Partially automated driving trial

The New South Wales CAV trial program testing connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) on all kinds of road conditions – including regional roads and Sydney’s busiest motorways.

The program was run in partnership by Transurban, Transport for NSW and Roads and Maritime Services. We hosted trials of partially automated vehicles on our Sydney Orbital Network.

Trial data was captured via an Australian-first, purpose-built app that tracked, recorded and measured interactions between CAVs and road infrastructure.

Audi, BMW, Hyundai, Jaguar, Land Rover, Lexus, Mazda, Mercedes Benz, Tesla and Volvo supplied trial vehicles.

Findings

Trial findings are helping vehicle manufacturers, road operators and governments prepare road infrastructure to support an automated driving future.

Report

NSW partially automated vehicle trials report nsw-trials-report.pdf

Video

The videos below illustrate some of our findings and scenarios that can arise in some vehicles in certain conditions. These findings were not necessarily common across all vehicles and conditions.

No road surface is flawless

Long cracks in the road surface sealed with bitumen often interfered with lane keeping.

Vehicle detects crack seal as line marking and brakes for perceived vehicle in lane.

Changes in road surface / markings

 
Changes in road surface sometimes disengaged lane keeping.

Markings on the road (such as signs painted onto the pavement) sometimes disengaged lane keeping.

Environmental impacts

Lane keeping was sometimes impacted by environmental conditions such as shadows and glare.

Lane keeping was sometimes impacted by environmental conditions such as the reflections of headlights.

Lane keeping was sometimes impacted by environmental impacts such as heavy rain.

Speed not limited to signs

 
Static signs on buses were incorrectly interpreted as though they applied to vehicles on the motorway.

Sometimes vehicles identified a change in speed limit where there was none (emerging from an underpass, at a former roadworks location), seemingly following speeds from a digital map.

Tunnel vision

Faded/dirty lines disrupted lane keeping, especially in tunnels.
 

Twists and turns on the road

Some vehicles struggled to maintain lane keeping while taking sharper curves or dips in the road.

Blinkered vision: CAVs can’t see everything

Permanent bollards separating lanes sometimes interfered with lane keeping.