Well, almost.
The city on Tuesday will launch a pilot program known as the Connect AV Shuttle that aims to fill one of the areas of the city identified as a “transit gap.” While the fleet of four shuttles running between Corktown and the East Jefferson Riverfront will begin running with drivers behind the wheel, officials say they will be autonomous by this fall.
Tim Slusser, the city’s Chief of Mobility Innovation, told WWJ’s Jon Hewett the service will be launching in “manual mode” so the vehicles can “collect the data to create the digital maps that will allow them to work in autonomy in about one to two months.”
Officials hope the fully electric shuttles will be running autonomously by October after that process is completed. Virginia-based Perrone Robotics is handling the autonomy aspect of the project.
The shuttles will run east from the newly renovated Michigan Central Station to Pensole Lewis College at 200 Walker Avenue, near the Riverfront, and back to Michigan Central.
The roughly 10-mile routes run mostly along Michigan Avenue, Trumbull, Lafayette and Jefferson, with nine stops headed east and seven coming back. Stops include popular spots like Campus Martius Park, Rivertown Market, the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center, Michigan and Rosa Parks, and more.
Riders will be able to track the shuttles in real-time and get estimated times of arrival via the Liftango web platform, which will be accessible via mobile devices or desktop. Video tutorial and user guides for the platform will be available when service opens on the official website.
Slusser says there have been other pilot programs with autonomous vehicles across the country in three-to-nine month stints, but “you’re not seeing a lot of rollouts where it’s intended to be a long-term solution.”
“I think Detroit is very much in a leadership position here,” Slusser said, noting this is still a pilot program and there is still a lot to learn in order to “make this technology effective for Detroit.”
In addition to bringing new options to the so-called “transit gap,” Slusser said it’s also bringing new job opportunities to Detroiters.
“This is absolutely helping to address some service gaps that we have, while bringing new technologies into the Detroit market,” he said. “We have Detroiters that are actually gonna be staffing these vehicles and running operations here that are getting first-hand experience in what it’s like to work in these technologies. Those individuals now have an opportunity to participate in this industry in ways they couldn’t before.”
In addition to the initial $1.5 million in first-year funding from Michigan Central, Bedrock, and the State of Michigan’s Office of Future Mobility and Electrification (OFME), the City of Detroit has secured an additional $1.67 million from the MDOT. This new funding will be used to enhance the Connect service by adding a fifth shuttle, reducing wait times, and extending the pilot by an additional year.