SAN DIEGO — Autonomous mobility experts said that the technology can open up new opportunities for drivers, noting that as progress on greater levels of automation expands over time, drivers will have chances to capitalize on that change.
“There are going to be a lot of situations where we can enhance the capabilities of the driver by providing the information technology,” Jenny Elfsberg, Volvo’s director of the innovation lab for connected vehicles, said during a Feb. 25 panel on autonomous technology here at the Lytx User Group Conference. “I think we should do our best in this industry to make the truck drivers, or the excavator operators, or the bus drivers, become the heroes of the transport society. They can actually move up a little bit.”
“Our view is the driver of the future looks like the driver of today — they’re doing a lot of the same things but in different domains,” added Alden Woodrow, co-founder and CEO of autonomous truck technology developer Ike, which is focused on creating fully autonomous trucks that can operate safely on interstate highways and bring value to fleets. “We are really focused on making the trucking industry better.”
Woodrow outlined a model in which drivers would take loads to drop-off points near interstates, where autonomous trucks would then take over for long stretches of highway. “The approach we want to take is to bring new technology to the industry in a complementary way,” he said. “The highway is very structured. You have access control, there are no stop signs and stoplights, and most of the things are driving in a straight line in the same direction most of the time.”