Volvo will have 100 autonomous cars on the road in its home city of Gothenburg by 2017, Marcus Rothoff, autonomous driving programme director, told the SMMTConnect conference. They will be operated by lease customers on their normal daily commute.
The carmaker has been working with Gothenburg city authorities, Linholdmen Science Park and the Swedish Transport Administration on its Drive Me programme which will use main commuting roads in the city.
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Rothoff said: “These are urban highway roads, dual carriageway with no pedestrians or cyclists and where speed is limited to 50mph (80km/h). This is technically feasible with current sensors and technology and we plan to start the autonomous driving programme by 2017.”
He added: “The car opened up the opportunity to travel and has become a symbol of freedom. That’s the way we want it to stay but the reality is being stuck in traffic and the frustration involved in that. When it becomes no longer time efficient and boring you become distracted and that leads to safety issues. Many customers already tell us they want the autonomous car now.
“At Volvo we don’t just focus on safety, we are safety. The company mission is that by 2020 no one will be killed or seriously injured in a Volvo. Long term we will have a Volvo that doesn’t crash – the only way we can get customers to trust us with autonomous driving is by making cars that do not crash.”
