PROVIDENCE – The R.I. Department of Transportation has awarded a contract to May Mobility Inc. to provide a limited and controlled automated vehicle service to run between downtown Providence and Olneyville, along the Woonasquatucket River corridor, the department announced Monday.
RIDOT said that a pilot service will be free and available to the public for one year.
The Ann Arbor, Mich.-based company is scheduled to conduct a study and testing phase with small autonomous shuttles that could hold up to six people, including an attendant who will be able to control the shuttle. RIDOT noted that the shuttles will be fully electric.
The first phase of implementation will occur at the Quonset Business Park. Shuttle service along the Woonasquatucket River is expected to be implemented in late spring 2019.
Rhode Island will contribute $800,000 for the first year of operation, including $300,000 in federal funds and $500,000 from the R.I. Attorney General’s Office consisting of funds from a settlement with Volkswagen AG over the diesel emissions scandal.
“Now that we are well underway in executing the Governor’s RhodeWorks program, we are able to focus on improving our transportation system – and that includes pilot programs like this to look at how to safely integrate new technology into our planning in a very careful, measured manner,” said RIDOT Director Peter Alviti Jr. in a statement.
The contract also includes an option to extend the service for two years.
RIDOT also announced that it has committed to working with the Amalgamated Transit Union as part of the program to study the unions concerns about automated vehicles’ effect on jobs.
Thomas Cute, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 618, said in a statement, “New technology associated with autonomous vehicles can be helpful to bus operators as far as pedestrian recognition and blind spot warnings, but the union remains concerned about the total replacement of human operators who bring a dynamic of safe interactions with passengers.”
RIDOT spokesman Charles St. Martin told PBN that there was no public hearing for the program, as it is a pilot test, but that the department will work with the company on public outreach closer to the launch of the free-shuttle program in Providence.
St. Martin also said that RIDOT chose the route because it identified Olneyville as an area of new economic development that is currently underserved by public transit.
Chris Bergenheim is the PBN web editor. Email him at Bergenheim@PBN.com.
