TX: ‘A step toward the future’: SwRI advances self-driving technology as VIA eyes possible applications
Sep. 8—Sitting in a back seat of a shuttle driving itself across the campus of Southwest Research Institute, Jeffrey Arndt recently got a look at the future.
The CEO of VIA Metropolitan Transit appeared to trust the artificial intelligence guiding the 14-seat vehicle— a mix of ground-facing cameras, automation software and lidar technology — as it rolled along at 25 mph.
"I think it is a step toward the future," Arndt said as he watched the SwRI engineer in the driver's seat — but whose hands were not on the controls. "There are elements that are still in development. But you need to build it incrementally. It is exciting to see and imagine the opportunity that this would provide us."
As Texas and the rest of the country anticipate a future with self-driving cars, SwRI's campus has become a laboratory for autonomous technologies that could help change the way San Antonians navigate the roads, as well as other AI research geared toward improving and maintaining public infrastructure.
VIA, San Antonio's public transit company, and SwRI have been in "consultation" about engineering research on autonomous vehicles, Arndt said.
"I think this decade is where we'll see this really come full-blown," he said. "We look for opportunities to work on demonstration projects."
Government, academia and the private sector have long touted fully autonomous vehicles as a means to improve transportation. And though it's expected to take years, perhaps decades, to reach the point that self-driving vehicles are ubiquitous and widely used, that hasn't stopped enthusiasts from investing in them.
Or the state from pushing for them. In 2017, Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill allowing autonomous vehicles on Texas roads.
Two years later, San Antonio officials discussed figuring out how the technology might affect fares. And they announced they planned to introduce self-driving vehicles at Brooks, the former Air Force base turned mixed-use development on the Southeast Side, as a "first mile/last mile" alternative for bus passengers.
Self-driving shuttles, they believed, could transport many riders between their homes and their bus stops. The work would focus on moving people from the then-new VIA Brooks Transit Center to their destinations.
But much remains unclear about such a pilot project. COVID-19 "put the brakes" on plans to test the driverless transit system in 2020, according to Brooks' website.
"VIA has no current (autonomous vehicle) projects in development, though we continue to support the development of innovative mobility solutions and the future integration of autonomous options, with transit as the backbone," VIA said in an email.
Brooks did not respond to requests for comment.
SwRI, meanwhile, is working on self-driving projects for other clients.
Show and tell
In August, SwRI engineer Dan Rossiter helped organize a demonstration of the automated shuttle for participants in the Leadership SA program, along with members of the San Antonio Chamber of Commerce and the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
"This midsize passenger vehicle presents future opportunities to improve mobility and access to transportation in neighborhoods where large buses cannot travel," Rossiter said.
At SwRI, Arndt described how an autonomous shuttle could first be used at Brooks or the Medical Center area, for example, by people seeking "last-mile" connections.
"I think that's probably the first application that we'll have," he said. "It would operate on a route and schedule."
Subsequent steps could involve dedicated lanes on roads, which Arndt called "the perfect place to have automated technology," though he acknowledged that San Antonio lacks an extensive network of high-occupancy vehicle lanes, such as those the state uses to encourage carpooling.
He noted the Texas Department of Transportation's multimillion-dollar plan to add a pair of lanes to some 120 miles of Interstate 35, from Bexar County to Williamson County.
"I-35 is going to have HOV on that second level," he said. "So that'll be an opportunity."
A hypothetical long-term use, he said, would involve autonomous buses running fixed routes.
Arndt's comments come as VIA is planning a $320 million citywide "bus rapid transit" system with dedicated lanes and reduced wait times that will take an estimated five years to get operating.
For now, the head of the local transit system said he's been checking with SwRI engineers for updates about their progress on autonomous vehicles.
AI and infrastructure
The value of artificial intelligence research with respect to solving infrastructural problems goes beyond transportation.
Rossiter sees a sense of urgency to build technologically advanced infrastructure as the region braces for growth in the coming decades. He pointed to the destruction that winter storms have caused to existing infrastructure as indicative of a need for change.
"It implies that the infrastructure has to drastically grow," he said. "If we keep doing what we've always done, it's not going to scale unless we look at things differently and take advantage of technology to do things smarter than we have in the past."
In August, dozens of city leaders, many of whom are part Leadership SA, joined Rossiter for several hours on SwRI's sprawling 1,500-acre campus to catch a glimpse of infrastructure-related technology projects. Leadership SA, which was created more than three decades ago, involves introducing local leaders to resources such as SwRI and other organizations.
Cody Porter, a manager of the intelligent machines section at SwRI, described "crawling robots" to one group, as well as a robot designed to traverse power lines while charging itself on the line.
The group included Tiffany Grant, deputy chief of staff at the nonprofit Communities in Schools in San Antonio, who wondered whether such robots can take photos or videos.
"Yeah, and it can record back the GPS location of where I found this defect and what was wrong," Porter said. "There's lot of interesting reasons to make these things."
Porter also showed simulated footage of another robot performing potentially dangerous tasks, including inspecting, removing paint from and painting corroded power lines.
"You could do this manually, but there's not enough people," he said. "I've been doing this for about 15 years, and I've never replaced a person with a robot."
"Let's advance this technology," Grant said, "and get this robot to paint my house."
Overcoming obstacles
Also at the event was Beth Watkins, a justice with the 4th Court of Appeals in San Antonio, who rode in SwRI's autonomous vehicle. She marveled at the practical, everyday applications of the robots being developed at SwRI, including the potential uses for autonomous vehicles across the city.
"When we're thinking about infrastructure in terms of broadband and Wi-Fi, that's easier for me to get because I already use it," she said.
She was particularly impressed by the autonomous vehicle's light detection and ranging — or lidar — technology, which can detect obstacles such as trees and pedestrians crossing the street, using laser beams to create 3D representations of its surroundings.
SwRI engineers, who have been working on the autonomous shuttle for more than a year, had recently driven it on the institute's grounds so that their Ranger system's ground-facing cameras and automation software could map the road's unique features, such as cracks, oil stains and other markings.
When Alexander Youngs, a senior research engineer at SwRI, sat in the driver seat during the demonstration event, he kept his hands off the wheel and let the system match in real time thousands of features seen on the ground to the data stored in the system.
The system takes pictures for comparison, Youngs said, which enables it to be accurate within about 2 centimeters.
"Think of these pictures like a fingerprint on the road," he said. "As long as we've driven there before, we can tell where we are."
With several lidar cameras attached to the vehicle, passengers watched a screen at the front of the shuttle displaying reds and oranges that indicated the road and surrounding signs, trees and a few people walking on the campus.
"It was super cool because of the lidar," Watkins said. "It was a totally different way of doing autonomous vehicles than I knew about."
The lidar system has some limitations, which Youngs acknowledged in response to a rider who asked how the shuttle performs in snow. While it does OK in light snowfall, the technology struggles to see the road when snow covers the ground. Also, Youngs said the vehicle can operate in the rain but that the lidar can have trouble in heavy rain.
Arndt was in the autonomous shuttle when it jerked slightly to a halt as its artificial intelligence detected a stop sign. It then continued forward and approached a crosswalk.
Arndt asked about the system's ability to detect pedestrians who are about to cross the street, just as several people in the crosswalk began moving across the road. As the shuttled approached, the lidar detected them and formed shapes in the distance.
"That's another feature that's in development as well or needs more testing," Youngs said. "If the pedestrian is near a cross walk, it will slow down and let them cross."
eric.killelea@express-news.net
___
(c)2022 the San Antonio Express-News
Visit the San Antonio Express-News at www.mysanantonio.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
Gloss