The future of transportation according to Khaw

by Ryan Ong

SO WE’RE going to have driverless pods, in addition our increasingly driverless trains. It’s all part of the Smart Mobility 2030 Master Plan, which is so ambitious it reads like we’re trying to make legs obsolete.

Smart Mobility 2030 was jointly launched by the Land Transport Authority (LTA) and Intelligent Transportation Society Singapore (ITSS) on 6th August, 2014. This is a 15 year plan to develop Intelligent Transport systems (ITS). It has three key strategies:

• Implement innovative and sustainable smart mobility solutions – I think this just means “doing what we plan.” This would be the hardest and most expensive part.
• Developing and adopting ITS standards for data sharing – This is about providing accurate transport information. It should help commuters who complain that apps for bus timings, train timings, directions, etc., are inaccurate, and that developers who code those free apps should be ashamed at their lack of psychic powers.
• Establish close partnerships and foster co-creation between public and private sectors – I foresee grants for people who code transport apps, and further teamwork between sites like Uber and the government sector.

The four areas of focus are informative, interactive, assistive, and green mobility. To simplify them:

Informative and interactive technologies

Soon, our phones may be able to tell us exactly how much time we have until the cab, bus, etc. arrives, so we know if we can dash in, buy our Llaollao, and finish it in time to board. The Smart Mobility Plan outlines an intelligent fleet management system, where bus arrival times and bus load (i.e. how many of you can still squeeze in) are provided via kiosks, terminals, apps, etc.

An interesting point here is integration: it will come from a single data source. The plan also mentions “harmonising” information sources for traffic apps – that may mean an end to a situation where SG Next Bus says your bus comes in 10 minutes, whereas SG Bus Leh says it’s four minutes, and IRIS just flat out admits it doesn’t know and refuses to load.

For private cars, imagine apps that can tell you the best time to set off to avoid jams, or apps that can find you the nearest empty parking lot with one tap. It may be right on the horizon: according to the Smart Mobility Plan, technologies that use cars as mobile “data gathering” could provide the information for such apps.

The Smart Mobility Plan specifically mentions the possibility of car-sharing data apps – subsequent car borrowers can find the vehicle on their smartphone, without it having to be driven back to a certain spot. We can expect tie-ins with car sharing companies on this.

Assistive technologies

The Smart Mobility plan will capitalise on Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle to Infrasturcture (V2I) communcations.

Imagine that, as you’re darting across the road, your smartphone transmits that to a traffic network. Nearby cars, on the same network, can pick up the information and immediately be warned that you’re making a dash for it. They can then slow down in preparation, and their car will auto-SMS swear words at you (programmers, if it doesn’t, someone will pay you for an app that does.)

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) are the biggest deal here. SMRT and 2getthere (a Netherlands based transport firm) are partnering up to bring us 24 passenger driverless pods. It will be a Group Transit Vehicle (GRT), which won’t be on the roads just yet.

But in the future, it’s possible that even regular cars on the road will be driverless. The key is to work out the safety and legal issues first (e.g. who is responsible if two of these cars collide, or if one of them runs down a pedestrian?) I call it first: Mass implementation will turn Singaporeans into hapless babies if we go abroad. I shudder at the thought of going to, say, Los Angeles without knowing how to drive.

Nontheless, the Smart Mobility Plan does point out that AVs such as driverless buses can mitigate the need for more drivers (see lah, what happens when you strike?). Driverless cars, trucks, busses, etc. also mitigate issues such as exhaustion or distraction, and may lower the workload on our traffic police.

We’ll see a few job losses there though. It’s a little frightening to ponder what happens if courier companies like UPS, Federal Express, DHL, etc. all adopt AVs, along with bus companies, cab companies, and SMRT. It could render an entire profession obsolete.

Green mobility

We have some distance to go here, giving that we place carbon emissions surcharges on a Tesla. But the Smart Mobility plan does mention three areas for environmentally friendly transport: encouraging public transport (which has gone on forever already), use of energy efficient equipment in the infrastructure, and development of environmentally-friendly vehicles.

Tripartite collaboration

The Smart Mobility plan mentions integration between industry players, public agencies, and academic insitutions. Nothing unusual there – the LTA can’t single handedly develop and build all the technologies needed, and the researchers or developers will need help with wide-scale implementation.

But I noticed the plan specifically mentions exporting our technologies overseas. This suggests the plan is to develop transport technologies locally, rather than just buying them from abroad. That’s interesting, because the latter has been more common in Singapore. Even the driverless pods I mentioned are from the Netherlands.

It will be interesting to see how the government intends for this to work. We’ll definitely hear another “we need more engineers” speech, but there may be more grants available in the future. Maybe it’s time professional drivers used their SkillsFuture credit, and start learning to code.

 

Featured Image by Sean Chong.

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- Ryan Ong