Volvo says car 'road trains' will become a reality

Testing of experimental 'tail-gating' technology continues full speed ahead and could be in use by 2020
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It turns out tail-gating could be good for road safety. Automotive safety pioneer Volvo wants to take control away from the driver – and force cars to drive nose-to-tail – using a controversial method to reduce the number of car crashes.

The company that invented the seatbelt and the crumple zone is well progressed with technology that enables a vehicle to follow the movement of the car in front.

The 'road train' system, as it is dubbed, uses camera, laser and radar sensors to judge the speed of the car in front and maintain a safe gap – and applies the brakes and steering automatically.

Testing of the system has been so successful that Volvo's senior safety engineer Thomas Broberg believes it will be used on European roads by the end of the decade.

Broberg told UK magazine Autocar that the company had 'attached' two cars to a road train in closed-road trials, and that Volvo would test the system on public roads in Sweden by the end of this year.

The system relies on the lead vehicle setting the pace – while the following vehicles mimmick its movements. Broberg expected that "small fees" would likely be paid by the drivers of the vehicles that followed.

"Road trains allow a driver to use their time better, drive safer, reduce congestion and improve the environment," he told the magazine. "You're always following another car, so why not let the driving be done by someone else?"

Volvo says road train technology is a crucial step towards fully autonomous, driverless cars, such as those being used by Google mapping. Experts in North America believe the first driverless cars for public use will be taxis in cities such as New York.

"I believe they [driverless cars] will happen," Broburg said. "From a technological point of view it's challenging, but possible."

Included among the challenges were "legal and social issues".

Two years ago Volvo boldly set a target of no one dying in its cars by 2020, but it has since conceded this may be a too ambitious task. Broburg told Autocar the company needs to "understand the mechanisms about how people think" before a zero road toll for Volvo drivers is possible.

Although Chinese-made Geely vehicles currently lack the high level of Volvo safety features, Broburg said the recent purchase of Volvo by Geely may help the car maker accrue more crash data at a faster rate – because Geely is a mass-volume manufacturer.


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