Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Transport and Communications
Issue No. 15 - Evidence - May 3, 2017
OTTAWA, Wednesday, May 3, 2017
The Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications met this day at 6:45 p.m. to continue its study on the regulatory and technical issues related to the deployment of connected and automated vehicles.
Senator Dennis Dawson (Chair) in the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair: This evening, the Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications is continuing its study on the regulatory and technical issues related to the deployment of connected and automated vehicles.
[English]
We have two panels of witnesses tonight. For this first panel, I would like to welcome Mr. Barrie Kirk, Executive Director of the Canadian Automated Vehicles Centre of Excellence, and a very knowledgeable person in this field.
Mr. Kirk, the floor is yours.
Barrie Kirk, Executive Director, Canadian Automated Vehicles Centre of Excellence: Thank you for the invitation to appear here.
I have a few key messages I would like to provide over the next few minutes. The first is that the first generation of autonomous vehicles is with us now, and I say that for two reasons. One is that you can go into a showroom and buy a semi-autonomous vehicle that has intelligent cruise control, lane-centering, self-parking, pedestrian detection, braking and so on. Second, there are some special-purpose low-speed, fully autonomous vehicles already in commercial use. In France and other places, they have been demonstrated, and in North America. In fact, one of these fully autonomous low-speed electric shuttle buses will be demonstrated on the streets of Montreal in about two weeks' time.
The second message is that fully autonomous vehicles for public use and road use will be available in about 2020. Some say 2019 and Ford says 2021, but these will be fully autonomous, commercially available, designed initially, in some cases, for use as driverless taxis.
The real benefits of self-driving cars are twofold. One is safety. A joint study we did with the Conference Board of Canada showed that with autonomous vehicles we could prevent 80 per cent of all collisions and traffic deaths. Not 100 per cent. The technology will be much better, but not perfect.
Second, there are huge global business opportunities, especially with the tech sector. Morgan Stanley in the U.S. says that the global market is worth about $10 trillion a year.
Canadian companies and Canadian universities are doing a wonderful job in this. The key ones, I'm sure you've heard of, are BlackBerry QNX, GM, Ford and others. The Government of Canada has made some real significant progress and steps forward in this, and I applaud the Prime Minister for his visits to BlackBerry QNX, Ford and GM to wave the flag for this industry. I'm also pleased that more money is being allocated for a federal regulatory framework.
But — there's always a "but'' — when I look at the G7, Canada is dead last in its preparations for the arrival of self- driving cars, and there are a number of different metrics for this. One is that we see silos. I look at what the Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada is doing to try to stimulate this, I call that the gas pedal. I see what Transport Canada is doing, and they are really trying to emphasize the safety aspects; that's the brake pedal. Unfortunately, the federal government is trying to move forward with one foot on the gas pedal and one foot on the brake pedal at the same time.
The U.K. has taken a different approach to really break down those silos and has created a new agency that combines both. The U.K. has a far more relaxed regulatory framework. You can test an autonomous vehicle on any public road anywhere in the U.K. without a permit. In Canada, you can only test them in Ontario with a permit, and that's banned everywhere else.
The U.K. government is a very prominent cheerleader. They want to be the number one go-to place in the world for R&D and testing of AVs.
I urge two things for your report. One is that you recommend that the Government of Canada reorganize itself to break down those silos and help industry and universities take advantage of the big business opportunities.
Second, I've been saying since 2015 that autonomous vehicles will have a big impact on transit and transportation infrastructure, and most thought leaders agree with that position. I look at the various estimates of the amount of money we will spend federally on new infrastructure projects, and I wonder if all of that will be spent wisely. My advice to the federal government, since 2015, is that any request for new funding, for new transit and transportation infrastructure, should come with an analysis of the impact of autonomous vehicles on the business case and on the design. That recommendation from two years ago is still valid today. I know people are listening to me, but so far I haven't seen it happen.
