Skip to main content

UK science centre gears up to become major driverless car test site following report’s findings

A consortium led by services provider Amey and partners RACE, Oxbotica, Siemens and Westbourne Communications has published the findings of its research into public perceptions of driverless cars. The PAVE (People in Autonomous Vehicles in Urban Environments) project engaged with over 800 people face-to-face through exhibitions, street surveys and workshops with industry experts and 500 feedback forms were collected. The report, which was overseen by Westbourne Communications, indicates that most peop
February 27, 2017 Read time: 2 mins
A consortium led by services provider 6110 Amey and partners RACE, 8307 Oxbotica, 189 Siemens and Westbourne Communications has published the findings of its research into public perceptions of driverless cars.

The PAVE (People in Autonomous Vehicles in Urban Environments) project engaged with over 800 people face-to-face through exhibitions, street surveys and workshops with industry experts and 500 feedback forms were collected.

The report, which was overseen by Westbourne Communications, indicates that most people feel that driverless cars will be the norm at some stage between 2030 and 2050, although the majority of respondents felt there was also not enough information currently available. The majority (63 per cent of respondents) felt positive towards the concept of driverless cars being on our roads, with men being significantly more positive than women. People over 40 were also generally more positive than those under 40.

Other key findings were that most people thought that roads would be safer with driverless car technologies. There was, however, scepticism from many participants that a computer system could ever be fully prepared for the complexity of urban environments and that it was unlikely that cars would ever be 100 per cent driverless. Most people acknowledged the potential economic and environmental benefits of driverless cars, but the most popular benefit of the technology was that it could allow greater freedom for older or disabled people.

The project is now focused on preparing Culham Science Centre as a major test site for driverless cars, following several months of initial trials of the technology there.

Related Content

  • Half of passengers ‘would pay for better technology’
    August 2, 2013
    David Crawford considers the finding of a passenger attitude survey in nine cities worldwide. Three quarters of regular users of public transport in nine capital and other major cities worldwide believe that electronic ticketing would make travel easier; while an overwhelming 92% would welcome paperless travel in any form, according to a recent consumer survey from global management consultants Accenture. Of the 4,500 urban travellers aged over-18 who were quizzed, some 90% routinely used public transport.
  • New Yorkers and Californians ready for autonomous cars – Volvo survey
    July 8, 2016
    A Volvo Cars survey of 50,000 global drivers found that nine out of ten New Yorkers and 86 per cent of residents in California feel that autonomous cars could make life easier. The survey, Future of Driving survey, indicated that residents of Pennsylvania, Illinois and Texas are less convinced than the average consumer about the safety benefits of autonomous driving. Only about half of Illinois respondents would trust an autonomous car to make decisions about safety, ten per cent less than the national a
  • We need to talk about AVs
    October 15, 2021
    Will driverless vehicles lead to more deaths and destroy more lives than their manual counterparts? Transport writer Colin Sowman argues that they will
  • First trial of driverless vehicles, regulatory review launched
    February 11, 2015
    The first trial of driverless cars is launched today in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, London. The Greenwich Automated Transport Environment project (GATEway) is one of three projects chosen by the Government to deliver demonstrations of automated vehicles in urban environments. The trial officially gets underway at Greenwich Peninsula today, attended by Business Secretary Vince Cable and Transport Minister Claire Perry, who also officially launched a regulatory review and the UK Government’s ‘Intro