News

The Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads (TMR) in Australia has chosen Unisys to provide facial image processing technology for the state’s smart card driver licences.

Microsoft is inviting autonomous vehicle (AV) start-ups to take part in a programme which offers access up to $120,000 of free Azure cloud computing platform. The Microsoft for Startups: Autonomous Driving programme will provide participants with access to Azure’s autonomous driving capabilities and one-to-one sessions with Microsoft cloud engineers. The company says members will have opportunities to expand their network by joining Microsoft’s autonomous driving ecosystem. Microsoft says current partner

Business life may be about to get trickier for transportation network companies following the passing of a new law in California which aims to give gig economy workers more rights. Assembly Bill 5 (AB5), which is due to come into effect in January next year, says that “a person providing labour or services for remuneration shall be considered an employee rather than an independent contractor” - unless three points are proved. One, that “the hiring entity demonstrates that the person is free from the con

Swedish telematics company TelliQ has acquired part of GPS tech firm Axtech in a move which it says increases its customer base by 20%.

TelliQ will take over the Axtech’s RedKnow Driver Log, which documents vehicle routes, and a fleet management solution called Live Pro Fleet.

Åsa Eklund, CEO of Axtech, says TelliQ’s “product range and industry knowledge in the fields of Internet of Things and connected vehicles will provide our customers with good and modern solutions and products”.

StreetLight Data is making annual average hourly traffic (AAHT) counts and monthly annual daily traffic (MADT) counts available to transportation planners via its cloud-based software platform InSight. The company says AAHT and MADT help identify and forecast traffic conditions for specific days or months of the year. StreetLight co-founder Laura Schewel says: “Transportation planners have always found it difficult to deliver accurate monthly and daily traffic data due to technological constraints, increa

Ertico – ITS Europe has announced it is to hold the first-ever Central Eastern European Congress next year. Hosted by the city of Kazan, in south-west Russia, the event will focus on cooperation with Russia, the Commonwealth of Independent States (which comprises a number of countries formed after the break-up of the Soviet Union) and Central Eastern countries, says Ertico. It will take place in Kazan, Tatarstan on 21-24 September 2020 and there is a preview of the event in the city next month, on 3-4 Oct

The National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) has updated a guide which it says helps US cities regulate and manage micromobility companies. NACTO president Seleta Reynolds says: “NACTO’s guidance provides crucial steps for cities to ensure that new mobility options benefit the public good, from best-practice data management to real-world examples on coordinating across neighbouring municipalities.” Guidelines for Regulating Shared Micromobility covers options for regulation for microm

A connected vehicle project in the US state of Wyoming has developed an open-source application to allow third parties to monitor safety along the I-80 highway. The Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDoT) Connected Vehicle Pilot includes the deployment of 75 roadside units (RSUs) along 400 miles of I-80. WYDoT’s app allows authorised transportation management centre (TMC) operators to monitor and manage each RSU on the route – and can also be used to let the travelling public know what is happening.

Volocopter has raised €50 million to help commercially launch its VoloCity air taxi within the next few years. Automotive company Zhejiang Geely Holding led the funding round and is partnering with Volocopter to develop urban air mobility in China. Li Shufu, Geely Holding chairman, says: “Geely is transitioning from being an automotive manufacturer to a mobility technology group, investing in and developing a wide range of next-generation technologies.” Looking ahead, Volocopter expects to close

BlackBerry has extended its agreement with Jaguar Land Rover to provide artificial intelligence and machine learning technology for the automakers connected vehicles.

A connected vehicle project in the US state of Wyoming has developed an open-source application to allow third parties to monitor safety along the I-80 highway. The Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDoT) Connected Vehicle Pilot includes the deployment of 75 roadside units (RSUs) along 400 miles of I-80. WYDoT’s app allows authorised transportation management centre (TMC) operators to monitor and manage each RSU on the route – and can also be used to let the travelling public know what is happening.

Nearly 50% of all car trips in the most congested US metropolitan areas are less than three miles and could be replaced by micromobility services, says Inrix. The company analysed data points from connected devices to rank the top US, UK and German cities where micromobility services (shared bikes, electric bikes and electric scooters) could have the most significant impact on replacing vehicle trips. Findings from the National Association of City Transportation Officials estimated that scooters are

TomTom has partnered with Hella Algaia, a supplier of computer vision software, to update its high definition (HD) map in real-time using crowdsourced data from vehicles.

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) must be part of future transport policies which prioritise efficiency and fairness, according to senior transport executives in the US and Canada. The second edition of the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO)’s Blueprint for Autonomous Urbanism sets out what it calls “the concrete steps that will need to be taken to ensure an equitable, people-first city”. NACTO is a collection of 81 North American cities and transit agencies which exchange ideas and coo

A spat over how dangerous the UK’s all lane running (ALR) or ‘smart’ motorways are has broken out between Highways England and a leading motoring organisation. Smart motorways do not have hard shoulders, instead relying on emergency areas at intervals to provide refuge for stranded motorists. The AA recently highlighted Stationary Vehicle Detection, a Highways England report published in March 2016, which looks at how long it takes to identify a vehicle broken down in a live lane of smart motorway when s