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South Korea launched its first commercial self-driving bus service on Friday as the country’s latest efforts to make autonomous vehicles an everyday reality and also to make people feel more comfortable with driverless vehicles on the roads.
The buses were developed by autonomous transportation startup 42dot, which Hyundai acquired in August.
The new vehicle does not look like a regular bus and has rounded edges along with large windows that make it appear more like a toy than a technological breakthrough. This design is intentional, said Jeong Seong-gyun, head of autonomous driving at 42dot.
“This is the future,” he told AFP, adding that the bus required “a considerable new type of design.” The bus looks a bit “like Lego” and is made of composite parts to help keep costs down and make it easy to replicate, he said.
It uses cameras and lasers to navigate the way instead of expensive sensors, Seong-gyun added. The company’s goal was to make the technology low-cost, safe and easily transferable to many types of vehicle in the future, for example delivery trucks.
Passengers can board the buses at a pair of stops on the route using a mobile phone app.
Passengers can board the buses at a pair of stops on the route using a mobile phone app
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