Transport, Serravalle and Milan Polytechnic test self-driving shuttle

Milan, May 8 (Adnkronos) – A Fiat 500e with autonomous driving without a driver left today from the Famagosta metro station in Milan and reached the Cantalupa area, access point to the A7 motorway towards Milan. This is an experimental test, to verify how autonomous driving technology can promote multimodal mobility, as part of the 'Serravalle Future Drive' project.

The initiative, born from the collaboration between the company and the AIDA (Artificial Intelligence Driving Autonomous) team of the Politecnico di Milano, within the research program of the national center Most, was presented today in the auditorium of the headquarters of Milano Serravalle – Milano Tangenziali.

Its objective – as explained in a note by Most, Fnm, Milano Serravalle and Politecnico di Milano – is to "test the effectiveness of a shared autonomous shuttle service in real traffic scenarios and how this can contribute to the construction of more sustainable, intelligent and interconnected mobility". Serravalle Future Drive is the first experiment in Italy that connects peripheral hubs, connected to the motorway network to urban transport nodes, exploiting the potential of autonomous driving. The project aims to reduce congestion in city areas and promote the use of public transport, integrating innovative solutions with existing infrastructures.

Those who attended the presentation were able to closely follow the behavior of the autonomous shuttle, a Fiat 500e provided by technical partner Fassina and equipped with an autonomous driving system based on artificial intelligence, developed by the Politecnico di Milano. "The vehicle, equipped with technology to collect and analyze data in real time, faced in complete autonomy - it is underlined in the note - complex situations such as motorway entrances and exits, in variable traffic conditions, concretely demonstrating the potential of the technology in an integrated urban-motorway context".

“Serravalle Future Drive represents the first project in Italy that concretely unites the world of motorways with the urban world through autonomous driving technology. It is a pioneering challenge that Milano Serravalle wanted to take up, aware of the strategic importance of integrating existing infrastructure and innovation to build truly intermodal, sustainable mobility that serves citizens,” commented Elio Catania, president of Milano Serravalle – Milano Tangenziali. “We are proud to contribute to such an ambitious project, which places Milan at the centre of technological innovation and opens up new perspectives for the mobility of the future,” said Ivo Roberto Cassetta, CEO of Milano Serravalle – Milano Tangenziali. “This initiative,” he added, “represents a concrete step towards more sustainable, efficient mobility that is attentive to the needs of the territory.”

"This experimental project of a multimodal autonomous shuttle marks a new step in the Aida team's journey towards increasingly sustainable mobility. The interconnection between different traffic scenarios represents a concrete evolution towards more flexible and widespread public transport solutions, enhancing the know-how gained by the Politecnico di Milano in research and experimentation activities on autonomous vehicles, both on the track and on public roads", said Professor Sergio Matteo Savaresi of the Politecnico di Milano, scientific director of the Aida project.

"A concrete example of how technology can become a lever for intelligent connection between strategic points of the territory that today escape traditional mobility networks. It is a mobility model that creates value by making the territory more accessible, functional and connected", declared Gianmarco Montanari, general director of the national center for sustainable mobility Most.