Self-Driving Buses in Nessland

[Wraith]

The bus stops, and then moves forward, but the driver's nowhere to be seen.

Two self-driving minibuses began plying the roads of Helsinki this week -- in real traffic.

The small electric buses were developed by a French company EasyMile and can transport up to nine passengers. They are able to travel at speeds of up to 25 miles per hour, although they are restricted to seven miles per hour during their trial period.

The buses are being used to move passengers between two busy public transit stations in the city's waterfront Hernesaari district. A driver is stationed on board in case of an emergency.

Other cities have experimented with self-driving buses, but the trials often take place in controlled environments.

The project is part of Helsinki's ambitious plan to make car ownership in the city obsolete within a decade. The city already has a very efficient public transport system, but it is also developing an on-demand mobility program, which would allow people to use integrated mobile apps to book and pay for any trip by bus, train, taxi, bicycle and car sharing.

Helsinki's Deputy Mayor Pekka Sauri said the city wants to be internationally renowned for smart urban transport solutions. "We hope more companies and research institutions in Helsinki will be developing self-driving buses," he said in a statement.

The buses will make their debut in two other Finnish cities -- Espoo and Tampere -- later this fall. They'll be taken out of action after the first snowfall, but then return to the roads in the spring.

Finnish law does not require a driver to be present in vehicles, easing the way for self-driving transport options.

"The law doesn't actually require it, it's the way it has been written historically, but the government has embraced it in relation to self-driving vehicles," said project manager Harri Santamala.

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Cool, although having a driver anyways seems to make the whole thing a bit pointless. I'm assuming they plan on dropping the driver after they can prove these things are safe.

[Lewkowski]

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Cool, although having a driver anyways seems to make the whole thing a bit pointless. I'm assuming they plan on dropping the driver after they can prove these things are safe.

That has to be the plan otherwise what is the point?

This is cool, one of the needless causes of death is traffic accidents - human drivers to be frank... suck balls.

[Flixy]

Problem is that so far computers were worse at it (at least driving solo - assistance is a different matter). The similar tests over here a bunch of years ago, the buses could see traffic and standing pedestrians but had trouble spotting pedestrians crossing or something like that.

[Wraith]

The tech has advanced a lot in the past bunch of years, though. It's actually improving very quickly. I don't know about what they're running specifically, but Google's cars at least are supposed to have no problems with pedestrians, even surprise pedestrians that pop out from behind an obstruction.

As the scale of rollout increases though, there's inevitably going to be accidents. As long as they're less frequent than with human drivers, it should be considered a win.

[Ominous Gamer]

Last year Google's cars reported almost 300 failures. In the scope of things that's not a lot but when you're dealing with the public it's a concern.

When you're dealing with the public the driver is mainly there to stop all the sex and drug use.

[RandBlade]

That has to be the plan otherwise what is the point?

This is cool, one of the needless causes of death is traffic accidents - human drivers to be frank... suck balls.

The point could be to get a better driven vehicle and free the driver up to be more of a conductor.

[Timbuk2]

Indeed.

As with the Docklands Light Railway trains in East London, they're driverless. There is occasionally a 'controller' who sometimes takes over the controls, and sometimes acts as a sort of conductor/overseer away from the controls. At other non-peak times there is no staff present on the trains whatsoever.

[Hazir]

I am ok with the concept of driverless public transport, but I am not so fond of this trend of making the system entirely automated. No amount of cctv is going to keep things safe if there's no staff present most of the time. I see this on the suburban metro stations in Amsterdam; if someone pulls up his hoodie on the way down I know he's going to leave the station without paying but with a well placed kick against the emergency exit door. It does not seem like a big thing but it has a negative effect on the feeling of security.