In the past few years, the long-envisaged self-driving car has come closer to reality. Prototypes are demonstrating the rapid advance of the technology involved and car manufacturers have announced that they may be bringing self-driving cars onto the market in the foreseeable future. The reason for pursuing this aim is not just to enable us to drive without our hands on the wheel. The self-driving car promises us a safer, more sustainable, and more efficient system of transport, one in which traffic accidents — most of which are the result of human error or carelessness — could be prevented. Traffic conge tion and fuel consumption could be reduced if intelligent cars drive close behind one another in platoons. According to the Netherlands Institute for Transport Policy Analysis (KiM), the national costs of congestion, accidents, and environmental damage caused by traffic were between 19.9 and 20.9 billion euros in 2012 (Kennisinstituut voor Mobiliteitsbeleid, 2013). And according to Dresden University of Technology, the cost to the European Union of traffic accidents and environmental damage is estimated at 373 billion euros (Becker et al. 2012). Besides reducing these costs to society, developing the self-driving car can give a major economic boost to the mobility industry in both the Netherlands and the European Union. It is therefore no wonder that the development of self-driving cars is on the agenda of policymakers. At European level, there are a number of EU-funded research projects to investigate the future of smart mobility, and treaties such as the United Nations Convention on Road Traffic are being amended to stimulate the development of (partly) self-driving vehicles (Miles & Graff 2014). In late 2013, the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure and the Environment, Melanie Schultz van Haegen, went for a demonstration trip in a self-driving car as part of the Dutch Automated Vehicle Initiative (DAVI). In June 2014, the Minister wrote to the Dutch House of Representatives to say that she will promote the development of such vehicles (Parliamentary Documents II, 2013/14, 31305, No. 210). She asserted that by allowing tests and through flexible legislation, the Netherlands could play a pioneering role in the development of the self-driving car. The self-driving car is therefore on the horizon. But if we look more closely, we see that it is not clear just what this vehicle should be like. Will it be an autonomous robot car like the Google car, or a cooperative car that drives in platoons on the motorway? Just what kind of car are we talking about when we refer to the self-driving car? And how do the various developments in this field relate to one another? Different innovations are taking place simultaneously, raising a variety of social, political and governance issues. In this study, the Rathenau Instituut aims to shed light on the technological developments concerning the self-driving car. We use the context of the Dutch mobility system to clarify the various developments that are taking place. However, the description of the dynamics of these developments is relevant not only to the Dutch debate about the self-driving car; it also provides insights for European policy discussions on mobility. The study describes how actors work in different ways to achieve the goal of the self-driving car, and how the different ways relate to one another. We show how these developments are driven and influenced by advancing digitisation. Next, we discuss what the various technological developments mean for the policies and programmes that have been developed in the Netherlands and formulate policy recommendations. How can the Netherlands use the self-driving car in such a way that it can achieve its policy objectives of safer and more sustainable traffic and less congestion, and contribute to the country’s innovativeness? This study is based on a background study describing the development of Dutch and international policy regarding self-driving mobility. That study appeared in Dutch as Tem de robotauto [Taming the Robot Car] and is available via the Rathenau Instituut (Timmer & Kool 2014). We present the main findings of that study here, and discuss the current political and policy issues regarding self-driving cars. In the present report, we refer in a number of places to the in-depth background study for a detailed discussion of the parties involved in the innovation process, and the development of their views and interests. Input for the study came from a series of interviews with experts in the Dutch mobility sector, a review of the relevant literature, and a workshop for policymakers and other relevant stakeholders in the governance process. We will first discuss the various paths of technological development and the different approaches to self-driving vehicles that result from them (Section 2). Next, we discuss how these developments should be seen in the context of existing policy and established interests at Dutch, European, and international level (Section 3). This provides an understanding of the dynamics of the field and the possible future of the various development paths. In addition to these innovation dynamics, we describe how digitisation — which forms the basis for the self-driving car — introduces its own dynamics and raises its own issues (Section 4). We then discuss what this means for Dutch mobility policy (Section 5) and we formulate our conclusions and recommendations for how the various developments towards self-driving traffic should be managed (Section 6). Our recommendations and conclusions target mobility policy in the Netherlands, but the interwoven nature of Dutch and European mobility policy means that they can also provide interesting input for a European discussion of the self-driving car. (Author/publisher)
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