A workshop on non-technical aspects of automated transport such as legal and operation strategy

SARTRE is a FP7 European project that performs transportation research, namely road train on public roads - also called platooning. A road train, according to SARTRE, is a collection of vehicles led by a manually forward heavy lead vehicle, and where several following vehicles (truck and passenger cars) follow the leader automatically, both lateral and longitudinally. The vehicles communicate wirelessly to form a cooperative system. Benefits expected are increased comfort, reduced fuel consumption, greater safety, efficient transportation, etc...

The technical challenges in the project are many and interesting. The reason for the workshop is however to participate in discussions concerning the non-technical challenges that platooning implicates!
Examples of non-technical challenges are:
* Legal aspects of autonomous or semi-autonomous vehicles – e.g. can the driver in the following autonomous vehicles send SMS (mobile phone text messages)?
* What regulations must be reviewed? E.g. the Vienna convention
* Strategies for platooning - How do the platooning vehicles operate most safely in various situations?
* Shall the following vehicles follow the leader under all circumstances?
* What change in responsibility and legal liability is placed on the driver of the lead vehicle?
*...

To get input to the SARTRE project on these non-technical issues we will hold a workshop with high-level people in Borås, Sweden on the 11th of October 2011. On the day before (10th October) there will be a half-day demonstration of platooning. You will be given the opportunity to try platooning at the demonstration we will hold.

Location: SP – Technical Research Institute of Sweden, Borås
Host: Carl Bergenhem, SP – Technical Research Institute of Sweden
Discussions will be held in English.
Questions or participation request to carl.bergenhem@sp.se
More information about the SARTRE project is available at: www.sartre-project.eu

The tentative programme is as follows:
 

Monday 10th
–    12:00 Workshop attendees congregate for lunch at SP, Borås
      o    Welcome and presentation of the demo and details
      o    Afternoon demo of SARTRE platooning at Hällered
–    19:00 Evening informal reception  – Borås

Tuesday 11th
–    09:00 Start second day (workshop)
      o    EU-presentation on the “big issue”, funding, ..
      o    Presentation of SARTRE
      o    Legal/political/road operator view of platooning
      o    Research view of platooning
      o    Passenger Vehicle Vendor view of platooning
      o    Panel discussion

–    12:00 Lunch at SP

      o    Heavy vendor view of platooning
      o    EU view of automatic driving
      o    Panel discussion
–    15:30 End