Self-driving Nissan Leafs to be trialled on rural and residential roads

A Nissan-led autonomous driving project will target the UK’s residential and single-track rural roads in a push to make the country more equipped to introduce self-driving vehicles. Launched today, the evolvAD project will test a fleet of adapted Nissan Leafs over the next 21 months to assess if self-driving vehicles can be used outside of cities and in less-connected areas. Fitted with Nissan’s advanced autonomous tech, the electric cars will utilise infrastructure such as CCTV in residential areas to improve situational awareness. This also creates a test study on how vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) systems can be used to enhance the performance of self-driving vehicles, which may allow for the creation of new V2I technologies, said Nissan, the UK government and their four project partners. The cars will also be tested on more complex rural roads to explore what types of autonomous vehicles could be used to connect more rural and intercity communities. Although using a passenger car, the overall goal is to make the country ready for the mass deployment of autonomous vehicles for industrial supply chain use, said Nissan. “Autonomous drive technologies are critical as they offer huge benefits in terms of vehicle safety, environmental impact and accessibility,” said Nissan’s David Moss, who added that autonomous driving was a key pillar of the Nissan Ambition 2030 strategy. This latest project builds on the success of HumanDrive and ServCity, the latter of which used a Nissan Leaf to autonomously drive 1600 miles around “complex urban environments” in Greenwich, London, in a bid to help cities deliver ‘robotaxi’ services. “In our previous research projects, our autonomous driving team and partners have tackled highways and complex city environments. Now we move onto our next challenge – built-up residential streets and rural roads,” said evolvAD project manager Robert Bateman. “To bring autonomous driving to market, we must test and trial the technology on as many different road types as possible and that’s why projects like evolvAD are so important. “Ultimately, we want to make driving cleaner, safer and more inclusive for everyone and we look forward to working with our consortium partners to deliver that.” The latest project, which includes backing from the government’s £100m Intelligent Mobility fund, comes nearly a year after some global car makers put the advancement of self-driving technologies on the back burner. This included the closure of Ford- and VW-backed autonomous driving brand Argo AI. However, in the UK, the push has continued with British technology firm Oxbotica, which shifted its focus from self-driving cars to autonomous vehicles that could be used for specific roles. The firm told Autocar it was looking at “where the world needs [autonomy] the most”, such as jobs that are dangerous, mundane and very specific. This was a notion shared by industry minister Nusrat Ghani. She said: “Self-driving vehicles have the potential to transform how we get around, making journeys safer, cleaner and more accessible while also helping grow the economy by creating highly skilled jobs. “This research project will help develop this technology and show that the UK is at the cutting edge in developing automated technology that is not only innovative but, crucially, has safety at its heart.”