Research shows increase in AV motion sickness

Passengers are suffering from queasiness in highly autonomous vehicles (AVs), according to academic research.
November 11, 2019 Read time: 2 mins

The UK’s University of Coventry said its data showed an increase in motion sickness from passengers in such driverless vehicles.

Speaking during his presentation The effect of human factors on the development of connected and automated mobility at last week’s 8268 Highways UK, Andrew Parkes, research director, said: “We have research going forward in terms of motion characteristics, vibration characters and sound characteristics to bring this back down to acceptable levels.”

Additionally, he predicts there will be rapid advances in highly autonomous first- and last-mile pods, but insists that “proper research” needs to be carried out to produce vehicles where people feel safe in the vehicle - and also in understanding whether they are prepared to pay.

Parkes also recognises that interesting work is being carried out in platooning, in which AVs normally operate in a single file.

“We may want to develop adaptive structures so that different vehicles actually adopt a different shape of profile depending on where they are in the platoon,” he continues. “Theoretically we have adaptive structures where we can change the shape but doing that in an efficient and cost-effective way is what we are looking at going forward.”

However, Parkes warns that only paying attention to the “technology push” in areas such as sensors and artificial intelligence can slow down implementation.

“A lot of it is the user acceptance, human factors and business models which are the real keys to success,” he concluded.

Urban Traffic Control

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • A new way to manage parking demand
    July 21, 2021
    Parking permit changes at one US campus could provide a model for encouraging active travel options post-Covid – and for transit ticketing adjustments as commuting patterns change
    Read More
  • Developments in urban traffic management and control
    February 1, 2012
    Mark Cartwright, Centaur Consulting, discusses developments in urban traffic management and control. Despite the concept of UTMC (Urban Traffic Management and Control) having been around for some years now, there remains a significant rump of confusion as to its relationship with its similar-sounding cousin UTC (Urban Traffic Control). To many people, the two are one and the same. However, this is not the case.
    Read More
  • PTV simulates York’s future
    August 26, 2021
    PTV’s predictive software modelling is helping one of England’s historic cities to improve traffic flow
    Read More
  • ITS benefits escape public
    June 8, 2015
    John Kendall considers the public’s awareness of the benefits of ITS. While the results of developing ITS technology may be clear to readers of ITS International, there is far less evidence that drivers have any appreciation of what the technology is doing for them. So how aware are drivers of the developments that are designed to make their journeys less congested and safer?
    Read More

Highlighted Content