Clark Global City”•French-made “autonomous” vehicles will shuttle athletes, coaches, delegates, and VIPs to point-to-point destinations within the New Clark City as the official mode of transport during the holding of the Southeast Asian Games in November this year.
“The vehicles run independent of any human intervention…that’s the thing of innovation,” said Bases Conversion and Development Corp. president and CEO Vince Dizon.
“These vehicles are fit for our vision to make NCC the first smart and green city. They showcase what is possible today in terms of technology.”
Three driver-less mini-buses with a capacity of 14 passengers each, Hizon said, will be crisscrossing the NCC during the SEA games. The vehicles will run by electricity.
“Come October, November, and December where we will be hosting the SEA Games. We will be very proud to be the first country in Asia to experience these driver-less vehicles for everyone’s use inside the NCC for free,” Dizon said shortly before the signing of the memorandum of agreement among the BCDA, CDC and COAST Autonomous held at the BCDA Corporate Office on the 9th Floor of One West Aeropark Building here.
Pierre Lefevre, Chief Technology Officer of COAST Autonomous, said the deployment of the driver-less vehicles would serve as a pilot test before the firm embarked on mass production targeting the cities and huge universities not only in Asia but also in Europe.
“Mass production will start next year and our main mission is to give jobs. The vehicles have safety and security features and very safe to use,” said Lefevre during the press conference here.
The vehicles, Lefevre said, were made to avoid humans. “Included in the safety features program is to make a sudden stop each time a human crosses in front.” It has a maximum speed of 60 kilometers per hour and runs at a low speed.
COAST (Connected Autonomous Shared Transportation) Autonomous conducted Wednesday mapping works of the entire NCC apparently to be programmed within the chips of the vehicles.
Under the agreement, COAST Autonomous will provide and use high-definition and 3D mapping machines to determine the route of each vehicle for it to operate on its own and transport passengers to their destinations.