Lyft Set To Begin Using nuTonomy Self-Driving Cars In Boston

Lyft is continuing to forge ahead with its nuTonomy partnership with a trial of its self-driving vehicles start soon in Boston. What does this mean for you?

Unless you live in Boston, the news might not seem terribly relevant, but its repercussions will be much broader and affect the way we move around cities.

The potential of autonomous vehicles (AV) with self-driving cars is obviously important for carmakers, but especially so for us. More productivity is a notable benefit we should see. Tired of sitting behind the wheel and getting nothing done? Let a robot do the driving for you.

Lyft’s nuTonomy trial is not the only game in town, but it is a well-funded one that is making great strides. The Lyft + nuTonomy partnership will happen in Boston’s Seaport district. So rush out there and tell us about your experience if you can.

How do you do this? You can get on the trial by requesting a ride through the Lyft app. As the pilot develops, a few select Boston passengers in that area will be selected.

What The nuTonomy + Lyft Test Trial Aims To Do

In a nutshell, the nuTonomy + Lyft trial is designed to let the public experience firsthand what a driverless vehicle feels like. And in order to better understand how driverless services will impact our lives, data needs to be gathered. The other important factor is the data feedback from the pilot participants nuTonomy and Lyft will receive. With this feedback, engineers from both companies will continue to improve the system to better accommodate the needs of riders.

Delivering an autonomous transportation experience requires a lot of data and user feedback. In order to do that, a lot of parameters need to be analyzed to offer the safe, efficient, and comfortable experience users demand. nuTonomy aims to continue to develop its research through this first public pilot in the United States.

With A Little Help From My Friends

nuTonomy has not only partnered with Lyft, but has also received a financial boost from Delphi, which acquired the company a couple of months ago.

Perhaps the part we tend to forget is what happens behind the scenes. In our previous discussions with various carmaker officers and engineers involved with autonomous driving, one of the key points is that almost anyone can shove LIDAR, GPS, and other sensors into cars. The trick is to bring it together coherently. The real work happens behind the scenes by designing a robust backbone that will coordinate the information gathered by vehicles used to determine the best course of action and thus save people’s lives while offering the service expected.

With a few players in the game, nuTonomy faces competition from GM’s Cruise, Alphabet’s Waymo and now Apple’s fascinating take on LIDAR.

Who’s Leading in AV?

It would be hard to say who’s leading at this early stage of the self-driving car game. With potential players each well funded, we hope the technology will mature fast enough to free us from the boring daily horror of traffic and free our time to be more productive.

You can follow the company on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and, of course, YouTube.

In the meantime, if you live in Boston, get on Lyft and tell us how the ride was.