Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) has confirmed that it will begin testing self-driving buses on Dubai’s streets early next year, with the service set to enter service within the next five years to be ready before 2030. The buses will operate based on the existing infrastructure, which is suitable given the plans to expand the emirate’s streets.
In detail, Khalid Al Awadhi, Director of the Transportation Systems Department at the Public Transport Agency of the Roads and Transport Authority in Dubai, revealed that the operational trials of self-driving buses will begin early next year, noting that self-driving transportation is among the means that the Roads and Transport Authority is focusing on in light of the Emirate of Dubai’s orientation towards future mobility.
“The Roads and Transport Authority in Dubai has entered into partnerships with two companies, one French and the other Chinese, to implement the project,” Al Awadhi said in statements to journalists on the sidelines of the 30th session of the International Conference and Exhibition on Intelligent Transport Systems, which concluded the day before yesterday. “We are currently working on setting the necessary standards for testing the buses, because the development of self-driving buses is not the same as the development we see in other small self-driving vehicles called ‘robotaxis’; most companies worldwide are competing on smaller vehicles, which are taxis.”
Al Awadhi added: “The Authority has previously launched the Dubai World Challenge for Self-Driving Transport to select companies that will participate in the self-driving bus project. It is expected that buses will start operating on specific routes in light of the existence of public bus routes in the Emirate of Dubai. Therefore, we will seek to exploit them in the best way with the entry of self-driving buses into service, and then the service will become fully automated.”
“As for the infrastructure of the buses, Al Awadhi said: “The self-driving buses will operate with the same infrastructure as the existing public buses, so we will benefit from the presence of specific routes and stations integrated with other means of transportation. We have a plan to expand in the city, which will help us introduce these means very quickly, but at the same time we will need to establish electric charging stations, because these buses will be self-driving and electric at the same time, which is what the Dubai government is currently working on, represented by the Roads and Transport Authority in cooperation with the Dubai Electricity and Water Authority.”
Al-Awadhi explained that the Authority has developed plans for the trials during the coming year, and based on them the exact date for its entry into service will be determined, but we have a target to enter service before 2030, which will be based on feasibility studies and test results to determine the confirmed date for its operation.
Regarding the challenges of operating buses, he pointed out that there are a number of challenges to operating the project, the first of which is the small number of companies working in the field of self-driving buses; there are not many options and multiple companies to compete with. Secondly, buses as a means of transportation face a challenge due to their size, because their movement on the roads is not as easy as small vehicles, in addition to the third challenge, which is the weather, which is a major challenge for all different technologies and vehicles.
Al Awadhi stressed that buses are the third largest means of public transport in the Emirate of Dubai, and converting them into self-driving buses in the coming years is a priority for the Authority, noting that there is maturity in the technology of self-driving transportation in the field of buses, which Dubai seeks to benefit from in the best possible way.
#Trial #operation #selfdriving #buses #Dubai #early #year