Abstract Manager

Automated vehicle (AV) technology has matured to the point where practical deployments are possible. As such, full size automated buses have been deployed by transit agencies outside of Canada in pilot projects to support their efforts to reduce cost, increase capacity, and improve their customer experience in the longer term.

As a response to these industry developments, Arcadis was retained by a major Canadian transit agency to develop a roadmap to evaluate and implement automated buses. The study involved a context scan of the legislative, regulatory, and business environment of AVs, a peer review of transit agencies that have deployed automated buses, and an internal organizational review to understand internal preferences around an automated bus pilot project.

The context scan revealed no major barriers to initiating an AV pilot project in Canada, with resources available at both the federal and provincial level. The peer review, undertaken through a combination of survey and interview, showed that peer agencies motivations to initiate AV pilots varies significantly. Despite the variability in project motivations, however, the peer agencies shared a common framework for delivering the project, including an executive champion, grant funding, multiple active stakeholders, a clear use case, and human operator in the vehicle. Internal engagement involved interviews with a broad cross section of the client organization, which informed recommendations to the final roadmap by aligning the experience of peer agencies with actions for the client.

The presentation will focus on methods Canadian agencies can use to create their own roadmap for AV pilot projects by offering valuable insights gained by examining the multifaceted landscape of automated vehicle implementation. It will integrate a locally-sensitive context scan, peer reviews of existing transit agency initiatives, and methods to undertake an introspective organizational analysis, providing a well-rounded perspective on initiating automated bus pilot projects, invaluable for Canadian professionals navigating this pioneering field.