If you recently caught the latest film of the X-Men franchise, chances are you caught the driverless cargo trucks grazing the highways. Alongside the nod to a classic Ford Bronco in the film, Ford gave us a glimpse of what their “City of Tomorrow” might look like. Self-driving vans, along with drones can soon be plying the highways and byways of our nation.
Addressing the challenge of mobility in urban areas, a team of Ford employees developed the “Autolivery” service for the company’s Last Mile Mobility Challenge. Self-driving vans can transport anything from emergency medical supplies to hard-to-reach urban communities efficiently and cost-effectively. At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, Ford showcased the Autolivery idea, alongside a robotic riding platform called Carr-E and a folding innovative tricycle for going around the city in the TriCiti.
The Ford booth experience gave a scenario of a dinner party preparation with a missing ingredient quickly ordered and delivered in a timely manner that didn’t hold-up the service. A set of data showed that European cities spent up to 91 hours sitting in congested traffic during 2016, the Autolivery service opens the door to how innovations in technology can improve the quality of lives of consumers and help pave the way for a more sustainable future.
Ford intends to have a fully autonomous, SAE level 4-capable vehicle for commercial application in mobility services such as ride sharing, ride hailing or package delivery fleets in 2021. SAE level 4 is a classification for automated vehicles in which the system can control the vehicle in all but a few environments such as severe weather. The driver must enable the automated system only when it is safe to do so. When enabled, driver attention is not required.
“We are challenging ourselves to understand how people live, work and move in urban areas, to inform our research in mobility technologies and solutions,” – Ken Washington, Vice President, Research and Advanced Engineering, Ford Motor Company
