This week on Highways Voices, we talk about real world here-and-now driverless solutions.

We’re joined by the former President and CEO of ITS America, Scott Belcher who is now Executive Director of ACES Mobility, a group looking to boost last mile Autonomous, Connected, Electric and Shared journeys with a new American initiative.

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“Our coalition is laser focused – we’re focused on one use case, and that one use case is first and last mile shared use mobility,” he explains. “The challenge that we have in the United States is that regulators want to look at autonomous transportation holistically as if it’s all the same. And when you look at first and last mile shared use mobility, you’re talking about a very unique use case and a very defined solution.”

Scott explains some of the examples of where public ACES solutions are now in regular operation rather than simply trials or demonstrators.

“We’re now seeing that the deployments are being placed in places where people actually use them,” he explains. “There’s a lot that goes into the public outreach. There’s a lot that goes into the outreach to first responders. There’s a lot that goes into safety information. And there’s a lot that goes into making sure that the routes are actually needed and can be used.”

You’ll also hear how people elsewhere in the world can get involved and learn from what the project is doing.

On top of this, we have our partner news, some headlines from the Highways News website and who wins the last Adrian’s Accolade of 2023.