Skip to main content

Ohio tests self driving truck

A self-driving truck developed by Otto has been travelling on two Ohio roads after state officials announced details of new investments to support innovative transportation technology, says Associated Press. The vehicle is travelling on a 35-mile stretch of US Route 33 and in central Ohio between Dublin and East Liberty, home to the Transportation Research Center, an independent testing facility. It travels in regular traffic, with a driver in the cab to intervene should problems arise. Officials say
December 1, 2016 Read time: 2 mins
A self-driving truck developed by Otto has been travelling on two Ohio roads after state officials announced details of new investments to support innovative transportation technology, says Associated Press.

The vehicle is travelling on a 35-mile stretch of US Route 33 and in central Ohio between Dublin and East Liberty, home to the Transportation Research Center, an independent testing facility. It travels in regular traffic, with a driver in the cab to intervene should problems arise.

Officials say that section of Route 33, a four-lane, divided road, is an important piece of autonomous vehicle research in the state and will become a corridor where new technologies can be safely tested in real-life traffic, aided by a fibre-optic cable network and sensor systems slated for installation next year.

The self-driving truck is also expected to travel next week on part of the Ohio Turnpike.

The turnpike's executive director said in August that officials were moving toward allowing testing of self-driving vehicles on the 241-mile toll road, a heavily travelled connector between the East Coast and Chicago.

Related Content

  • Drivers ‘need reassurance on safety, cybercrime and terrorism if truck platoons are to deliver’
    August 29, 2017
    Commenting on the UK Department of Transport announcement regarding trialling of platoons of self-driving lorries on England's motorways, independent road safety charity is advising there must be more reassurances on issues such as cyber attacks as well as basic road safety needs such as telling other drivers which trucks are in the platoon. The trial, due for 2018, will see up to three lorries travel in automated convoys which will be controlled by a driver in the lead vehicle in a bid to cut congestion an
  • 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
  • Video developments in automatic incident detection
    May 22, 2012
    David Crawford reviews technological progress with automatic incident detection Highway safety problems are likely to intensify given recent predictions of future traffic growth across the world. In the United States, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports that currently over 30,000 deaths and 1.5 million injuries occur as the result of accidents on the nation’s roads each year. These figures will increase with the number of kilometres travelled each year in the US expected to gr
  • Autopilot highlights shape of Things
    March 30, 2020
    Driverless vehicles require rich data to operate safely, and a European consortium is harnessing the Internet of Things to help.