The future of transportation

This article is part of The future of transportion, a content series developed by The Economist Intelligence Unit, sponsored by Toray. In this series, we explore how the future we see today will navigate the future of transport in the next five, ten to twenty-five years.

5 years from now

On the road: Driverless cars coming soon

The advent of commercialised jet travel in the 1950s was the last major advance in transportation, with the arguable exception of high-speed trains, which debuted in Japan in 1964. Since then, improvements across all modes of transport have been largely incremental. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner, for example, is lighter and more fuel-efficient than its predecessors, the Airbus A380 is larger, and both rely on the latest computer equipment for flight operations. But neither are fundamentally different from first generation commercial jets. And the same could be said of cars, ships, trains, and even bicycles — they all certainly look different and function far better, but they wouldn’t necessarily shock someone present at their invention.

That is about to change, at least in one mode. Self-driving cars are expected to be on the roads more quickly than was anticipated just a few years ago, and in greater numbers. Forecasts vary, as they always do, but the emerging consensus among the industry’s larger players is that, at minimum, fleet vehicles — trucks, taxis, and buses — that can take control and make independent decisions, i.e. SEA level 3, will be in use by the end of this decade. More recent entrants into the industry, like Tesla and the Delphi-Mobileye partnership, believe fully- autonomous vehicles, i.e. SEA level 4 or 5, will be available around the same time; NuTonomy, a start-up spun out of MIT, is already conducting road trials in Singapore, with plans to deploy in 10 cities across the globe by 2020.

While the technology is clearly advancing from being speculative and a curiosity on the roads of Northern California, its near-term impact on transportation is likely to be minimal outside of a few major cities and perhaps the world’s long-haul trucking routes. However, looking to 2025 and beyond, driverless cars will become increasingly integrated in a system that might have a passenger using her smartphone to hail an autonomous, fully-electric taxi that communicates with other vehicles to ensure safety and with infrastructure managers in order to manage traffic flows. If she’s in Nagoya, Japan, her destination might be that city’s central rail station, where she will board the next great advance in transportation — maglev, a technology that would make trains nearly twice as fast as the high-speed trains in current use.

Self-driving cars are expected to be on the roads more quickly than was anticipated just a few years ago, and in greater numbers.

10 years from now

Above the rails: the floating future of trains

Magnetic levitation, or maglev, technology has been around for decades, but is in commercial use in only a few locations. The technology, powering trains, is mainly a curiosity or tourist attraction, as is the case with the Shanghai Maglev which began operations in 2004 and connects Shanghai Pudong International Airport with a station on the outskirts of the city proper. The first line of substantial length, the Chuo Shinkansen, is planned to come into service in the mid-2020s and will cut the travel time between Tokyo and Nagoya, 350km apart, by half to just 40 minutes. At least ten other countries are now considering the development of maglev lines of their own over the next 20 years, including the UK, Germany, the US, China, India, and Malaysia.

Until a few years ago, proponents of high-speed and ultra-high- speed rail believed their competition to be cars, buses, and short-haul flights. But a new concept has since emerged: the hyperloop. Described by its developer, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, as a ”fifth mode” of transport, the hyperloop would send passengers between cities at speeds of more than 970km/h in capsules that float in partial vacuum tubes. Mr Musk’s concept document for the hyperloop, published in August 2012, was greeted with a mix of wonder and scepticism, if not more of the latter, initially. Now, however, there are three major start-ups working to commercialise the technology, not including Mr Musk’s own firm, and with others sure to follow.

By the end of the 2020s, both maglev trains and hyperloops could be options for countries and cities considering upgrades to their transportation infrastructure. Commuters and business travellers alike stand to benefit from eased congestion, less onerous security procedures, and smoother, safer, and faster rides.

Yet unlike driverless cars, neither maglev nor hyperloop technologies can piggy- back on existing infrastructure. At best, maglev lines can save some costs by running parallel with existing conventional lines, but those savings are minimal compared to the overall cost. Hyperloops will need to be built on entirely new, standalone platforms.

That makes them both expensive, at least at current and projected costs, and with most governments in the developed and developing world struggling under massive and growing debt burdens, convincing taxpayers that either mode represents a worthwhile investment is sure to prove difficult, no matter how sleek and appealing the concept.

The future of high-speed transport may not be so far off but its arrival may be delayed because of economic constraints, much to the frustration of entrepreneurs and the rest of us.

25 years from now

Can we have nice things? Customised transport and data protection

What will transport look like in 2040 if economic and other constraints are relieved? In an ideal scenario, all forms of transport, including the “fifth mode,” the hyperloop, will be faster, more efficient, and seamlessly integrated, both physically and digitally. There are also expectations that it will be increasingly customised. A person in almost any major city, for example, could by 2040 be able to step out their front door to find waiting the autonomous pod they ordered from a nearby multi- storey charging station only minutes earlier.

The pod, just one among the suite of options offered by her or his personal mobility provider of choice, will embark once the passenger has taken their seat and presented authentication, either through a wearable device or some form of biometric ID. The destination that day could be quotidian, the office or a restaurant to meet friends for dinner. Or it could be grander, the start of journey tailored to the precise needs and interests of the traveller, with the reservations and tickets and experiences all selected by the provider’s proprietary algorithm, which draws on each subscribers’ travel history, social media posts, search history, and other sources to take them to where they want to go.

This will of course require continuing advances in trains, planes, cars, roads, and ICT and energy infrastructure. But it will also need an expansion and deepening of digital trends, like the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, and machine learning and AI. And, equally, consumers will need to be comfortable sharing massive amounts of personal data. That is far from assured. Various surveys conducted on the subject have revealed that concerns about data privacy are generally high and rising, while at the same time noting that there are differences between regions (e.g. EU and North American attitudes) and generations (e.g. milennials and their parents).

For transport to become truly customised, all companies must therefore convince consumers that their data is safe.

If consumers feel that they cannot trust their financial institutions, search engines, social media platforms, and other online services that are responsible for protecting data, it won’t matter how secure transportation providers keep their customers’ data.