Auto-immunity – is AV pessimism spreading?
I was fortunate last week to attend the Centre for London’s launch of its report ‘Building for a New Urban Mobility’, held at the offices of Arup in central London. The report contains a wealth of interesting statistics around the mobility challenges faced by the capital, citing long commutes, congestion, air pollution and climate impact as critical issues. The report’s authors offer ten principles to enable more adaptive and more sustainable transportation:
Base masterplans on active travel and public transport
Use street layouts to prioritise active travel
Limit parking provision, and locate strategically
Enable easy interchanging
Provide electric charging infrastructure
Consolidate local freight
Offer shared mobility service memberships
Ensure buildings are easily adaptable
Future-proof parking
Create dynamic streetscapes
Barriers to adoption of these principles are identified and recommendations around leadership, adaptability, flexibility and evaluation are proposed. It’s a worthwhile read with contributions from a wide range of industry and public sector experts as well as input from Centre for London’s own highly qualified team.
After the key outcomes from the report had been neatly presented by lead author, Nicolas Bosetti, the event concluded with an hour-long panel session and audience Q&A. Skilfully chaired by Kate Spiliopoulos (Head of Events, Centre for London), the participants were:
Harbinder Birdi (Partner & Head of Infrastructure and Transport Sector, Hawkins / Brown);
Fatema Karim-Khaku (Senior Transport Planner, Arup);
Councillor Claire Coghill (Leader and Executive Member for Business, Europe and Good Growth, London Borough of Waltham Forest);
Roger Madelin CBE (Head of Canada Water Development, British Land).
Participants in the panel session (Spiliopoulous; Birdi; Karim-Khaku; Coghill; Madelin – left to right).
Karim-Khaku explained Arup’s lateral thinking in relation to future mobility options with their ‘FlexKerbs’ concept that was shortlisted in the National Infrastructure Commission’s Roads for the Future competition. This envisions cities where the kerbside infrastructure can quickly and easily be repurposed to suit the needs of the community. This could be for parking, to create dedicated lanes for automated vehicles or for active travel / light mobility modes. It could provide bookable space for delivery vehicles or temporary space for social or commercial activities.
Councillor Coghill’s borough of Waltham Forest is home to one of three ‘mini-Holland’ projects. They were each awarded £30m to make town centres more pleasant and to encourage walking and cycling. In a one-year evaluation of these measures, Dr Rachel Aldred (University of Westminster) and colleagues produced evidence to show the Mini-Holland schemes had successfully increased time spent engaged in active travel modes and positive perceptions of the streetscapes. Further, Dr David Dajnak (King’s College London) and colleagues estimated that the improvements in air quality as a result of the mini-Holland changes would lead to residents living longer. Despite this success, Coghill spoke powerfully about the need for community leaders to show bravery and emotional resilience when delivering such transformational schemes in the face of criticisms and protests from local residents, stakeholders and political opponents. Although not surprising, this was a remarkably honest appraisal of the realities of trying to innovate in local government.
However, for me, the most interesting statement came from Madelin. With an Honorary Fellowship from RIBA, a CBE for services to sustainable development and leadership of the £3bn redevelopment of Canada Water, he spoke with the assurance and wisdom of someone with little to prove. In discussing the challenges of urban mobility, he stated that:
“Autonomous cars completely miss the point and if they are introduced, I'll put a bollard in front of ‘em!”
There were palpable murmurs of agreement from across the audience in response to this pessimistic view. I have alluded previously to the sense that perceptions of automated vehicles are becoming increasingly mixed as the technology heads into the trough of disillusionment. There are several possible reasons for this discontent, including:
Safety concerns have been growing, triggered in particular by the Joshua Brown / Tesla and Elaine Herzberg / Uber fatal crashes.
The initial (and perhaps exaggerated) promise that automated vehicles are claimed to offer has yet to materialise as developers fail to hit overly ambitious timelines despite huge industry investment.
There is a growing sense that cars are not the right solution for city mobility – replacing human driven cars with automated cars will not drastically improve matters (and could make things worse)
I think Madelin’s pessimism stems primarily from this last point, a view that automated vehicles do not offer tangible solutions for the large-scale urban developments for which he is responsible. I have sympathies for this view. The tendency to date has been for automated vehicles to be shown as self-driving versions of existing vehicles. Even the recently unveiled GM Cruise Origin, which offers a more radical vision of shared and automated mobility, seemed to be a rather large vehicle for transporting four to six passengers around an urban environment. One can be forgiven for doubting the radical transformation of mobility by automated vehicles if existing cars are simply replaced by self-driving versions.
However, as a counterpoint, I offer the principles laid out in the UK Government’s Future of Mobility: Urban Strategy (many of which align with those put forward by the Centre for London); adoption of which would see new technologies being introduced where they can be shown to:
improve safety;
deliver benefits available to all parts of the UK and all segments of society;
contribute to efficiencies of and integrate effectively with mass transit;
support the transition to zero exhaust emission transport services;
reduce congestion;
improve choice and value for consumers;
provide shared data to support overall improvements in the operation of the transport system.
American programmer and author Ellen Ullman described pessimism as “broken hearted optimism”. As an AV optimist, my heart is not yet broken but I would contend that the automated vehicle industry must show how the services their technology would enable align with these principles to ensure that these pessimistic perceptions of automated driving do not become contagious.