‘Urban Mode’ Driverless Vehicle Operation

The Next Challenge?

Nicholas Robinson, M.IEEE, M.IMechE, MCP+i (‘99), B.Sc(HONS), M.Des(RCA)

04/20/23(C) Nicholas Robinson, Nicholas Robinson Design,

Cottingham, UK, Inventor@Driver-less.com 1

Driverless Technology – Where it’s at

• Inside Google’s Driverless Car

Packet-Switched Driverless Vehicle Operation in ‘Urban Mode’

•Where its going– going Native: Driverless Vehicle

Technology from the macro, Real World perspective

04/20/23 3(C) Nicholas Robinson, Inventor@Driver-less.com

How it Started

• Red Flag Act

Where its been: Historical Development: The “Autobahn” View

• Speed is King!• Kraftwerk– 1970s post-war German electronic music band – Emotional response to ‘speed’ being the new

solution to getting around faster– The motorway compared to a ‘factory’ producing

‘traffic’ on a ‘production line’• Likened to the Economy requiring to grow by having the

production line run ever-faster

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Urban Developer’s View• Historical Development

– Average speed of horse-drawn vehicles in Victorian London is (google) 8mph!• Horses for courses

– Average speed of traffic in London 3 Decades of average traffic speed data 1968 - 1998

– Average speed of traffic in London has slowed to just 10.2mph in 2013! Traffic slows to 10.2 mph• Red Flag Act 1865

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Macro Perspective – Many-to-Many

• Urban traffic management– Present view

• Internet of Things IoT– Future view• Packet-switched traffic• Routing and directing traffic

04/20/23 (C) Nicholas Robinson, Inventor@Driver-less.com 7

Past, Present and Future ViewsPast

Technology: the needs of the one (driver) outweigh the needs of the many (passengers, other road users) as a primary considerationPeople movement as a secondary ‘utilitarian’ consideration

PresentTraffic congestion management ‘by red tape’: the needs of the many outweigh those of the one as a primary considerationPeople movement still treated as a secondary consideration

FutureEmbedded ‘Packet Switched’ solutions integrate people technology and crowd to give parity with smarter people movement (transit)Public-private partnershipsDetermination of personal space, crowd behaviour and demographic trends – our social and health needs are changing and evolving

04/20/23 (C) Nicholas Robinson, Inventor@Driver-less.com 8

Packet-Switched Smart Grid PSSG

• PSSG utilises EVs and their batteries to store and distribute charge, similarly to traffic management in a city as described.

• Distributed power generation model• Local micro-grids - reconfigurable• www.ecomagination.com/NPRFTE

04/20/23 (C) Nicholas Robinson, Inventor@Driver-less.com 9

The Future View: Packet Switched Smarter Traffic Management

• Imagine the scene from “I, Robot” – Will Smith plays a ‘retro’ cop living in a large

future metropolis dystopia where “people-centric” ‘commonsense’ leadership and social objectives have been subverted to serve “machine-centric” ones

– Isaac Asimov rules for robotics are quoted

04/20/23 (C) Nicholas Robinson, Inventor@Driver-less.com 10