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In future this could all change with an increasing share of the work and school related activities being done from home or a nearby facility with suitable communication facilities. Also, scheduling of the out-of-home activities will be more flexible and avoid “rush hour” periods thus reducing the risk of delays and congestion.
Where personal and small goods transport is required, it is expected that intelligent road guidance and mobility planning systems will be available, and the use of autonomous vehicles whose sizes would be adapted to the specific transport needs, will drastically reduce travel time, energy requirements, and congestion.
Such a new future is also likely to affect the attitude towards vehicle ownership. Like today, all the journeys could be made by private vehicle(s) owned by the family, by vehicles where the ownership and use is shared with others, or by vehicles leased for the duration of the trip from a transport services company which owns and operates a fleet of vehicles to suit their clients’ daily transportation needs. In the latter case, this would also offer the flexibility to require a small vehicle for single person short distance trips, a larger more luxurious one for longer trips and/or professional use, an MPV for school trips, an SUV which can transport bulky items or accommodate the family’s extended holiday needs etc.
The private ownership option is closest to our current use pattern but has significant drawbacks in terms of user efficiency (empty return trips and long idle periods) and is bound to be most capital intensive. Its dedicated use may also do little to alleviate other transport problems such as congestion and the need for sufficient parking space. On the positive side, a privately owned vehicle is more likely to satisfy personal requirements for style, cleanliness and privacy.
Shared use and lease options, making use of advanced travel information, coordinated satellite navigation and sophisticated demand planning systems would be expected to provide more efficient utilisation of vehicle fleets and reduce congestion. If a significant share of the vehicles would be battery electric vehicles, the shared use and lease options could also optimise the use of the charging networks, which are expected to remain a limiting factor especially during the transition period.
38 LUBE MAGAZINE NO.146 AUGUST 2018
Perhaps we could also re-consider the current vehicle design which still highlights differentiation of brands, customisation to satisfy an increasingly diverse customer demand mix, individuality and driving experience. With the expectation that the majority of vehicle movements in future would be autonomous, we could move towards a system of small, unitary vehicles that could be easily linked together to accommodate individual (personal and small goods) transport requirements. These vehicles could still vary in size, style and amenities to reflect a limited range of convenience offerings, not unlike what we have long since accepted when travelling in other modes of transport like air and rail.
Autonomous driving, once universally applied (i.e. also for HGVs) would also allow major changes to the road network infrastructure. Centrally optimised planning of autonomous transport is expected to allow more efficient use of existing road infrastructure (fewer m2
/
vehicle) thus reducing the need for new roads. There may also be further benefits that would allow better use of available space allocated to transport facilities while not compromising safety. Would we in the long run still need central reservations between two carriageways if cars drove autonomously? If vehicles relied on their own internal guidance systems, would we need the same density of road signage or do we need it at all? The countryside could look rather differently and large sums of money could be saved by avoiding investing in soon obsolete facilities. All these changes could have significant benefits for more efficient resource use, but it would only materialise once all traffic would move autonomously. In the likely, lengthy transition period there would inevitably be significant duplication of effort and obsolescence in vehicles and transport infrastructure.
While it is easy to see the benefits of such a future transport system, it is also clear that getting there will require significant government intervention to drive these changes. Given the need for development of sophisticated technologies, it will also require a high level of alignment to common standards to reduce development costs and benefit from economies of scale. Such standardisation will also ensure a seamless transition for vehicles crossing borders. While this may be less critical for most UK passenger movements, it will be of greater importance elsewhere in Europe and especially for X-border commercial (“heavy goods”) transport.
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