London Tries to Lure Google Self-Driving Cars for Testing

Jennifer van der Kleut

Barely two weeks after news broke that Google was applying to add four additional U.S. cities to its self-driving car testing program, it seems Google could be setting its sights across the ocean as well.

News outlets like The Guardian and Engadget are reporting that London officials are attempting to woo Google to their city.

Engadget claims that one of the key reasons to test Google’s self-driving cars in the U.K. is because things are the polar opposite there-drivers sit on the right side of the car, and drive in the left lane.

Engadget reports the most recent meeting between Google reps and London officials took place just in the past few weeks, but that it was just the latest of “at least a dozen” such meetings over three years.

“It is still very early days, but we would be keen for trials to happen in London whenever Google are ready to move them into other countries,” The Guardian quotes Isabel Dedring, deputy mayor for transport.

Both The Guardian and Engadget add, there’s a lot going on in the U.K. transportation-wise these days.

In an effort to ease congestion between London’s east and west ends, The Guardian reports that two different tunnels are being proposed. Dedring pointed out that autonomous car technology could allow the tunnels to be built much more narrowly, since radar and sensors control the distance between autonomous vehicles.

Engadget says earlier this month, the U.K. government also announced that it will invest 20 million pounds in eight driverless car projects. This comes after the government partially funded a number of research projects including electric shuttle buses and two-person pods, virtual simulators and LIDAR-equipped jeeps in December of 2014.

The four U.S. cities Google plans to expand its testing to are still not completely clear, though the famous Koala cars suddenly popped up in Kirkland, Washington one day last week, a sea-side suburb of Seattle.

Speculation is that Contra Costa in northern California, where the GoMentum Station testing ground is located, could be another spot where they pop up soon.