©Mark Ollig
Are you ready to hop aboard and take a ride in a
battery-powered shuttle bus with no human driver, or even a steering wheel?
Don’t be nervous. A certified human shuttle operator
will be aboard providing customer service for the passengers, as well as the
human intervention of the autonomous bus ride if it’s needed.
This driverless, fare-free, 12-passenger shuttle
travels at comfortable cruising speeds averaging 10 to 12 miles per hour, with
a top speed of 20 miles per hour.
The city council of Arlington, TX is currently
operating two self-driving electric vehicles under a lease agreement with
EasyMile headquartered in Toulouse France, with offices in Denver, CO.
Arlington’s self-driving shuttle service is called
Milo, meaning “mile zero” or the point at which shuttle passengers arrive or
depart from an event’s location.
“Arlington is the first local government in the US to
offer ongoing autonomous vehicle service to the general public,” said Arlington
Mayor Jeff Williams.
These self-driving vehicles are shuttling people
back-and-forth over non-public vehicular transportation roadways and trails
within the city’s Entertainment District, where many events take place.
Arlington is exploring the use of autonomous
transportation software and hardware technology, and is conducting a one-year
pilot program which began in August.
Part of the purpose of the Milo pilot program is to
familiarize the public with driverless vehicle technology, according to Bill
Verkest, Arlington Transportation Advisory Committee Chair.
One of the routes Milo travels is the paved trail
system connecting to AT&T Stadium, where the Dallas Cowboys professional
football team plays.
Information about Milo posted on the City of
Arlington’s website includes the following:
• Milo shuttles are free to use, wheelchair accessible,
and can hold up to 12 passengers, (or 10 passengers plus one wheelchair).
• Shuttle rides are available along select
Entertainment District off-street trails during stadium and ballpark events.
• Although Milo runs autonomously, a certified operator
will always be onboard.
• Milo has a maximum speed of about 20 miles per hour
and can accelerate, brake, and steer by itself.
• Milo’s driverless technology comes with collision
avoidance systems that detect other vehicles, cyclists, pedestrians, and
obstacles.
• Milo will operate by following a pre-programmed route
on trails, not city streets.
• Milo includes air-conditioning and an
automatically-deploying ramp for people using a wheelchair or those pushing a
stroller.
“The experts are saying every day there is something
new being invented in transportation. It’s a great opportunity for us to do
these pilot projects, for us to actually test them in our community and for our
citizens to be able to look at them and see if they work here and what their
opinion of it is,” Arlington Mayor Jeff Williams said about Milo during his
2017 State of the City address Oct. 18.
“We want to see how this technology performs, where it
is best utilized and how it can be harnessed to potentially serve the city’s
transportation needs in the future,” he added.
I encourage you to watch the City of Arlington’s video,
“Arlington Unveils Milo Autonomous Shuttle Service,” at http://bit.ly/2uOqfwV.
Another video of Milo in action can be seen at
http://www.arlington-tx.gov/visitors/milo.
EasyMile was founded in 2014, and specializes in
providing software powering autonomous vehicles and end-user smart mobility
solutions. Its website is http://easymile.com.
Follow me on Twitter at @bitsandbytes, and visit my
blog page at https://bitscolumn.blogspot.com.
(The above photograph is used with permission from the City of Arlington, TX)