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UK government funding announced for a Smart Mobility Living Lab

Posted: 26 October 2017 | | No comments yet

A consortium, led by TRL, has been awarded £13.4 million of the government’s £51 million Connected and Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) test bed funding for a Smart Mobility Living Lab in Greenwich, London.

UK government funding announced for a Smart Mobility Living Lab

The GATEway shuttle

This funding is to create a real-world test environment named the Smart Mobility Living Lab (SMLL) for the development of future mobility solutions. This initial round of funding is part of the £100 million UK CAV test bed competitive fund and is the first investment by the government and industry through Meridian to develop a coordinated national platform of CAV testing infrastructure.

“Users of the SMLL will be able to collaboratively or independently test their ideas, technology and services in a real-world environment,” said Paul Zanelli, Director, Engineering & Technology at TRL. “This exciting project will see us working closely with industry to develop the evidence case for bringing new products and services to market, and with local and national governments to address the challenges and opportunities of future mobility. This will ensure we gain the benefits and minimise the pain of change.”

SMLL will operate as an open environment where innovators in the automotive sector, transport service and technology providers, SMEs, local and central government and research bodies, can come together to exchange ideas and develop technical and business solutions for the future development of smart mobility solutions.

“Combining ambitious new technologies and innovative business models to address social and economic challenges lies at the heart of the Government’s modern Industrial Strategy,” added Business and Energy Secretary Greg Clark. “Accelerating connected and autonomous vehicle technology development is central to achieving this ambition and will help to ensure the UK is one of the world’s go-to locations to develop this sector.

“These projects, backed by Government, form part of a globally unique cluster running from our automotive heartlands in the West Midlands, down through our innovation centres in Oxfordshire and Milton Keynes, through to London, Europe’s only mega-city.”

Included in the consortium to receive the funding is TRL; DG Cities; Cisco; Costain; Cubic; Loughborough University; Transport for London; and the London Legacy Development Corporation.

TRL, together with its partners, has an active portfolio of autonomous, connected, electric and shared mobility projects including the UK HGV platooning project, GATEway, MOVE_UK, Atlas, Driven, Streetwise, Merge Greenwich and DRAGON.

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