Skip to main content

Australia launches self-driving vehicle pilot

The Victorian Government in Australia has partnered with Bosch, the Transport Accident Commission and VicRoads to build the first vehicle developed in Australia with self-driving capabilities. The US$900,000 (AU$1.2 million) investment has helped Bosch develop the self-driving vehicle, which has been designed to navigate roads with or without driver input and includes technology such as inbuilt sensors and cameras to detect and avoid hazards such as pedestrians, cyclists and other vehicles. Trials of
October 6, 2016 Read time: 2 mins
The Victorian Government in Australia has partnered with Bosch, the Transport Accident Commission and 4728 VicRoads to build the first vehicle developed in Australia with self-driving capabilities.

The US$900,000 (AU$1.2 million) investment has helped Bosch develop the self-driving vehicle, which has been designed to navigate roads with or without driver input and includes technology such as inbuilt sensors and cameras to detect and avoid hazards such as pedestrians, cyclists and other vehicles.

Trials of the vehicle will be used to inform the development of regulations and infrastructure to enable similar self-driving cars to operate on Victorian roads when they become commercially available in the future.

The trial will also help VicRoads better understand how motorists use self-driving vehicles and the changes needed to prepare for the future.

Traffic management experts and urban planners will get a better understanding of the need to reconfigure road networks and traffic signals to optimise safety and the flow of vehicles across the network.

The government believe self-driving vehicles are an important step to reducing road trauma with 90 per cent of crashes resulting from human error. It says the introduction of highly-automated vehicles has the potential to help Victoria achieve its Towards Zero vision – a future free of deaths and serious injuries on the state’s roads.

Related Content

  • April 5, 2017
    Autonomous vehicle takes to the road in UK
    An autonomous shuttle is to take to the road as part of the UK GATEway Project (Greenwich Automated Transport Environment) research into public acceptance of, and attitudes towards, driverless vehicles. In the latest phase of the GATEway Project a prototype shuttle will begin driverless navigation of a 2km route around the Greenwich Peninsula, using advanced sensors and state-of-the-art autonomy software to detect and avoid obstacles whilst carrying members of the public participating in the research stu
  • January 27, 2012
    Integrate systems to reduce roadside infrastructure
    David Crawford reviews promising current developments. Instrumentation of the road infrastructure has grown to become one of the most dynamic sectors of the ITS industry. Drivers for its deployment include global concerns over the commercial and environmental pressures of traffic congestion, the importance of keeping drivers informed throughout their journeys, and the need to reduce accident rates and promote the safety of all road users, for example by enforcing traffic safety rules.
  • March 16, 2016
    Observing driver behaviour in real traffic condition
    The EU’s UDRIVE project will investigate driver behaviour in terms of road safety and the decarbonisation of road transport, as Nicole van Nes and Silvia Curbelo explain. There were nearly 25,700 fatalities on European Union (EU) roads in 2014 or, to look it another way, roughly 70 people are killed in traffic accidents on European roads every day - and many more are injured. Around 22% of the fatalities are pedestrians, 15% will be motorcycle riders and 8% cyclists. So despite the improvements in road safe
  • December 6, 2013
    Transmax trials emergency vehicle ‘green wave’
    Existing equipment used in Australian emergency vehicle ‘green wave’ trial. Despite the lights and sirens, accidents between the motoring public and emergency vehicles on their way to/from the scene of an incident are relatively frequent. Figures from various sources indicate that road accidents are the second most frequent cause of death for on-duty fire fighter fatalities and that more than 90% of ambulance and fire engine accidents occur when the lights are on and the sirens wailing. Other studies indica