UK government to test convoys of semi-automated trucks on public roads by the end of 2018, allocating £8.1M for the project
Gwyn Topham / The Guardian :
Context & Ripple Effects
The £8.1M convoy trial extends a string of UK public-road autonomy experiments that began months earlier with an Oxbotica-built driverless shuttle carrying passengers through London at 10mph. Where the shuttle tested low-speed passenger transport, this project targets freight — platoons of semi-automated trucks running on real motorways by the end of 2018.
It also lands just ahead of the government's separate commitment to spend three years examining driving laws for self-driving vehicles, making the truck trial the first stress test of whether existing road rules can absorb automated platooning.
First-order effects
- Hauliers operating on the trial corridors see platooning move from concept to funded public-road testing, with the £8.1M covering the convoy technology and trials rather than commercial rollout.
Second-order effects
- The military dimension surfaces in parallel: the US Army's own driverless convoy trucks show defence buyers pursuing the same platooning capability, giving suppliers a second customer beyond civilian freight.
Third-order effects
- If the trial feeds into the government's three-year review of driving laws, the UK's sequence — shuttle, truck convoy, law reform, then the planned London autonomous taxi trial in spring 2026 — points toward regulation being written around accumulated public-road evidence rather than ahead of it.
The trend: Governments are using small, publicly funded road trials to generate the legal and safety evidence base before commercial autonomous-vehicle deployment.