Amsterdam to get driverless ‘roboats’ on canals

“Imagine a fleet of autonomous boats for the transportation of goods and people”, says Carlo Ratti of MIT, who is a principal investigator in the program.

Wait a minute: self-driving boats?

Famous for its Red Light District, marijuana-dispensing coffee shops, and substantive system of canals, Amsterdam is taking advantage of its ample waterways to test self-driving boats.

The total budget for the five year Roboat research project, which will be based in Amsterdam, is €25m.

The autonomous boats will be programmed for other missions that were once left to humans trying to make a euro, such as retrieving the some 12,000 bicycles that end up in the cycle-centric city’s canal each year, the organizers said. The city has more than a hundred kilometers of canals that wind their way throughout the area.

The first prototypes of the so-called “Roboat” will launch next year, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS) said.

As well as creating autonomous boats that could be used as temporary bridges or public transportation, the Roboat project will also explore the creation of data-gathering robots to help with public health issues.

For example, the Roboat program is also partnering with the city of Boston, says van Timmeren, which is one of the most vulnerable cities in the U.S. when it comes to rising tides. The scientists will use robots in Amsterdam’s sewer systems to map the spread of diseases.

According to professor Arjan van Timmeren, the Scientific Director at AMS, the Roboats can also be used for things like testing water quality. Developed floating structures and transport vehicles could be in significant demand.

The Roboat program is also collaborating with Boston city, which is vulnerable to high tides.

To deal with the effects of these rising sea levels, architects have previously suggested converting some of Boston’s streets to canals, reducing the impact on the city’s defences.

The AMS is a science and engineering institute funded by the city of Amsterdam that also uses the city as a test subject for various civic projects.