SYDNEY, Aug. 29 (Xinhua) -- Main Roads and Transport Minister for the Australian state of Queensland Mark Bailey said the state would soon receive its first automated vehicle from French carmaker Renault.
"Plans are underway to test vehicles with automated driving capabilities as part of the Department of Transport and Main Roads' Cooperative and Highly Automated Driving (CHAD) Pilot," Bailey said at the Australian Intelligent Transport Systems Summit in Sydney on Tuesday evening.
"In early 2019, we will receive a Renault ZOE EV, a Society of Automotive Engineers Level Four automated vehicle purpose built in France for our CHAD pilot."
A designation of level four means a driver is not required to any action when the vehicle is active, while the term 'cooperative' refers to the car's ability to sync up with other vehicles, infrastructure and road operations systems to share safety-related messages and warnings.
To examine how the technology can be utilized safely, the state government has partnered with the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and iMOVE Cooperative Research Center.
"Through QUT's partnership with VEDECOM -- a French collaborative research center -- we will test automated vehicle safety across five areas -- roads, roadsides, vehicles, road users and speeds," Bailey said.
"This will be the fourth vehicle prototype built by VEDECOM, it will be both cooperative and able to operate in autonomous mode under certain conditions."
While Bailey believes there is huge potential for the rapidly developing technology to significantly reduce environmental emissions, crashes and crash-related gridlock, he explained that "preparation is key."
"We must ensure our road network, infrastructure, legislation, regulation and licencing processes are aligned to support to integrate automated vehicles with our transport network," he said.
