Skip to main content

Engineers and inventors of the future at World Congress

Tomorrow’s engineers, inventors and transport system planners showed their ideas, visions and solutions for dealing with current and future transport challenges to delegates at this week’s ITS World Congress. Displays outside the main exhibition area included the Young Students Design Your Future Challenge, and the Victorian Model Solar Vehicle Challenge, with students from local primary and secondary schools working with Museum Victoria’s Scienceworks to present their ideas. Jonathan Shearer, Scienceworks’
October 12, 2016 Read time: 2 mins
Scienceworks’ Jonathan Shearer with kids from local schools
Tomorrow’s engineers, inventors and transport system planners showed their ideas, visions and solutions for dealing with current and future transport challenges to delegates at this week’s 6456 ITS World Congress. Displays outside the main exhibition area included the Young Students Design Your Future Challenge, and the Victorian Model Solar Vehicle Challenge, with students from local primary and secondary schools working with Museum Victoria’s Scienceworks to present their ideas. Jonathan Shearer, Scienceworks’ STEM program co-ordinator, said the Design Your Future Challenge, asked students from four local schools to come up with ideas to make transport around Melbourne safer and more efficient.

“We had a whole bunch of good ideas, including proposals to redesign local bridges, robots directing traffic at dangerous intersections, maglev trains, and apps for more efficient transport planning.

“All these ideas have been presented at the concept stage during the World Congress,” said Shearer.

Also on show were working models from the Model Solar Vehicle Challenge, an annual national competition where students work with engineers to design and build their own solar powered vehicles. These displays and demonstrations are part of the World Congress every day until Friday.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Columbia brings the noise to VRUs
    May 7, 2020
    ‘Twalking’ – the practice of staring at a smartphone screen while walking – may be a matter for wry amusement for the non-addicted, but is potentially hazardous to the phone users. A US research project may have found a solution, finds Alan Dron
  • New large-scale initiative towards Europe smart cities
    December 18, 2012
    The Smart Cities Stakeholder Platform, part of the Smart Cities and Community Partnership, which was launched by the European Commission in early 2012, works as an advisory body for the EU’s leading research initiative on the future of cities. Members include technology producers, energy providers and urban visionaries. The open-invitation group is already 1,000 members strong, and is currently building a database of high-tech solutions to help build the smart cities of tomorrow. The ideas, coming from the
  • Dynamic charging boosts electric vehicles’ potential
    December 16, 2014
    With an increasing need to use electric vehicles in city centres to reduce pollution, David Crawford looks at various solutions to power delivery. The UN’s September 2014 Climate Summit has added fresh momentum to the drive to increase urban electric vehicle (EV) takeup. It has launched the Urban Electric Mobility Initiative, which wants to see EVs accounting for 30% of all urban travel by 2030, and make cities worldwide more friendly to their use. Encouragingly, the plan is being well supported by commerci
  • Report urges US$25 billion transport improvement plan
    August 6, 2014
    The One North report, produced by the city regions of Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle and Sheffield in the UK, puts forward a strategic proposition for transport in the north of the country. The US$16.8-US$25.2 billion plan urges major changes in connectivity and capacity between the northern cities over the next 15 years and proposes optimisation of strategic highway capacity, a new high speed trans-Pennine rail route and improved city region rail networks interconnected with HS2 services, new inte