Yandex's drone is the first in Europe to become available for everyday travel

Yandex has begun public testing of its self-driving car at Innopolis in Tatarstan for everyday commuting, the company said in a statement to The Bell. The car will be available for trips around the city to all residents who have agreed to participate in the project. Thus, Innopolis became the first city in Europe where you can take a drone as a taxi.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFmUcc7LSiw&feature=youtu.be

Details

• Yandex and the government of Tatarstan signed an agreement on the development of unmanned vehicles in the republic, which provides for the creation of a test zone in Innopolis for the movement of the company's unmanned vehicle. The test zone includes five points of embarkation and disembarkation of passengers, which are located near key urban infrastructure facilities.
• The car will be available daily, it can be tested by all adult residents of the city. Yandex assures that the car strictly observes all traffic rules, but for safety reasons, a test engineer will always be in the cabin.
• “We decided to create a test zone in Innopolis for several reasons. Firstly, this is one of the centers of the Russian IT industry - a kind of "city of the future". Secondly, a full-fledged urban environment has developed in Innopolis <...> Finally, young scientists live and work in Innopolis. They are enthusiastic about everything new and strive to make life more convenient with the help of technology, just like we are,” Yandex explained.

Context

• Yandex announced it was testing a drone for its future use as a taxi in 2016. the first prototype The company showed in May 2017, and in June of this year, the company's unmanned vehicle made its first long-distance trip from Moscow to Kazan. As specified in the press release, it is this car that now provides taxi services in Innopolis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zljaMjLFqfI

• Self-driving car technology is being developed by many automakers and technology companies, including Uber and Tesla. For example, in the US, the Waymo project of Google parent company Alphabet is already testing hundreds of its own autonomous minivans on the roads and plans to launch a full-fledged unmanned taxi service this year.

Artem Gubenko