UK’s first public driverless vehicle trials open for registration

Registration is now open for volunteers to take part in the UK’s first public driverless vehicle trials to be held in Greenwich later this year.

The public driverless vehicle trails, taking place in the Royal Borough of Greenwich within the UK Smart Mobility Living Lab, are part of the GATEway (Greenwich Automated Transport Environment) project – an £8million research project to investigate the use, perception and acceptance of autonomous vehicles in the UK. Members of the public are now invited to take part in the trials and workshops held between June and August 2016.

£8m research project to investigate the use, perception and acceptance of autonomous vehicles

The trials, led by TRL (the UK’s Transport Research Laboratory), will see fully electric automated vehicles navigating their way around Greenwich. The research, funded by funded by Innovate UK and industry, will seek to understand how a wide range of different user groups feel about the use of fully automated vehicles. Volunteers who attend the workshops will have the chance to discuss and debate how driverless vehicles might impact UK cities as well as participate in creative activities with designers and researchers from GATEway partner, the Royal College of Art.

“The move to automated vehicles is probably the most significant change in transport since the transition from horse drawn carriages to motorised vehicles,” said Professor Nick Reed, Director at TRL and Technical Lead of the GATEway project. “Testing these vehicles in a living environment, like the UK Smart Mobility Living Lab, takes the concept from fiction to reality. It gives the public a chance to experience what it’s like to ride in an automated vehicle and to make their own mind up as to how much they like it, trust it and could accept it as a service in the city.”  

Those with experience or knowledge of Greenwich are also encouraged to share their views on driverless vehicles via a web-based sentiment mapping tool. The site, developed and managed by GATEway partner Commonplace, provides members of the public with a chance to provide feedback on how driverless vehicles might impact life in and around Greenwich.