Ricardo UK demonstrates road train on Spanish motorway

A road train consists of a lead vehicle driven by a professional driver followed by a number of vehicles.

One lead vehicle and four trailing vehicles — consisting of a Volvo S60, a Volvo V60 and a Volvo XC60 plus a truck — made up the road train on a motorway outside Barcelona. The vehicles drove at 85kmph and the gap between each vehicle was just 6m.

The demonstration occurred through the Safe Road Trains for the Environment (SARTRE) project, which is aiming to develop technologies that enable vehicle platoons to operate on normal public highways with significant environmental, safety and comfort benefits.

‘This is a very significant milestone in the development of safe road train technology,’ said SARTRE project director, Tom Robinson of Ricardo. ‘For the very first time we have been able to demonstrate a convoy of autonomously driven vehicles following a lead vehicle with its professional driver, in a mixed-traffic environment on a European motorway.