A new project in Detroit deploying four autonomous shuttles is modeled as a new transit service, with complete real-time vehicle tracking and stops that connect to the Detroit Department of Transportation bus system.
“The primary focus is, it must feel like transit. It must operate like transit,” said Tim Slusser, chief of mobility innovation for the city of Detroit, discussing The Connect, a new 10.8-mile autonomous vehicle (AV) shuttle service. Now wrapping its first month, the service winds through downtown and neighboring Corktown and operates from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., Monday through Friday. Technically a pilot, The Connect is set to run for two years — for now.
“We see this as a pilot project that has real opportunity to actually grow into a full, long-term program,” Slusser said. “So we wanted to make every determination to mirror those requirements, such that we could go after federal funding to continue this.”
The four vehicles — a fifth is planned — are Ford e-transit shuttles, equipped with autonomous technology from Perrone Robotics. They will operate at speeds up to 35 mph, a speed seen as consistent with downtown traffic, and one able to keep the shuttles arriving at stops every 10-15 minutes during peak hours.
“A lot of the success we’ve seen in transit services, when they reach that 10-minute mark it becomes something people feel they can depend on. And that’s really the goal here, is to design a service that feels like transit, first, while incorporating these new technologies,” Slusser said.
Another key planning feature is having the service seamlessly integrate with the city’s existing bus network.
“We’re not just testing sustainability and how people interact with the technology, but actually integrating it into the system as a whole,” said Konner Petz, project manager for The Connect program and senior mobility strategist for Detroit’s Office of Mobility Innovation, which Slusser leads.
The Connect is a partnership among the city; Bedrock, a real estate firm; the Michigan Office of Future Mobility and Electrification; Michigan Central, a 30-acre redevelopment project in Corktown with a restored train station as its centerpiece; and Perrone Robotics. The $3.17 million project is funded by a variety of state and other grants.
As a first step, its vehicles are involved with mapping their route, which can take one to three months. This happens in conjunction with passenger services. The vehicles will begin using their autonomous features in about a month, Slusser said, but a human operator will remain onboard.
“It’s not actually operating [in] autonomous mode yet, today,” he said. “But we took advantage of the fact that, ‘Hey, we’re going to be paying you to put these vehicles on the road. Let's start moving some people.’”
The autonomous transit shuttle service in Detroit is not entirely unlike PRESTO, a similar service launched Thursday in Martinez, Calif., in the Bay Area. PRESTO operates as a shared, autonomous, free service in a roughly two-square-mile region around the Contra Costa Regional Medical Center.
It will operate through August 2025, using seven Toyota Sienna Autono-MaaS vehicles outfitted with autonomous technology from May Mobility. The tech uses AI “to learn in real time by imagining thousands of ‘what-if’ scenarios every second while it drives,” according to a joint press release by the Contra Costa Transportation Authority (CCTA) and May Mobility.
The vehicles will travel at a top speed of 30 mph for now, project officials said. Each seats five passengers and includes an attendant. The service has roughly 27 designated pickup and drop-off locations, including the county hospital, local public health centers and the nearby Amtrak station.
"We established the county hospital element to aid patients who may need rides in the afternoon to resources in the community,” Newell Arnerich, CCTA board chair, said in a statement. “As an added benefit to residents, during the evening hours, the service will carry passengers to an array of destinations in the city of Martinez."
And in Florida, the Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA) plans to integrate AVs into its fleet in the next two years, with the development of an autonomous shuttle manufacturing center in Jacksonville.
Slusser, back in Detroit, highlighted the public-private partnership for its potential to resolve transit gaps in other parts of his city — and elsewhere, too.
“The model here is, I think I’m going to create more value for you than the dollars you’re going to spend on this program. That’s going to be your ROI,” he said. “And if I can prove that, then I want to have a long-term relationship with you to help fund transportation solutions in the city of Detroit, maybe not just on this route, but other areas of the city as well.”
