In the UK’s largest trial of connected and autonomous vehicle technology a consortium including Jaguar Land Rover, Ford, Tata and Arup have this week (Thursday 22nd March) demonstrated a range of connected and autonomous vehicle technologies on the streets of Milton Keynes.

The UK Autodrive project, which is being led by Arup, has been using public roads and car parks in the Buckinghamshire “new town”, famed for its grid system of roads, to explore how connected and autonomous vehicles could reduce congestion and improve safety on the UK’s roads.
Centrepiece of the latest trials – which The Engineer experienced first-hand – is Jaguar Land Rover’s latest self-driving vehicle technology, a Prototype Range Rover sport capable of Level 4 autonomy, meaning it’s theoretically able to perform all safety-critical driving functions.
JLR autonomous vehicle research engineer Jim O’Donoghue told The Engineer that the vehicle – which is equipped with a mix of lidar, radar and cameras and has been programmed to follow a pre-mapped route – has performed well in “the wild”, and dealt effectively with the unpredictability of a real-life traffic environment.
Despite being carried out during a week when an autonomous Uber car was involved in a fatal collision (sparking a heated debate over the safety of driverless cars) those involved in the current trials say the public response has been largely positive.

Indeed, as The Engineer experienced first-hand, driverless cars are, if anything, sometimes a bit too polite and unwilling to take the risks or bend the rules in the way that human drivers are prepared to do. O’Donohughe commented that the next generation of autonomous vehicles may have to be designed to drive more aggressively if they are to operate alongside human-driven cars without causing frustration.
Reflecting on the trials O’Donohughe said that Milton Keynes has proven to be an excellent test-bed: “The grid-like nature is great. The traffic lights are great – each four entry and exit points get their own go so we’re not having to give way to traffic which helps us out a bit. The dual carriageways are also an interesting element, as the car’s having to cope with a lot of information around.”
Alongside JLR’s trials, the Autodrive consortium partners have also been exploring a range of closer to market applications for connectivity technology, using DSRC (dedicated short range communications) – a low latency, high speed wireless communications technology similar to wifi – to push the boundaries of vehicle to vehicle communication.
These trials have included a demonstration of collaborative parking – in which connected vehicles update each other on the location of available parking spaces, and an Electronic Emergency Brake Light (EEBL) feature which gives a warning when another connected car further up the road brakes heavily – potentially giving drivers several additional seconds to avoid a possible collision.

The group also demonstrated a so-called Emergency Vehicle Warning (EVW) system, which displays information on the location of an emergency vehicle before a driver sees it or hears it. Dennis Witt, a research engineer with Ford, one of the companies that’s been trialling this system, said that the technology has been particularly well-received by ambulance drivers involved in the trials. “They loved it,” he said. “One of their biggest problems is battling through traffic and people generally not knowing where to go.”
Witt added that the obvious safety benefits of this application could represent the most likely route to market for the connectivity technology. “There is a view that this may be the way it becomes a bit more ubiquitous,” he said. “You could easily see it becoming legislated as a safety system that has to be added to vehicles.”
Clearly for connected systems of this kind to work, competitive OEMs will need to work closely together to develop systems and standards that work across different types of vehicle, and this collaboration has been another interesting aspect of the project said Witt. “It’s been really useful testing with Jaguar and Tata,” he said. “If we just tested three Fords together with same hardware and software it would all work – it’s only when you get into that mixed environment that you can understand some of the interoperability challenges.”

Whilst these kinds of connectivity technology are, said Witt, possibly closer to production than full autonomy there is, he added, something of a chicken and egg situation with the technology only likely to yield benefits once a critical mass of vehicles is on the road. One of the key aims of Autodrive, he said, is to identify this saturation point. “You only need one of four or five cars in front of you to have the capability for it to work.”
Autodrive finishes at the end of this year (2018). A trial of a fleet up up to 40 low-speed self-driving ‘pod’ vehicles set to take part in pedestrianised areas of Milton Keynes this summer with a final set of demonstrations, involving both passenger vehicles and pods scheduled to be held in the autumn.
Let’s hope there aren’t many jaywalking pedestrians around…
Once the systems are robust and safe, it is great opportunity to transfer some drivers to autonomous: those who cannot operate the turn signal, those who tailgate, those shortsighted who wait last minute to change gears, etc… In short impatient to see this working properly.
“I’ve got a little list, I’ve got a little list – and they’ll none of them be missed, they’ll none of them be missed” (from the Mikado). seems appropriate for you!
What is the point of a dashboard-display EVW if it takes the driver’s eyes off the windscreen at the exact moment there is a clear and present hazard ahead?
So install the pilot helmet visor system with display projected onto it. Ask Gentex Inc of Carbondale PA, USA : I believe it only costs about $35,000 -and they would probably do a deal for bulk purchases.
Some of us actually enjoy driving – another one of life’s little pleasures which technology will soon take away from us.
The roads of Milton Keynes are not exactly representative of the rest of the UK !
Very true, but the layout is highly predictable.
I’ve always found Milton Keynes quite tricky as there are few numbers and no property names displayed (apparently a local aesthetic policy).
Coventry’s ring-road will be the true test of these cars: it has defeated many drivers! Followed by central London I suppose.
So, we might have an autonomous car following its internal Sat Nav down one of our beautiful sunken lanes – no room to turn off or around, no lay bys, etc. – when it meets another coming the other way. How do they decide who’s going to reverse that half a mile back to the last passing place . . . ?
In an ideal world the cars would have communicated before the last lay by and someone would wait there so there’s no need to reverse.
Of course then you need to add an AI with some knowledge of game theory and or a notification going to human drivers windscreens to determine and coordinate who waits and who drives on. We’ll get there one day. In the meantime, shoddy planning from the transport authorities if you have to reverse for half a mile to find a lay by…
In response to ‘another Steve’: whilst the grid layout of MK is possibly an advantage, my experience of MK is that it is full of boy racers (and girl racers) who seem to treat the road system as a race track. If an autonomous vehicle can cope with the poor standard of driving from humans in MK then it will be a good indication of its capabilities.
Will they be programmed to speed up if you try to overtake them?