Semi-autonomous truck trial to begin on Melbourne’s freeways from tonight

A truck that can talk to the road and is fitted with semi-autonomous driving technology will hit Melbourne’s freeways from tonight.

The truck and semi-trailer doesn’t have an array of vehicle radars and sensors, but instead uses lane-keep assist technology, traffic sign recognition, and real-time data received from closed-circuit televisions (CCTV) along the route to drive itself.

Referred to as a ‘connected and automated vehicle’ (CAV), the trial is being conducted by Transurban – the infrastructure company that owns and operates CityLink tollways – and will operate between Todd Road on CityLink and Warrigal Road on the Monash Freeway.

A driver will be behind the wheel at all time to intervene if necessary, and pilot vehicles will accompany the truck in the early stages of the program – as well as being monitored remotely from the CityLink control room.

When the ‘automated mode’ is engaged, the truck will only be able to drive down the freeway in the right-hand lane – which is subsequently closed to other vehicles – while the driver will take over controls when using freeway exits and on-ramps.

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While testing of higher levels of autonomous driving technology is more commonly found on the streets of San Francisco and Los Angeles, trials for vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) systems have been happening in Melbourne since mid-2021.

Transurban says it has conducted 10 CAV trials in both North America and Australia – with the latest trial only proceeding after it was “subject to weeks of rigorous testing” at the Australian Automotive Research Centre in Victoria’s south-west.

The trial will be conducted at night when there is less traffic, and will continue throughout November and December 2022.