---
title: "Vehicular automation"
chunk: 5/7
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicular_automation"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:24:39.053882+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

Autonomous buses are proposed, as well as self-driving cars and trucks. Grade 2 level automated minibusses were trialed for a few weeks in Stockholm. China has a small fleet of self-driving public buses in the tech district of Shenzhen, Guangdong.
The first autonomous bus trial in the United Kingdom commenced in mid-2019, with an Alexander Dennis Enviro200 MMC single-decker bus modified with autonomous software from Fusion Processing able to operate in driverless mode within Stagecoach Manchester's Sharston bus depot, performing tasks such as driving to the washing station, refueling point and then parking at a dedicated parking space in the depot. Passenger-carrying driverless bus trials in Scotland commenced in January 2023, with a fleet of five identical vehicles to the Manchester trial used on a 14 miles (23 km) Stagecoach Fife park-and-ride route across the Forth Road Bridge, from the north bank of the Forth to Edinburgh Park station.
Another autonomous trial in Oxfordshire, England, which uses a battery electric Fiat Ducato minibus on a circular service to Milton Park, operated by FirstBus with support from Fusion Processing, Oxfordshire County Council and the University of the West of England, entered full passenger service also in January 2023. The trial route will be extended to Didcot Parkway railway station after acquiring a larger single-decker by the end of 2023.
In July 2020 in Japan, AIST Human-Centered Mobility Research Center with Nippon Koei and Isuzu started a series of demonstration tests for mid-sized buses, Isuzu "Erga Mio" with autonomous driving systems, in five areas; Ōtsu city in Shiga prefecture, Sanda city in Hyōgo Prefecture and other three areas in sequence.
In October 2023, Imagry, an Israeli AI startup, introduced its mapless autonomous driving solution at Busworld Europe, leveraging a real-time image recognition system and a spatial deep convolutional neural network (DCNN) to mimic human driving behavior.
In September 2025, trade publications described the "smartbus" concept in connection with depot-based autonomous bus operation for manoeuvres such as parking, washing, and charging, in coverage of Autonomous Systems. The concept was presented at Busworld Europe later that year. In December 2025, a smartbus pilot involving the public transport operator PKM Gliwice in Poland was reported.

==== Modular autonomous transit ====
Modular autonomous transit is a research concept for public transit using self-driving vehicles with connectable units, or "pods", that can adjust capacity based on passenger demand. Studies suggest these systems could improve efficiency through dynamic routing, with simulations showing reduced travel times in urban networks, though no operational systems existed as of 2025.

=== Trucks ===

The concept for autonomous vehicles has been applied for commercial uses, such as autonomous or nearly autonomous trucks.
Companies such as Suncor Energy, a Canadian energy company, and Rio Tinto Group were among the first to replace human-operated trucks with driverless commercial trucks run by computers. In April 2016, trucks from major manufacturers including Volvo and the Daimler Company completed a week of autonomous driving across Europe, organized by the Dutch, in an effort to get self-driving trucks on the road. With developments in self-driving trucks progressing, U.S. self-driving truck sales is expected to reach 60,000 by 2035 according to a report released by IHS Incorporated in June 2016.
As reported in June 1995 in Popular Science magazine, self-driving trucks were being developed for combat convoys, whereby only the lead truck would be driven by a human and the following trucks would rely on satellite, an inertial guidance system and ground-speed sensors. Caterpillar Incorporated made early developments in 2013 with the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University to improve efficiency and reduce cost at various mining and construction sites.
In Europe, the Safe Road Trains for the Environment is such an approach.
From PWC's Strategy & Report, self driving trucks will be the source of concern around how this technology will impact around 3 million truck drivers in the US, as well as 4 million employees in support of the trucking economy in gas stations, restaurants, bars and hotels. At the same time, some companies like Starsky, are aiming for Level 3 Autonomy, which would see the driver playing a control role around the truck's environment. The company's project, remote truck driving, would give truck drivers a greater work-life balance, enabling them to avoid long periods away from their home. This would however provoke a potential mismatch between the driver's skills with the technological redefinition of the job.
Companies that buy driverless trucks could massively cut costs: human drivers would no longer be required, companies' liabilities due to truck accidents would diminish, and productivity would increase (as the driverless truck doesn't need to rest). The usage of self driving trucks will go hand in hand with the use of real-time data to optimize both efficiency and productivity of the service delivered, as a way to tackle traffic congestion for example. Driverless trucks could enable new business models that would see deliveries shift from day time to night time or time slots in which traffic is less heavily dense.

==== Suppliers ====

=== Motorcycles ===
Several self-balancing autonomous motorcycles were demonstrated in 2017 and 2018 from BMW, Honda and Yamaha.

=== Trains ===

The concept for autonomous vehicles has also been applied for commercial uses, like for autonomous trains. The world's first driverless urban transit system is the Port Island Line in Kobe, Japan, opened in 1981. The first self-driving train in the UK was launched in London on the Thameslink route.
An example of an automated train network is the Docklands Light Railway in London.
Also see List of automated train systems.

=== Trams ===
In 2018 the first autonomous trams in Potsdam were trialed.

=== Automated guided vehicle ===

An automated guided vehicle or automatic guided vehicle (AGV) is a mobile robot that follows markers or wires in the floor, or uses vision, magnets, or lasers for navigation. They are most often used in industrial applications to move materials around a manufacturing facility or warehouse. Application of the automatic guided vehicle had broadened during the late 20th century.