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Volkswagen Research is testing autonomous vehicles (AVs) at SAE Level 4 in real driving conditions in the German city of Hamburg. The announcement comes as the fall-out from VW’s ‘Dieselgate’ nightmare – when the company was found to have programmed turbocharged direct injection diesel engines to activate their emissions controls for laboratory tests - putters on. This week the company’s former chief executive Martin Winterkorn was charged with fraud for his involvement. But VW has admitted that the scan

Teledyne Dalsa is to launch three Genie Nano cameras equipped with Sony CMOS sensors which it says can be used for ITS and traffic applications. The Genie Nano 2.4M, M1950 and C1950 models offer a cost-efficient solution for organisations looking to upgrade vision inspection systems from Sony charge-coupled device (CCD) to CMOS imaging, the company adds. According to Teledyne, the M1950 and C1950 enable high-speed image capture without smear or distortion while the 2.4M is built around the Sony Pregi

German urban air taxi manufacturer Volocopter has signed a deal with Honeywell to jointly develop new navigation and automatic landing systems. They will be used on Volocopter’s vertical take-off and landing aircraft - perhaps as early as this year, the companies suggest. “A key goal of our collaboration is to fly a Honeywell inertial measurement-based attitude reference system solution in one of our Volocopters in 2019,” says Jan Hendrik Boelens, chief technology officer, Volocopter. Urban air mob

Ride-hailing platform Karhoo was selected as one of the Gold Prize winners for the European Startup Prize for mobility in a ceremony at the European Parliament in Brussels. Other Gold Prize winners are: Geovelo for its software platform for cyclists, Shotl (mobility platform for public transport operators), Twaice (predictive battery analytics software) and Einride (all-electric autonomous vehicle services). Karhoo was chosen among the 50 finalists by a jury of mobility influencers and thought leade

Three-quarters of Brits do not expect to see artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) or machine learning (ML) used in transport in the next five years, says Fujitsu. Eight out of 10 respondents to a survey for the Japanese tech firm also do not anticipate the use of facial recognition for security purposes in that time. Despite this, the British public welcomes new technology used in transport, with more than a third of respondents saying that technologies such as contactless payments

Early bird registration for ITS World Congress in Singapore is now open and runs until 19 August. Themed ‘Smart Mobility, Empowering Cities’, the 26th World Congress will offer a technical programme and demonstration showcase as well as technical tours that encompass a range of transport modes. Other themes include intelligent, connected and automated vehicles; crowdsourcing and big data analytics; sustainable smart cities; multimodal transport of people and goods; safety for drivers and vulnerable user

The new president of TISPOL, the network of European traffic police forces, has insisted that rules around traffic safety must be harmonised across the continent. "I believe a simplification of regulations is necessary,” says Volker Orben, whose appointment was confirmed at a TISPOL council meeting in Prague. “I will make this a priority when I am working with EU experts and other organisations for traffic safety.” Orben, from the ministry of the interior and sports in Germany's Rhineland-Palatine reg

Kapsch TrafficCom is working with local partner Evocon to provide its urban mobility management solution EcoTrafix to the city of Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. EcoTrafix is a software suite which gathers all traffic data into a real-time dynamic visualisation which, Kapsch says, allows operators to further optimise traffic. The €18 million contract is with the local authority, Instituto Nacional de Tránsito y Transporte Terrestre, and includes a 17-month period for the implementation of ne

Traffic management and enforcement specialist Videalert has launched an electric mobile enforcement bike. The BMW C Evolution e-scooter will enable councils “to enforce a wide range of moving traffic, parking and clean air zone contraventions whilst demonstrating their commitment to reducing emissions”, Videalert says. The company points out that other bike brands can be used “if required” but the BMW has a range of up to 160km plus intelligent energy recuperation when braking and accelerating. I

Lyft is to invest at least $50 million of profits to local transportation initiatives in the US as part of a commitment called Lyft City Works. Starting in Los Angeles, Lyft – which has just begun life on the stock market - says it will support local groups by providing transportation, developing transportation infrastructure and creating clean energy. The company is partnering with mayor Eric Garcetti’s A Bridge Home programme which seeks to tackle homelessness. Lyft will provide transportation to

Lime has launched 100 electric scooters in the Brookline area of Boston, US. It hopes the roll-out will help change current legislation which prohibits electric scooters from operating in Massachusetts. Brookline sits on the border of several Boston neighbourhoods including Fenway-Kenmore and is home to around 6,000 residents. The project comes hot on the heels of Boston city council’s vote to create new guidelines for electric scooters, which - according to Lime - is an indication that the city is

ITS (UK) has developed a ‘Scale of connections for co-operation of connected vehicles’ to help people understand how connected their vehicles are. It mirrors the existing scale for automated vehicles, the SAE international standard, which goes from Level 1 (driver assistance required) to Level 5 (fully autonomous). The ITS (UK) scale, developed by the group’s Connected and Automated Vehicles (C/AV) Forum and supported by the Department for Transport and Highways England, uses letters instead. “Currently a

Private ride-hailing giant Uber, which is aiming to follow rival Lyft in becoming a public company this year, has warned that it may never be profitable. The candid admission comes in a filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as Uber prepares for an initial public offering (IPO) which it reportedly hopes will value the company at $100 billion. This potential IPO figure is some way below the $120bn predicted by analysts just last year. And Uber warns: “We have incurred significant loss

Flowbird has deployed touchscreen terminals at three park and ride sites in the UK city of Durham, allowing users to pay for multiple tickets in a single transaction. The company says its Cale Web Terminal Touch product, installed by scheme operator NSL, is reducing queues at Belmont, Howlands Farm and Sniperley sites. The terminals, installed by scheme operator NSL, allow users to pay via coin, credit/debit card as well as Apple Pay and the Android equivalent. The system’s back office allows us

Daimler Trucks has acquired a majority stake in Torc Robotics in a bid to commercialise highly automated trucks operating at SAE Level 4 on US roads. Roger Nielsen, CEO of Daimler Trucks North America (DTNA), says: “Torc’s Level 4 system has been shown to operate well for both urban and highway driving in rain, snow, fog, and sunshine.” Martin Daum, member of the board of management at Daimler, says the deal will combine the company’s truck hardware with Torc’s “agile software development”. Torc i