Skip to main content

France gives the go ahead for autonomous vehicle testing

The French government has given the go ahead for autonomous vehicle testing on public roads as part of its ‘New Industrial France’ plan to rejuvenate industry in the country. It sees autonomous vehicles as the future of the automotive industry, saying they are an indispensable step towards making mobility, regulation and security of traffic and transport more efficient and more environmentally friendly. The government also views autonomous cars as a way to improve road safety, saying that the cars sh
August 8, 2016 Read time: 1 min
The French government has given the go ahead for autonomous vehicle testing on public roads as part of its ‘New Industrial France’ plan to rejuvenate industry in the country.

It sees autonomous vehicles as the future of the automotive industry, saying they are an indispensable step towards making mobility, regulation and security of traffic and transport more efficient and more environmentally friendly.

The government also views autonomous cars as a way to improve road safety, saying that the cars should have a better reaction capacity than humans who may be tired intoxicated or distracted.

French automotive manufacturer PSA Group, which controls Peugeot and Citroen, has already participated in a 300km autonomous driving demonstration from Paris to Amsterdam during event set up by the Netherlands for European Union transport ministers.

Related Content

  • How MaaS and AVs can cut Oslo traffic
    June 17, 2019
    A new study shows that on-demand AVs and MaaS together could make a significant difference to traffic in Oslo, Norway – but only if ride-share is involved too If you replace today’s traditional private car ownership with a mixture of Mobility as a Service (MaaS) and on-demand autonomous vehicles (AVs) running door-to-door, you could make dramatic cuts in city traffic. That, at least, is the view of researchers from COWI and PTV, who have modelled a variety of future scenarios based on the morning rush h
  • Australia’s laws are ‘not ready for driverless vehicles’
    May 13, 2016
    Australia’s National Transport Commission (NTC) has released Regulatory Options for Automated Vehicles, a discussion paper that finds a number of legislative barriers to increasing vehicle automation. The paper proposes that there are barriers that need to be addressed as soon as possible to ensure clarity around the status of more automated vehicles on Australia’s roads and to support further trials. In the longer term other legislative barriers will need to be addressed to allow fully driverless vehic
  • 5G or not 5G?
    April 16, 2019
    Just a few years ago, there was only one solution in terms of communications protocols for delivering vehicle connectivity. Now, road operators and vehicle manufacturers face choices – including a moral choice, perhaps. Jason Barnes looks at the current state of play There is a debate raging in the ITS world over future communications protocols. Asfinag, Austria’s national strategic road operator, has announced it will from 2020 be using ITS-G5 to support cooperative ITS (C-ITS) applications (‘First thin
  • FHWA collaborative framework on automated driving systems: an explainer
    September 26, 2023
    USDoT FHWA has put together a collaborative framework to help secure the roll-out of automated driving systems in the US. John Harding of FHWA explains the thinking…