Currently, we are witnessing even more powerful trends that are likely to lead to revolutionary changes in mobility. Technological innovations coupled with policy directives that have lingered previously are now maturing and emerging to drive the next wave of transition to smarter, more efficient, and safer mobility.
Automation – After the DARPA grand challenge[1] and Google started its autonomous driving unit[2], an estimated $100B+ has been invested[3] into the developments of automated driving systems (ADS, per SAE 3016[4]). Despite limited deployment as of today[5], the automation trend has permeated into various sub-sectors of transportation. ADS have proliferated and a variety of use cases for automated vehicles abound. The increasing incorporation of automation will be a main theme in future mobility, such as advanced driver assistance systems, goods shipping and logistics support, robot taxi, long-haul trucking, fixed route shuttle, aerial transport, and special use cases in agriculture, factory, airport, harbor, mining, military, and remote deployments in restricted, hazardous, or difficult-to-reach areas.
Connectivity (V2X and Cooperative Infrastructure) – The concept of sharing data via communication (V2X) has been around since after the 1998 Intelligent Transportation Systems Act, the FCC reserved 75 MHz of the 5.9 GHz band for dedicated short range communications (DSRC). Cellular V2X has emerged as an alternative technology and a broad-based consortium[6] and many automakers are leaning toward C-V2X. The latest decision by FCC 5.9 GHz waiver opens road to C-V2X deployment in US.[7] Another term that is often grouped with V2X is “Smart Roadway” or “Cooperative Infrastructure,” which is advocated as sensing and processing capabilities of vehicles and roadways can be combined through connectivity and further enhanced mutually.
Climate Change - A frequently cited topic that draws much attention in recent years is “climate change.” This is especially noticeable in terms of policies adopted and implemented by many countries and regions around the world. See United Nations Climate Change webpage[8] and associated Net Zero Coalition webpage[9] for more detail. As a further example, “The U.S. Government is now joined by 18 national governments committed to attaining net-zero government emissions by 2050.”, per statements from the US White House Council of Environmental Quality.[10] These policies in turn have caused a chain reaction among the energy, infrastructure, transportation, and automotive industries globally to adapt to the new requirements and led to profound and far-reaching impacts.
Electrification – As the environmental polices aim to reduce greenhouse gas emission, a great shift has occurred in the automotive industry in terms of electrical vehicles (EV) market growth and realignment. Multiple U.S. states plan to stop sales of gas-powered cars by 2030.[11] Carmakers announced that they would phase out gas car sales by 2035.[12] European Union voted to ban the sale of Internal-Combustion Engine (ICE) earlier but only steps back[13] to a revised mandate. This phenomenon transition to EV not only causes a change in market competition of the automotive industrial players but also has global complications on geopolitical considerations as well as future supplies of commodity and materials needed. See IEEE’s “EV Transition” publication[14] for excellent discussions of opportunities, as well as engineering reality and challenges in the coming decades.
Internet of Things – With availability of high-bandwidth communication and the proliferation of sensing and processing devices, the internet of things for vehicles and transportation is finally coming to fruition. The path toward such a network of tools and machines is further facilitated due to powerful edge computing as low-cost and computation-intensive devices become increasingly available. This sector is projected to have an extremely high compound growth rate in the upcoming decades.[15]
Artificial Intelligence – The buzzword of AI plays has been taking up a storm after ChatGPT[16] released its latest version in March 2023. It is a fascinating technology, but AI is certainly not new and has been around multiple decades with cyclic ups and downs.[17] What is significant over the last decade is the evolving developments of deep learning and associated tools for various domains are now suitable for utilization in transportation, including vehicle detection and classification via image processing, data analysis and decision making through machine leaning models, methodologies for traffic managements, not to mention their applications for autonomous driving and logistics support.
The mobility field is undergoing an impactful and profound paradigm shift. The transformations are significant from several perspectives: technological advancement, rate of change, breadth of reach, and societal impacts. As a result, the tectonic movements in the transportation landscape will result in intriguing opportunities and stimulating challenges for private industries and government agencies alike.
Regardless of the pace and extent of realized accomplishments in a selected time window, what we learned from previous periods of technological revolutions, such as the internet in the 1990s, are that profound ramifications will propagate throughout society and that the industrial landscape will continue to evolve with changes that may not be foreseen definitely in advance. This is an exciting era for the field of mobility.
