Technology AI, Science and New Things
Japan faces a drastic shortage of lorry drivers. New laws restrict the amount of overtime workers can log and a shrinking population allows those entering the workforce to be pickier.
Lorries still carry 90 per cent of Japan’s cargo and the country’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT) estimates that overall transport capacity will fall 34 per cent by 2030.
Japan’s solution? Automation. The MLIT has released a video on its plans for “auto-flow roads”, built in the middle of motorway carriageways between Tokyo and Osaka and protected from normal traffic and the weather.
Wheeled driverless pods the size of large wardrobes would carry cargo and travel along the route. The project aims to lower CO2 emissions, buffer driver shortages and increase shipping capacity. Test runs begin in 2027 and the project could be operational by the mid-2030s.
Ambitious? Maybe. But the land of robot-waiters and bullet trains could be the perfect nursery for the future of infrastructure.
