SAFER takes key role in the new project Autofreight - automated trucks between Gothenburg and Viared
Every day many trucks drive with containers between Gothenburg harbour and Viared industrial area, outside Borås, Sweden. Making these transports more efficient would mean increased profitability for the transport companies, but also for the society due to reduced environmental impact and improved safety. This is the background to a new major research project within SAFER, AutoFreight.
The overall objective with the project is to create conditions for self-driving trucks along highway 40 between Gothenburg harbor and Viared, a distance of about 75 kilometers. The vision is that the driver will drive the truck manually from the port to highway 40 and when activate the autonomous mode. The project will also review existing legislation for high automation.
“There is incredibly much happening in the field of self-driving vehicles now and this project will play an important role in research on more efficient and more environmentally sound freight transports. The project set-up with several different types of actors in the project also provides great opportunities to develop knowledge about technology, logistics, business models and societal benefits," says Fredrik von Corswant, SAFER’s project leader.
The truck combination
The self-driving truck that will be used in the tests is approximately 30 meters long and consists of the combination Tractor + Trailer + Dolly + Trailer. The vehicle combination has a total weight of up to 80 tonnes.
Research areas
Some examples of research areas that will be covered within the project:
• Traffic situation predictions up 10 seconds horizon of long vehicle combinations; high speed control of long combination vehicles within safe corridors.
• Traffic situation decision making up to 10 seconds horizon; Tactical decision-making in dynamic uncertain traffic situations.
• Vehicle positioning and object detection; Lidar odometry and landmark-based localization for local dynamic mapping.
• Sensor fusion.
• Data integrity, perception.
• Driving time legislation for autonomous vehicles.
The project will run until the beginning of 2020 and has a budget of about SEK 50 million SEK. FFI accounts for SEK 21 million SEK and the parties to the project stand for the rest. The project partners include SAFER Vehicle and Traffic Safety Centre at Chalmers, Volvo Technology, Combitech, City of Borås, GDL Transport, Volvo Bus, Speed Group, Ellos, Kerry Logistics and The Swedish Transport Administration (Trafikverket).
