Mercedes to test autonomous vehicles at secure US Navy base

Mercedes-Benz is to begin testing its autonomous cars on a unique site in California, at the Contra Costa Transportation Authority Concord Naval Weapons Station (CNWS), the largest test bed site in the US. Since mid-September the company has also held an official licence, issued by California, to test self-driving vehicles on public roads. The additional testing opportunities provided by the CNWS site will enable the company to significantly expand the scope of its research activities. With a test ar
October 3, 2014 Read time: 2 mins
1685 Mercedes-Benz is to begin testing its autonomous cars on a unique site in California, at the Contra Costa Transportation Authority Concord Naval Weapons Station (CNWS), the largest test bed site in the US.

Since mid-September the company has also held an official licence, issued by California, to test self-driving vehicles on public roads. The additional testing opportunities provided by the CNWS site will enable the company to significantly expand the scope of its research activities.

With a test area covering 2,100 acres, the CNWS site is currently the largest and most secure test bed site in the US. It features a network of surfaced roads resembling an urban grid plan, making it an ideal location for testing autonomous vehicles in surroundings that are as close to real life as they can be. For security reasons the testing ground, which is operated by the US Navy in conjunction with the City of Concord and the Contra Costa County Transportation Authority, is not accessible to the public.

“We can use the test site in Concord, California to run simulation tests with self-driving vehicles in a secure way, including specific hazardous situations", explained Dr Axel Gern, head of autonomous driving at 5403 Mercedes-Benz Research and Development North America, Inc. (MBRDNA). "Taken in conjunction with the results of our test drives on public roads, these tests will help us with the ongoing development of our autonomous cars." He emphasised, however, that the focus of research continues to lie in tests undertaken in a real-life environment.
Location Based Systems

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Demonstration of first German A9 motorway safety project
    November 10, 2015
    In the first project of the ‘digital A9 motorway test bed’ to show how vehicles on a motorway can share hazard information, Continental, Deutsche Telekom, Fraunhofer ESK and Nokia Networks have carried out a real-time demonstration of communication between vehicles via the Deutsche Telecom LTE cell network. The project, which aims to improve road safety and traffic management, involved upgrading Deutsche Telekom's existing LTE network at sections of the A9 motorway test bed with Nokia Networks’ mobile e
    Read More
  • Electronic toll collection: Change is in the air
    November 7, 2024
    Trends in technology plus users’ comfort in adopting new advances indicate that the environment for a new electronic toll collection architecture is evolving. Hal Worrall considers what this might look like
    Read More
  • Toyota expands safety research funding
    September 5, 2014
    With the goal of making tomorrow’s driving safer, Toyota’s Collaborative Safety Research Center (CSRC) announced that it is significantly expanding its mission to advance automotive safety research, with a new focus on the challenges and opportunities that evolving vehicle technologies will present over the next decade.
    Read More
  • Consortium gets £4.7m to investigate AV technologies
    April 26, 2018
    An industry group led by Jaguar Land Rover has been given a multi-million pound grant to increase the road performance and safety of autonomous vehicle (AV) technologies. The AutopleX consortium – which also includes INRIX, Highways England, Siemens, Transport for West Midlands and University of Warwick - is to receive £4.7 million as part of the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles’ CAV3 competition. It is tasked with developing fully- and semi-automated vehicle technologies through simulation an
    Read More

Highlighted Content