For four years running, Arlington’s self-driving rideshare project displayed what the future of transportation across the globe could look like.
The funding for the Rideshare, Automation and Payment Integration Demonstration — or RAPID — program officially ended in May. Now, the city is without an autonomous vehicle service for the first time since the tail end of the COVID-19 pandemic.
For Ann Foss, the planning and programming manager for the city’s transportation department, seeing the program she looked over for four years end was bittersweet.
“We knew they were time-limited,” Foss said. “From the get-go, we made sure to call it a pilot. Personally and professionally, I was a little sad as it wrapped up.”
While the program has driven off into the sunset, Foss said it will have a lasting impact on transit in North Texas.
Finding their feet
Arlington was the first U.S. city to integrate an autonomous shuttle when that service, known as Milo, launched in 2017.
At that time, officials were exploring ways to improve travel in the largest city in the United States without mass public transit.
A report from a resident advisory committee called for using such shuttles along with demand-response rideshares, bus rapid transit and personal rapid transit, such as the Ultra Pod PRT in London’s Heathrow Airport.
Milo was already in place when the report came out and was taking riders from parking lots in the entertainment district to larger venues using EasyMile vehicles.
Arlington’s autonomous shuttle service, Milo, ran from 2017 to 2018. (Courtesy photo | City of Arlington)
As that service ended the following year, the city partnered with Drive.ai to bring the autonomous vehicles to the road.
“I think the EasyMile vehicle works well in low-speed settings, but it wasn’t really designed to be on-street or driving with traffic,” Foss said. “So, we were excited to move on to the Drive.ai pilot and be able to be on the street.”
The Drive.ai program was easy to drop into the existing foundation set by Via, the city’s human-driven, on-demand service established just a year before, Foss said.
The Drive.ai program in Arlington was the city’s first on-street autonomous vehicle program. It ran from 2018 to 2019. (Courtesy photo | City of Arlington)
Once again, the program ended after one year of operations. The service provided a total of 760 rides without incident, according to a city press release.
Drive.ai was bought by Apple after the program ended and folded into the company’s failed Project Titan.
Ditching the training wheels
In 2019, city leaders caught wind of a new federal grant that could allow them to run an expanded pilot program using knowledge gained from Milo and Drive.ai.
Officials made their case for what would become RAPID alongside representatives from Via, the University of Texas at Arlington, and May Mobility, a Michigan-based autonomous vehicle company.
“It just kind of clicked,” Daisy Wall, the director of business and policy at May Mobility, said.
In 2020, the city of Arlington struck gold as it received a $1.7 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation under the Integrated Mobility Innovation program, which awarded more than $20 million nationwide.
The North Central Texas Council of Governments, or NCTCOG, also helped foot the bill through a program aimed at spurring automated vehicle usage in the area.
Nearly $1.2 million of RAPID’s initial funding was from nonfederal sources, according to a fact sheet from the Federal Transportation Authority.
By March 2021, the May Mobility fleet used for the newly funded project departed and began the RAPID pilot program.
RAPID’s deployment
The initial deployment included five vehicles — four Lexus RX450s and one Polaris GEM electric vehicle, which was used for those who needed wheelchair accessibility.
Each car was deployed in a defined area near the UT-Arlington campus and downtown. The rideshare service was free for UTA students.
RAPID vehicles were confined to an area around the UT-Arlington campus and downtown. (Courtesy photo | City of Arlington)
The city added RAPID as an option to its Arlington Transportation app as it integrated it with other on-demand services.
“If you booked a ride, and the parameters of the ride matched with the RAPID service, you would get a standard human-driven option and the autonomous RAPID option,” Foss said.
Generally, more than 75% of riders chose the RAPID option if available, Foss said.
After two years of federal funding, the NCTCOG became the sole grantor for the program. During the same timeframe, May Mobility swapped its original RAPID fleet out for four Toyota Sienna vans.
The program officially ended on May 30.
Lessons learned and the future of autonomous transportation in Arlington
RAPID helped not only the city but the nation take a step forward with autonomous vehicle technology and understanding, officials said.
UT-Arlington tracked various data for the program, from ride usage to survey responses. Overall, more than 95% of passengers said the vehicle felt safe, Foss said.
While the vehicles were self-driving, they still had a driver who would take control of the vehicle when needed. RAPID itself had an 80% autonomous rate, according to Natalie Bettger, NCTCOG’s congestion management and system operations project manager.
RAPID gave roughly 113,000 rides in its four years, Bettger said.
“Arlington RAPID was an important step in advancing autonomous vehicle deployment in real-world conditions while building public understanding and trust,” Bettger said in the statement.
While the RAPID pilot program has ended, autonomous vehicles will return to Arlington soon.
Uber and May Mobility announced plans to offer an autonomous vehicle ride service sometime during the fall.
Wall said a formal announcement on the timing of the new private partnership will come in the future.
Both Bettger and Foss pointed to completely autonomous vehicles as something their two respective organizations were looking at.
“I still think we are a little bit away from getting to that point on a large scale,” Foss said. “But all of the services we’ve had and the testing we’ve done have helped us move in that direction.”
City officials are committed to finding out how to use new technology to improve transportation in Arlington, Foss said. That includes possibly incorporating it into long-term plans for on-demand services.
“The goal is, as autonomous technology continues to mature, that we’re able to start incorporating autonomous vehicles in a more substantive way into that fleet,” she said.
Chris Moss is a reporting fellow for the Arlington Report. Contact him at chris.moss@fortworthreport.org.
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