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The project uses Nissan’s electric Leaf model. Each car is festooned with cameras and sensors, many of them bolted to a perfectly ordinary roof rack. The boot is full of computers and electronics. It all looks rather rough and ready.<\/p>\n
But out on the road, following a circuit between roundabouts on the A206, it feels smooth and controlled. Sitting in the back seat, it’s remarkably easy to forget the car is guiding itself.<\/p>\n
Such precision is helped by guidance systems using precise 3D mapping, highly accurate GPS, radar, and Lidar – a laser-based sensing method.<\/p>\n
Over the past three years, ServCity’s cars have racked up some 1,600 miles of autonomous driving, without a serious incident – though on every outing a safety driver has been in position to take control if necessary.<\/p>\n
It is an impressive record. The roads of Woolwich are busy and unpredictable. Buses dice with taxis, delivery drivers stop without warning, and cyclists weave through heavy traffic.<\/p>\n
“What we’re actually trying to do is expand the boundaries of autonomous drive,” explains David Moss, Nissan’s senior vice president for research and development in the UK and Europe. <\/p>\n
“So we want to be able to improve not just the ability to drive on the highway, but also to take on complex environments in the city.”<\/p>\n
Trials of self-driving vehicles are nothing new. There are even commercial services using them as taxis<\/a>, on a strictly controlled basis, in some cities in the US, China and South Korea.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n