CityMobil2: a pilot platform for automated road transport systems


A number of local authorities or equivalent sites (i.e. CERN premises) have expressed their interest to host such a demonstration and only a few were finally selected. The demonstrations were either large (lasting 6 months) or small (lasting approximately 1 month). Three sites have been selected to host a large demonstration (West Lausanne region, La Rochelle and Trikala). Two fleets of six vehicles each have been made available to the selected pilot sites for the duration of the demonstrations. In addition to the pilot activities, research has been undertaken into the technical, financial, cultural, and behavioural aspects and effects on land use policies and how new systems can fit into existing infrastructure in different cities. CityMobil2 has performed probably the largest step with regard to the legal issues surrounding automated transport and has developed a proposed framework for certifying automated transport systems. In addition due to the project partners’ efforts a number of legal adjustments to allow automated vehicles operation have been made in at least 3 European countries.
Under this essence CityMobil2 has been a landmark project for the promotion of automated systems in public transport and in the European toads of tomorrow, hosting for the first time actual implementations of such systems in real life conditions and gathering the necessary data to prove their usefulness, safety and benefits.

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CityMobil2 Impact for ICCS / NTUA

CityMobil2 project is unique at an international level, as it has demonstrated ARTS for passenger transport operating in real conditions in a number of sites in Europe. Trikala was one of the sites selected for a large scale demonstration, under the direct support and coordination by ICCS. The specific WP under which the demonstration was hosted had the participation of the two entities only (ICCS and e-Trikala). The peculiarity of the Trikala demonstration was that it was the only demonstration that chose to operate in a mixed traffic urban scenario with literally no segregation from conventional vehicles. Consequently the demo gathered huge dissemination from several means (incl. BBC, CCTV, National Geographic, Euronews). Therefore, the ICCS’ visibility in the area of road automation was significantly boosted, considering the wide coverage of this demonstration by the mass media and its visibility to the general public. Apart from that, the participation in this project has:

  • Established ICCS positioning as the main technical consultant to the Greek Ministry of Infrastructure, Transport and Networks, specifically with regard to legislation and policy measures towards road automation
  • Fostered further research collaborations both in cooperation with Trikala and other cities as the two specific partners have been responsible to host a world-first long-lasting automated transport system implementation in real urban scenarios
  • supported the research by ICCS on technical verification, functionalities and limitations of automated public transport vehicles as well as on evaluating their acceptability by the general public, thus strengthening the ICSS’ expertise in the areas of ergonomics and evaluation studies
  • supported the publication of 2 original papers (while at least 2 more papers are expected with the evaluation of the demo results) and ICCS participation in working groups on automation, like the Trilateral (Europe, USA, Japan) IA subgroup for ART, the Road Automation task force of the TM2.0 platform and others
  • new partnerships with some of the leading organizations worldwide to develop automated vehicles such as 2GetThere, Naya, Robosoft and EasyMile

Publications (indicative)

  • I. Karaseitanidis, P. Lytrivis, A. Mpallis, O. Raptis, A. Amditis, “Automated road transport systems in mixed urban scenarios – Trikala city case”, ITS Bordeaux 2015, October 5-9, 2015
  • Portouli, E., Amditis, A., Lytrivis, P., Tzanidaki, J., Laborda, J., Rodrigues, N., van Waes, Fr., Liebermann, J., Dafonte García, P. (2016). “Traffic Management of the future and Road Automation”. 11th ITS European Congress, Glasgow, Scotland, 6-9 June 2016

Contact: Dr. Angelos Amditis, ICCS