Pilot Tests of Automated Bus Aiming for Campus Transportation Service

The aging of population and shortage of drivers have troubled the public transportation in Japan for years. Recently, automated bus has become a promising way to provide future public transport, including the university campus transportation service, with the rapid development of automated driving technologies. On-road pilot tests are considered as an effective way in promoting the deployment of automated buses. In this paper, several on-road pilot tests of automated bus aiming for campus transportation would be introduced, of which the tests conducted in Okinawa were mainly aimed for technical verification, and the tests performed at Kashiwa campus, the University of Tokyo, were mainly focused on the operation and maintenance issues. It is expected that the tests can provide an evidence for the possibility of applying automated bus in public transportation.