Intelligent Vehicles

Mobility in general touches everyone's life and the majority of people are drivers. Intelligent vehicles are therefore close to society.

We would like to learn more about existing perspectives on the impact of intelligent vehicles on people and society. We invited people from a variety of different organisations and governmental agencies for an interactive discussion. Participants came from different backgrounds, such as catering firms, insurance companies, the police, hackers, local and national government and various representative associations. They show a great interest in discussing the impact of intelligent vehicles on: road traffic efficiency, safety, inclusivity, and trust in technology.  

Illustrated views

We collected a wide variety of views from the discussions of the twenty participants on four topics (Society, Safety, Mobility and Trust) and captured these views in illustrations made by Menah Wellen. For each topic, the illustration explores some views, concerns and hopes expressed in the discussion on that topic. 

Illustrations by Menah Wellen

Mobility: Intelligence vehicles will make traffic flows more efficient, yet may also attract more traffic, if people decide to live further away from work, or when they don’t share public intelligent vehicles.
Safety: Intelligent vehicles will reduce accidents caused by human error, but new types of accidents may in time emerge, say in less structured environments like old city centres.
Society: New groups of people may become able to travel with intelligent vehicles, such as disabled people, but intelligent vehicles may also diminish the availability of public transport. 
Trust: Over time, people can gradually build up trust in intelligent vehicles, yet this trust can be lost much faster, for example when an awful accident happens.

The introduction and acceptance of intelligent vehicles in everyday life will go hand in hand with an integrated approach in which other aspects of society and life will transition, such as a change to the way insurance works, a change to the way public transport is operated and a change to urban design and open spaces.

workshop participant

People are enthusiastic about the prospect of having intelligent vehicles,but trust can be easily lost; it is a fragile commodity

workshop participant

Researchers