Announcements of AVs Coming - Popping Up Like Weeds

Companies and cities, sometimes countries, are announcing that AVs, whether shuttles or conventional passenger cars, are coming and they will arrive by a date certain. Those dates differ, but still, such certainty makes one wonder whether the technology is essentially ready or whether engineers are being encouraged to improve the technology fast enough to lend credence to the hype.

Tough, but sweet, outdoor cat taking a break from mouse patrol.

A snarky person like me could wonder whether these bold declarations might encourage companies to suppress, a la Lion Air and Uber (with Herzberg killing), any safety concerns. Perhaps an AV "drivers test" and/or continuous performance monitoring might be in order. After all, auto companies will be combining the driver with the vehicle, and recalls show that those vehicles have sometimes been far from perfectly safe.

UK OK with AVs

London, England, UK - AV testing will begin this month in the London borough of Hounslow. The software is from Oxbotica. Addison Lee, a taxi and limousine fleet management company, will be providing the taxis to be outfitted with AV technology. Nominet, the UK's domain name registrar, will be in charge of data transfer and the protection of data from hacking.

Scotland buses on bridge. Photo from BBC post.

Edinburgh, Scotland - AV full-size transit buses will be piloted on a 14-mile route between a commuter parking lot in Fife and a commuter train station . The buses will use the "the dedicated public transportation corridor across the Forth Road Bridge that also allows buses and taxis."

Across a landmass and over water

Japan - Though Japanese automaker Toyota has been relatively quiet about its AV activities, the plan declared a few years ago, and which continues to be repeated, is that AV service will be available for the 2020 Olympics. So where are we?

Toyota is saying it will shuttle athletes around the Olympic village in its e-Palette AV configured for human shared rides. The e-Palette is basically a shell that can be configured for different uses, such as deliveries, pop-up cafes, offices, mini-hotel rooms, or crowded mini-buses. That's my translation of reports on corporate statements.

Plans are also moving ahead for AV robotaxis to ferry visitors around in Tokyo during the Olympics. Reports from the summer stated that AV vans were being tested as a step toward service during the Olympics. Partners are a Japanese taxi company and a Japanese AV tech company. Toyota is also an investor.

In contrast to bravado or openness?

Miami, Florida - Ford has invited journalists to ride along on trips in its AVs in the traffic mess of Miami (though what US city is not a traffic mess?). These rides are taking place on actual busy streets with bikers and pedestrians and other drivers, all who arbitrarily violate the law and otherwise act in unexpected ways on  a regular basis. Ford is basically using the city traffic as a test bed, though with careful backup drivers. The carmaker has a clear goal - AV ridehailing service on the street in Miami and Dade County in 2021.

Will AVs Bring Transit Popularity?

Two articles that popped up on my Google alerts this week point to a possible - though still unlikely - scenario of transcendent transit systems and a waning auto dealership distribution model - both due to fully automated vehiches (AVs) and the ways they will be available, particularly in cities and traditional suburbs (not exurbs).

Auto dealers have not said much or done much in response to AV developments thus far. Even as every prediction says that most AV passenger transportation will be fleet based and publicly available, whether through transit or private companies or public-private partnerships, auto dealers have remained silent. After all, it is still a profitable business in most places in the US to sell cars, even in most cities.

Change drastically or get out

Now an executive at a firm that does financial advising for car dealers, and which itself invests in dealerships, is ringing the alarm for dealerships and holding up the scary prospects of Kodak and Blockbuster as examples of companies that had their heads in the sand as technological developments began bubbling up around them.

The opinion piece insists that in the next 20 years, dealerships will either go out of business (so better to sell out soon) or undergo massive consolidation, down to a few huge dealership companies.

Singapore planning for drastic change

Singapore is possibly the city (okay city/state) most prepared for AVs. It has been investing in AVs and allowing testing for years. Now Singapore is turning to the AV shuttle with an EasyMile AV that will serve a university. This will be a pilot that begins in March 2019.

With its good weather, Singapore is well placed to take early advantage of AVs.

Waymo to launch real no-driver service and expand to more cities

Yes, it's all over the news, almost old news, from last week that Waymo will slowly begin and then incrementally expand its AV service, but without backup drivers in every vehicle. I'm about to head to the airport, so I am excusing myself from providing one of any 50 easy-to-find sources for this news.

Still no word from Waymo on working with transit or providing accessible vehicles. Since I like the company, that is quite disappointing.

So the title question - will AVs bring transit popularity?

The answer may be publicly available transportation will become popular, but transit itself becoming popular in the places where it barely hits the edge of the spectrum on mode share is doubtful. Transit quality means investment, which means funding in the form of public dollars, which has grown, but, in the US, still remains the exception rather than the rule.

Taxi-Like and Microtransit AV Pilots

US sees on-demand AV expansion with taxi- and transit-like pilots

Big news! California has granted Waymo permission to operate AVs without a safety driver, but, for now, only in the Palo Alto area and only for free. Waymo must request permission to charge a fare for AV service in California. This permit will not only enable Waymo to go truly backup-driverless in California, but it will also boost Waymo's credibility if the company wants to expand elsewhere. In fact, Waymo is also about to begin experimenting with charging fares for AV ridehailing in Arizona. Waymo continues testing in California, Arizona, Washington, Michigan, Texas, and Georgia.

Meanwhile, free AV shuttle service is going well in the entertainment district of Arlington, TX, in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. This service is used to shuttle people on game days for the Dallas Cowboys and Texas Rangers, and other events. The North Texas Council of Governments (NTCOG) will be spending "$1.5 million for its cities to have planning assistance ahead of autonomous vehicle deployment. Total funding up to $10 million for the actual programs would follow." The Dallas-Fort Worth Regional Transportation Council, a part of the NTCOG, is also involved, with its own AV 2.0 plan. This AV 2.0 is not yet posted on either the NTCOG website or on the RTC webpages.

International on-demand, small AV taxi-bots 

Tel Aviv AV ridehailing service announced for 2019. New Mobility will be VW cars using Mobileye technology. If AVs can operate on roads with crazy Israeli drivers, which means all Israeli drivers, then they are ready for anywhere. Though the service is self-described to include Mobility as a Service (MaaS), there is nothing to indicate an actual MaaS platform such as FlexDenmark or Whim, which operates in Finland. [MaaS is generally thought to be of as a coordinated technology platform for delivering transportation choices across all modes. This can be done on a per ride, monthly, or even an annual basis.]

In Finland, in March 2019, an AV shuttle will be piloted with passengers in Helsinki. The shuttle bus is touted to be an all-weather vehicle that can handle snow.

First-mile/last-mile solutions to retrofit for sprawl may use AV transit or shared-use private transportation pods that seat up to four passengers. The video shows a pilot in Milton Keynes, a UK city in England, of AV pods available on demand via an app. The company manufacturing the AV pods is Aurrigo. FYI: The pilot just ended after a successful seven months.

Up to 15 pods – capable of travelling up to 15 miles per hour and lasting up to 60 miles from one charge – have been operating in the city centre from Central Railway Station. There are plans for the pods to continue to operate in the city, with a service being offered to residents in the near future.

Advertised in the video above is the independence-enhancing aspect of the mobility-on-demand AV pods for some people with disabilities. Showcased is an individual who is blind. What goes unmentioned is that the vehicle appears not to be accessible to people with wheelchairs and other mobility-related disabilities.