Singapore Built a Dedicated Town for Self-Driving Buses

The city-state’s secure test park gathers information about autonomous vehicles.

By Kyunghee Park and Krystal Chia : June 4, 2018, 5:00 PM EDT

In the race to deploy driverless public transport, Singapore has built a mini town that could vault it into pole position.

The 2-hectare complex, unveiled in November, has intersections, traffic lights, bus stops and pedestrian crossings, all built to the specifications that Singapore uses for its public roads. There’s a mini hill to check how vehicle sensors perform when they can’t see directly ahead, mock skyscrapers to mimic the radio interference from tall buildings and a rain machine to simulate the island’s frequent tropical downpours.

The advantage for the city-state is that the test circuit, and the information provided by companies vying to put driverless buses on Singapore’s streets, is helping it build an unrivaled database of information on the challenges and solutions that would allow the government to introduce the technology safely.