New Zealand, and other small markets such as ours, have a big part to play in the roll out of Intelligent Transport Systems around the world, according to one of the world’s leading experts on the subject.
Dr Peter Sweatman is in New Zealand with the Ministry of Transport and ITS New Zealand, and spoke to large groups in Auckland and Wellington this week about the subject.
Until the end of 2015, when he left to become a consultant, Dr Sweatman was director of the University of Michigan’s Transport Research Institute (UMTRI). UMTRI and the newly established MCity, an artificial city research facility that Dr Sweatman helped establish, are at the forefront of research into implementing ITS technologies.
In particular, in 2013 and 2014, UMTRI conducted what is still the largest trial of nearly 3000 connected vehicles around the streets of Ann Arbor, Michigan, on behalf of the US Department of Federal Highway Administration. More recently, companies including Ford, have begun testing autonomous vehicles at MCity.
While such large-scale testing is being driven in places like the United States and Europe, New Zealand is well placed to assist.
“I think countries like New Zealand and Australia have a special role and opportunity, because in other parts of the world there are a fair bit of chaos around how government agencies and various jurisdictions are involved in the deployments,” Dr Sweatman says.
He believes in our corner of the world government agencies are happier to take a leading role. Having fewer levels of governance helps too.
He notes the study in Ann Arbor, with just 3000 vehicles, required buy-in from four different government groups.
“The ability to setup the world’s definitive on road test environment for ITS is right here,” he says.
New Zealand’s relatively undeveloped national roading network amplifies the effect of such a system.
“I think it is even more important because this technology allows you to get the most out of what you have got – and if what you have got is not up to the mark it is even more important.”
The issue facing New Zealand of varying radio frequencies in vehicles coming from our multiple source markets will likely be solved in the future.
“We already have cognitive radios, where they automatically adapt to different wireless regimes – I think some solution like that will certainly come about.”
Dr Sweatman says while government involvement in roll out is important, third parties, particularly universities, are important to the process.
DIESELtalk notes the case of an earlier ITS trial in New Zealand that struggled to get buy-in from trucking operators. Read about that HERE
“You don’t need the government doing the convening; you need a trusted third party, such as a university,” he says. “If not, some will think ‘The government is going to learn something to use against me’.”