Those, Mr. Chair, are my initial remarks. I would be very pleased to answer any questions you might have.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: Mr. Kirk, thank you very much for your presentation. I am fascinated by the developments in artificial intelligence. Autonomous and near-autonomous vehicles really represent the integration of artificial intelligence into our modes of transportation. It affects every facet of our lives. Artificial intelligence is changing our behaviours on sociological, physical and economic levels. It is phenomenal. We are on the cusp of a revolution. I don't know whether you remember the film The Sixth Sense.
[English]
I think in English it's The Sixth Sense.
[Translation]
In that film, we see taxis flying in the sky. Dubai aims to have autonomous drones account for 25 per cent of its taxis. The transportation sector has just entered another dimension where the revolution will be much more than a land-based revolution. Next fall, in Canada, human-carrying drones will be sold and used only in areas with no road traffic, such as waterways. If we focus solely on autonomous vehicles from a land-based perspective, we may forget a large component of the development that will also occur through technologies that are revolutionizing air transportation. At the end of the day, this will define individual transportation and not public transit. We are currently mostly focusing on public transit. Might our consideration be too narrow when it comes to roads, highways, and so on, while other aspects are developing whose capacity cannot be estimated?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: An excellent question, senator. This is a very valid concern and issue. A lot of things are indeed happening. In fact, at the AV conference in Toronto two weeks ago I gave a 45-minute presentation just on this.
Some people call them PATs — personal airborne transportation — which will be commercially available and used, as you say, in Dubai this summer. Airbus is actively working on two different versions. One version is not just for single passengers but to carry groups of people, and basically there will be bus stops for airborne vehicles. Airbus calls their vehicle an air bus, which is very appropriate. Their vision is a multi-passenger electric vehicle that stops at heliports.
With respect, one thing I would disagree with is that it's not just for where you don't have ground-based vehicles. Uber has decided and announced it wants to get into this business in a big way. They have published a 90-odd-page report, and they focused initially on a route between San Francisco and San Jose. They think a flying taxi will do the trip in about 15 minutes that would take two hours by land. They are saying eventually it will be cheaper than the ground-based Uber vehicles.
You all know, senators, that aviation is a federal responsibility. If I look, further ahead, I think that might evolve at some point in time. Once we have a situation in the future where personal driveways become landing pads, does the federal government really want to be involved in regulating that at a micro level? Well, that's for the future, but it's a very valid point — very disruptive, yes.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: My next question will be very specific. In the current study, can we avoid that new reality, which consists of the air and land-based component concerning autonomous vehicles? By limiting ourselves to land-based transportation, don't you think we may overlook another dimension that is quickly catching up to us?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: I agree. I would recommend you include that. Interestingly the Ontario Ministry of Transportation has a working group looking at the future of transportation in southern Ontario out to 2050, and with a fuzzy extension to 2070. I participated in one of their workshops, and I in fact put this whole idea of airborne taxis on the table, and that will be a very important technology in the decades ahead. Absolutely, I recommend it be included.
Senator Mercer: Thank you for your presentation.
I'm very concerned about jobs. I'm concerned about jobs in the auto sector. The province of Ontario in particular is top-heavy with jobs in the auto sector, and I think we'd like to keep those high-paying technical jobs that are in Ontario.
How do Chrysler, General Motors and Ford stack up against BlackBerry QNX, Apple, Uber and all these other people who are now in this business that weren't in the business before? What will that do to the industrial base of supplying vehicles, whether they are flying vehicles or ground-based driverless vehicles?
We continue to hear through this study that we may be getting into a lot of shared cars. Well, guess what? If I'm sharing a car with Senator Eggleton, that means one of us doesn't own a car, or both of us may not own a car. That means that neither one of us have bought a car. I happen to drive a Chrysler product; Senator Eggleton may drive a General Motors product. Those are two sales that they don't have now, which means jobs in Ontario or wherever, and that applies to the other major auto industries.
This is where I have a problem. We all know that there is a razor blade that never has to be sharpened and that will never dull, and the reason you and I can't buy it is because the razor companies have bought it and they have it locked in a safe somewhere because they don't want to sell that product. They want to sell a blade that you have to replace every few weeks or every week.
