the Horizon 2020 funded research project LEVITATE.

The LEVITATE project develops methods to forecast societal level impacts of connected and automated transport (CATs). This includes the impact of CATs on safety, the environment, the economy and society.

To develop tools that meet the needs of future users, 45 experts from Europe and Australia have come to Gothenburg to discuss their visions, expectations, use cases and conflicts for a future with connected automated vehicles.

“Vehicle automation and connected mobility services will have a major impact on transport safety, the environment and prosperity. We have to find the best approaches to ensure future technologies will be beneficial to individuals, society and industry stakeholders”, says Prof. Pete Thomas of Loughborough University and the coordinator of the LEVITATE project.

What regulation will deploy benefits and mitigate the risks?
The impacts of connected and automated transport systems are expected to be disruptional and transformative so conventional approaches to forecast impacts, based on a continuation of existing trends, may not be effective. Authorities in particular face two main challenges: How should they respond to the deployment of connected and automated transport systems (CATS)? And how can they take advantage of these systems to achieve broader policy objectives?

“While automated vehicles may bring some benefits, there is also the possibility that their widespread introduction in urban areas could lead to increased congestion, negative environmental impacts and negative health impacts, if walking and cycling are discouraged”, says Suzanne Hoadley of the European city network Polis.“Therefore, it is of utmost urgency to bring professionals together beyond their own sectors and exchange about use cases and risks of CATs. Today’s workshop in Gothenburg takes an important step on that matter.”

Workshop participants include local, regional and national authorities, agencies, services providers, OEMs, researchers and networks representing user groups such as cities, pedestrians, automotive or road research.

A self-driving minibus with space for 11 passengers is currently being tested in Gothenburg that connects the parking facilities Polstjärnegatan and the workshop venue in Lindholmen Science Park. Participants have the possibility to test the shuttle and take the eight minutes trip.

The LEVITATE Stakeholder group facilitates a continuous and purposeful dialogue with experts, users and the consortium about the impacts of connected and automated transport (CAT). Through the SRG, LEVITATE provides a European platform for knowledge sharing and discussion about automation in transport. The group meets several times until the completion of the project in 2021.

About LEVITATE
Launched in December 2018, LEVITATE is a 3-year project led by Loughborough University whose main output will be a policy support tool (PST) to help local authorities forecast the impacts of automated vehicles over the short, medium and long-term. The PST will also contain a back-casting tool providing guidance to local authorities on the measures to implement to achieve desired outcomes against a backdrop of increasing vehicle automation.