Features
14 Jun 21

Turin gets an ‘open-air lab’ for smart mobility

With the support of the city’s polytechnic university, Turin has inaugurated an ‘open-air laboratory’ for Smart Mobility and Smart Road. The centre will focus on the real-world testing of technologies and solutions for mobility solutions that are sustainable and/or autonomous – but in any case: smart. 

Turin, Italy’s motor city, is also claiming the title of smart mobility capital of Italy. Now it has a test centre to underscore that claim. 

Innovative activities
The centre will offer OEMs – local and international – and the city’s own services a ‘laboratory’ to research, experiment and certify innovative activities in the related fields of smart mobility and smart cities; anything involving assisted-driving or autonomous driving technology, and intelligent and connected mobility.

Among the services it offers, the centre will provide road-testing in dedicated urban settings, equipped with the digital and connected infrastructure to suit the needs of OEMs wanting to test their autonomous driving systems. Such tests will take place along a circuit that is also provided with intelligent outside cameras, to monitor the progress of the test vehicles. 

Electric hypercar
Recently inaugurated, the centre was ‘pre-tested’ in March, with a city tour by and presentation of a pre-series electric hypercar (pictured at the Geneve Motor Show in 2019), designed in Italy by Battista di Automobili Pininfarina. 

“This centre will allow us to pool the knowledge of academics with the skills of the companies involved in developing innovative solutions,” says professor Giovanni Belingardi, of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Turin Polytechnic, and coordinator of its Interdepartmental Centre for Cars. 

Image: Shutterstock

Authored by: Frank Jacobs