Driverless Vans Complete 8,000 Mile Journey

On October 28th, two minivans arrived amidst much fanfare, to the World Expo in Shanghai, after completing an epic 8,000-mile (13,000 km) voyage across two continents in 92 days. What was so epic about the journey? Just the fact that it was the longest single trip ever made by autonomous or driverless vans.

The brainchild of The Artificial Vision and Intelligence Company of Parma University, The Vislab Intercontinental Autonomous Challenge, was a project aimed to demonstrate that it is possible to move goods between continents, without creating pollution and without any need for human intervention.

To execute it, two vans, powered by electric batteries and solar energy and, equipped with stereo cameras, laser scanners, a 180-degree panoramic vision system, computers and actuators, set off from Milan, Italy on July 21st. Supporting them were two back-up vehicles, 4 trucks to provide mechanical support and accommodation and 2 media trucks recording everything and plotting their course.

The lead autonomous vehicle was programmed to drive by itself on certain sections of the route, while conducting experiments on it how good its sensor and decision making was and collecting data at the same time. A team member rode in the van, ready to take the wheel in case of emergencies or when the route was not very clear. However, every time a human driver intervened, the number of miles he/she drove was logged and deducted from the number of miles driven.

The second van was 100% autonomous. When the lead van was in sight, it followed it visually. if not visible for some reason, either because another vehicle had cut in between or it was on a curved road, the second vehicle used GPS to guide it along.

As would be expected, the journey was not completely without glitches. There were a few technical hiccups like a power surge that caused multiple battery failures bringing one of the vans to a standstill, as well as, loss of satellite communications for short periods of time. They also had two incidents of runaway vans, both caused by human error - One when a tired team member forgot to disengage the navigation system and another when curious reporters pressed buttons they shouldn't have. Luckily, in both cases the damage was contained in time and nobody was injured.

However, bigger than the technical issues were the bureaucratic ones, especially at the border checks between Russia/Kazakhstan and Kazakhstan/ China, where the officials were baffled by the driverless vehicles.

But given that the vans traveled for 92 days and went through a terrain of mountains and deserts, and even gave a couple of hitchhikers a ride, the project was considered to be extremely successful.

However, before you fire your chauffer (A.K.A. your mum), just keep in mind that even Vislab, who developed the technology behind these smart vans, does not envision driverless cars to become a common phenomenon for at least another two decades!

Sources:gizmag.com,manonthemove.com