I'm surprised that the Big Four haven't gone in and bought this technology and locked it away so that we're not interested in it. I'm concerned about the industrial base of the auto sector with these people in the business. They are not big manufacturers of automobiles right now, but they could become that if they corner the technology.
Mr. Kirk: First of all, I share your concern. In fact, this Friday, in two days, I will be in Windsor speaking at a conference put on by the Conference Board of Canada. It's a Windsor-Essex economic development conference, and I will be talking exactly about what you have just mentioned, senator.
I see three big trends. One big trend, as you suggested, is that there will be in the 2020s a decrease in the number of vehicles being made and sold. It will not be that you two senators will share a car, but rather there will be driverless taxis and you use a cellphone and call one up. It won't solve all your transportation needs, but there will be a trend towards that, especially earlier on with millennials and seniors and handicapped people. That's one big trend. The car companies know they will be making and selling a lot fewer cars in the 2020s.
Mary Barra, the CEO of General Motors, has said in public a couple of times at least that over the next 5 to 10 years the auto industry is going to change more than it has in the last 50 years. It will be very disruptive.
The second trend is that companies like Ford, GM and others realize the real future is in the transportation service market. Ford has said publicly that providing transportation as a service, using driverless taxis, will create a market twice as big as the market for making and selling cars. That's where the future is.
The third thing in terms of a trend is the role of technology. At the moment, if you buy a new car, maybe about 5 per cent of the value of a car is technology. By the mid-2020s, the value of technology in a car will be between 40 and 60 per cent. It represents a huge trend towards a lot more tech and a lot of opportunities for tech companies, not only the people like BlackBerry QNX, but also some of the smaller companies. There's a company in Kanata called Neptec that makes LiDARs for drones, and they are looking at repurposing that technology for self-driving cars.
Senator Mercer: You also said in your presentation that the United Kingdom wants to be number one in driverless cars. What's the advantage to them? What does that give them that I've not picked up on?
Mr. Kirk: The big benefit for them, and I believe for us if we take the challenge, is to get a larger slice of that $10 trillion global market than we otherwise would have done.
Senator Mercer: Is that the manufacturing market?
Mr. Kirk: No, that's transportation services. That includes manufacturing and transportation as a service. It's what they call the overall mobility market.
Senator Mercer: Connect the dots for me. I understand manufacturing. Whether a vehicle is flying or driverless, it has to be manufactured, but what is the service side?
Mr. Kirk: There are two elements. One is taking cars and providing a driverless taxi service. At the moment, the average personally-owned car is unused 95 per cent of the time. If a vehicle is being used as a taxi, it's earning money for 30, 40, and 50 per cent of its time.
The other big part of the money chain is the value chain. I was in a meeting recently a few weeks ago in Washington, D.C. One of the car companies has estimated that the value of data collected by all the sensors in the vehicle is worth three times the value of the vehicle, and that's the big pot of gold.
Why do you think Google has invested so much money in self-driving cars? It's not for transportation; it's for the data. Google is uniquely positioned in the entire world to be able to harvest that data, process it with big data analytics, and target advertising to all of us more precisely. The more precisely you can target the advertising, the more value there is, and that's the big pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, whether we like it or not.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: I would like to come back to earth a bit. The success of these kinds of vehicles will surely require significant investments in highway systems. We know that governments here are struggling to properly maintain the highway network. All you have to do is drive on our roads, especially in the Montreal region, to realize that it's not about the three hundred seventy-fifth anniversary of Montreal, but about the three hundred seventy-fifth pothole, which you try to avoid.
Could this vehicle be used in those conditions? Our roads must be rebuilt, as they have been left in a state of disrepair for a long time. Who will fund the infrastructure while the automotive industry is making profits by selling automated vehicles? We mustn't forget that roads are in bad shape. How will that whole project work?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: Let us separate the infrastructure spend into two groups. One is repair of existing infrastructure. No doubt that's required.
