Skip to main content

Indra leads European autonomous driving project

Spain-based consulting and technology company Indra is leading a project that will test autonomous driving on European roads, mainly in the metropolitan areas of Lisbon, Madrid and Paris. These are the three largest cities in the Atlantic Core Network Corridor, which comprises roads that are regarded as priorities for developing Europe's transport infrastructure. Spain's Traffic Department, the Polytechnic University of Madrid, Portugal's National Road Safety Authority, the University of Coimbra, the Ped
November 17, 2016 Read time: 3 mins
Spain-based consulting and technology company 509 Indra is leading a project that will test autonomous driving on European roads, mainly in the metropolitan areas of Lisbon, Madrid and Paris. These are the three largest cities in the Atlantic Core Network Corridor, which comprises roads that are regarded as priorities for developing Europe's transport infrastructure.

Spain's Traffic Department, the Polytechnic University of Madrid, Portugal's National Road Safety Authority, the University of Coimbra, the Pedro Nunes Institute and Inventors for the Digital World in France are the other members of the Autocits consortium, which has a budget of US$2.8 million (€2.6 million) and financing from the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) program.

The Autocits project kicks off on 23 November  with the aim of  assisting the deployment of autonomous vehicles in urban nodes by developing intelligent transport services based on cooperative systems (C-ITS) that will enable vehicles, users and infrastructures to communicate and share information, using the ITS-G5 European standard.

Three pilots will be designed and then developed and deployed in Lisbon, Madrid and Paris in 2017 and 2018 to test the relationship between autonomous vehicles, conventional vehicles and control centres and recommendations will be drawn up on the basis of the results. The ultimate goal is to contribute to the regulatory framework and traffic rules in order to enhance the interoperability of autonomous vehicles while ensuring correct use on all types of roads in every country in Europe and safe coexistence with other vehicles There is currently no European standard and the regulations in each country have a different degree of maturity, with Spain and France at the vanguard.

In addition to receiving input from traffic authorities, operators and universities, Autocits will tie in with other European R&D&I initiatives in this area, such the C-Roads project and the EU EIP Platform.

The pilots in Lisbon, Madrid and Paris will be the first of their kind in the Atlantic Core Network Corridor and among the first in Europe to include tests of autonomous vehicles, from different providers, both closed and open to conventional traffic on urban and arterial roads and highway interchanges. Specifically, the tests will be carried out on the Bus-HOV lane that connects the M-30 beltway in Madrid, on the A-4 highway on the outskirts of Paris, and on Avenues Marginal and Brasilia, two major roads connecting the city of Lisbon to the A-36 highway and other transport infrastructures such as waterways and rail links.

Each pilot will include the deployment of cooperative services with state-of-the-art technology (known as Day 1 services), drawing on the gains from previous R&D&I projects in which the different members of the consortium have been involved.

All three pilots will also include the design and testing of different services that utilise the information that the connected vehicles offer the control centres. In addition, the services and systems tested in one city will be shared with the other two to check that they are interoperable and function properly.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Barrier-free truck tolling for Spain's Basque region
    October 11, 2024
    MLFF system covers 146 lanes and has been processing 1.4 million transactions daily
  • Latest ITS technology upgrades India's toll systems
    November 13, 2012
    An ambitious programme of new and upgraded interoperable toll systems has been launched in India, featuring far-reaching technology developments. David Crawford reports. In April this year, Indian Union Minister for Road Transport & Highways CP Joshi inaugurated a new era of electronic toll collection (ETC) in India when he unveiled the country’s first RFID-based tolling installation. This was at a recently-completed plaza at Chandimandir, near the city of Panchkula in the northern state of Haryana. The sys
  • South Australia opens applications for fund to boost connected, autonomous car technology
    November 16, 2016
    The South Australian Government is inviting applications for a three-year US$7.5 million (AU$10 million) Future Mobility Lab Fund to boost local testing, research and development of connected and autonomous vehicle technologies. From today, companies, industry bodies, research institutions and other organisations are able to submit creative proposals which will accelerate the development and implementation of connected and autonomous vehicle technology, focused on three themes:. Autonomous vehicle te
  • Transportation hub the centre of sustainable urban development
    November 21, 2012
    A marriage of transit, technology and culture is taking shape in Minneapolis, with ITS systems vital to hopes for a sustainable development centred on a hub of public transportation. Construction started in July this year on ‘The Interchange’ – a station in the Midwest US city of Minneapolis claimed as the most spectacular expression yet of the fast-spreading North American concept of transit-oriented development (TOD). Due for completion in 2014, the Interchange is designed as a multi-modal public transpor