Several autonomous driving companies in China has been permitted to carry out more manned demonstration activities on city motorways, latest development of Chinese autonomous driving firms supported by government policies.
Chinese autonomous driving company Pony.ai said recently that the roads between the Beijing Daxing International Airport and Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone, with a length of more than 40 kilometer of highways, could allow L4 driving, which means a vehicle could operate itself without the active intervention of a human driver.
The route contains urban roads and highway scenarios, including about 40 kilometers of expressways.
Pony.ai has launched the airport pick-up and drop-off function on the taxi-hailing app.
Market watchers said that urban travel at airports and high-speed rail stations are an important part of the commercialization of autonomous driving, which means more mature iterations of technical capabilities, as well as exploration of revenue models.
Earlier in November of 2023, a circular released by four ministries, including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Ministry of Transport, said that China will pilot market access for intelligent connected vehicles (ICVs) and allow them to run on public roads.
Cities will choose some ICV models equipped with automated driving functions, capable of being mass-produced, to grant them market access and test the selected vehicles on designated city roads.
In a work report delivered by Beijing municipal government in 2024, the capital city said it will launch the construction of a high-level autonomous driving demonstration zone and promote the orderly opening of key application scenarios such as airports, train stations, and urban road cleaning.
