Shiotsu Autotrade Japan wrote:Hitachi’s Self-driving Robotic Car ROPITS
Hitachi Ltd. has recently revealed a driver-less tiny electric car to assist elderly citizens & citizens with mobility disabilities. This one seater self-driving robotic car uses GPS system to carry its single passenger. Hitachi displayed a prototype of this car recently in the Tsukuba city to demonstrate how this car is designed to automatically pick up & drop passengers. Hitachi has named this self-driven car ROPITS or Robot for Personal Intelligent Transport System.
Many automakers and researchers are working on autonomous vehicles technology. Google car is a great example of this. This self driven car ROPITS by Hitachi resembles to Toyota i-Road which was revealed recently at Geneva Motor Show. Both these car prototypes from Toyota and Google promise fewer accidents, safe highway driving and less traffic jam. However, this tiny car by Hitachi doesn’t require direct control by the passenger.
This narrow car is designed to aid the needs of aging population as well as physically challenged individuals in Japan. The course & transport time of ROPITS can be programmed through map-loaded tablet computer. This is the unique factor of this self driven car. ROPITS can be used on sidewalks. Once the passenger uses the tablet PC to summon the car, it reaches to the location of the passenger. And passengers just need to indicate their destination using a touch screen. ROPITS is ideally suitable to move in & out of pedestrian spaces and even in crowded streets.
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I'm sure nothing can go wrong with self-driven cars on what passes for sidewalks in Japan