Developing a travel network management system for new mobility

£250,000+ funding available to develop innovative ideas on how to integrate new mobility options (CAVs, drones and more) and manage the network.

This is a Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) competition with funding provided by the GovTech Catalyst for Oxfordshire County Council. The aim of the competition is to develop new ideas on how traffic and network management can be upgraded to accommodate ‘new mobility’ options in Oxfordshire.

The aim of this competition is to enable the development of a traffic management system suitable for traditional vehicles and the ‘new mobility’ technologies transforming the movement of people and goods in Oxfordshire.

New mobility technologies include, but are not limited to:

• connected and/or autonomous vehicles (CAVs)
• electric vehicles (EVs)
• drones
• dockless bikes
• electric bikes

Proposals should consider how collaborative traffic and network management can:

• reduce the risk of deployment of these new mobilities
• enable the growth of the smart mobility market in the area
• safeguard citizen safety
• reduce the reliance on infrastructure

The system must be able to use data from several sources, including infrastructure owned by Oxfordshire county council (such as closed circuit television, automatic traffic light control systems or automatic number plate recognition), crowdsourcing and third-party data providers, and historic data. It will use this to generate insights, through dashboards and automatic tactic implementation (such as changing traffic lights automatically for specific vehicles), and will make it easier to monitor the network.

This is phase 1 of a potential 2-phase competition. A decision to proceed with phase 2 will depend on the outcomes from phase 1. Only successful applicants from phase 1 will be able to apply to take part in phase 2.

The first phase involves research and development (R&D) contracts being awarded to demonstrate technical feasibility of the proposed solution. A total of up to £250,000, including VAT, is allocated to phase 1 of the competition. It is anticipated that the feasibility study R&D contracts will be in the region of up to £50,000, including VAT. This is for each project for up to 3 months. Projects must start on 15 July. Up to 5 projects will be funded. We would welcome bids that bring together a consortium of sector specialists.

The second phase involves up to 2 R&D contracts being awarded to organisations chosen from the successful phase 1 applicants. Up to £500,000, including VAT, will be allocated for each contract to develop a prototype and undertake field testing for up to 1 year.

For further information on the competition and how to apply, click here. Applications are open from 4th March to 10th April.