In terms of new infrastructure, about a year ago the then Secretary of Transportation in the Obama administration, Anthony Foxx, wrote an article that was published in a transportation magazine. He said with autonomous and connected vehicle technology, we can increase the traffic carrying capacity of the existing infrastructure by a factor of five.
With respect to Secretary Foxx, I don't believe him, but even if we could increase the traffic carrying capacity of the existing infrastructure by 50 per cent or even double it, then we need to look at how many of those transit and transportation infrastructure projects are really required. That's why I have urged you in my prepared statement to recommend that all requests for funding for new transit and transportation infrastructure include that analysis as to what autonomous vehicles will do to the business case and do to the design.
I will give you one small example. I mentioned I'll be in Windsor-Essex on Friday. As you all know, there's ongoing progress to design and build a new bridge over the border. That bridge will come online at about at the same time as we have autonomous trucks coming online, and as far as I know there are no provisions to have autonomous truck lanes or autonomous lanes for trucks going across the border. What do you do at the border when you have a fully autonomous truck with nobody in it? Those sorts of issues aren't being addressed, but that ties in very well with the role that the Windsor-Essex region has in the Canadian economy.
The Chair: Senator Mercer and I were on the committee when we were told that that bridge would be opening this year. That being said, the legislation was passed and we're still expecting the bridge, so we can predict, but we can't produce all the time.
Senator Bovey: I was really interested in your comment about silos. We have been hearing from a lot of groups and people about who is doing this and who is doing that. I have been really concerned about who is pulling all this together and leading it. When you talk about silos and the need to get rid of them, there's one agency to pull it together. I wonder if you can talk about that a bit more because there are the safety issues, the economic issues and the social issues with this and the industry versus the gas and the brake pedal you talked about.
Mr. Kirk: I would be pleased to.
Certainly when you have the silos, especially with ISED and Transport Canada, people in Transport Canada's main job is safety. They are very passionate about that and they tend to be very risk-averse. In some ways, to my way of thinking, they overdo it.
What they have done in the U.K. is create a new government agency called CCAV, the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles. It is not private; it is a government agency. They have taken their policy group from their equivalent of Transport Canada and their policy group from their equivalent of ISED and put them into the same agency. So the people developing policy see both sides of the coin, the economic development and innovation aspect and the safety aspect, and you get a better balance.
Senator Bovey: Does that include issues of privacy? I shudder when I think of me just going to the grocery store or taking somebody from point A to point B, all that data is collected and worth three times the value of the car. I think my data is not worth three times the value of the car, but would you put the privacy issue within this new agency that is poking holes in all the other silos?
Mr. Kirk: I would, absolutely, as it relates to connected and autonomous vehicles. There is a much bigger universe of privacy issues, but yes, absolutely. Linked to that, you also have cybersecurity.
Senator Bovey: And you get the provinces into this as well?
Mr. Kirk: You have to.
I like the model in the U.S. The U.S. Department of Transportation has taken the initiative and developed model regulatory frameworks for the states. They have the same basic setup, but the U.S. DOT has this model framework which they are hoping the states will adopt. I would love to see Transport Canada develop the approach to create a model framework that the provinces can adopt.
I have been in Canada 48 years. I know federal-provincial issues, not as well as you senators, but enough. We cannot have a patchwork quilt.
Senator Duffy: Mr. Kirk, picking up on your reference to a patchwork quilt, whatever we do presumably will have to mesh with whatever they do in the United States, because we have millions of cars every year travelling back and forth on the highway systems between the two.
You talk about connected cars. The federal government now has an initiative under way called Connect Canada to move high-speed internet into remote rural areas of the country. Will this connection be required to allow these vehicles to operate? Isn't part of the infrastructure question going to be providing that communications infrastructure so the vehicles can speak to each other and whoever is directing them?
Mr. Kirk: That is a good question, Senator Duffy. Connected vehicle technology means different things to different people.
There is one technology developed in the U.S. called dedicated short range communications — DSRC — that is also being tested in Canada, in Alberta and British Columbia. This is, among other things, where vehicles "talk'' to each other to avoid a collision. That is one of them.
With autonomous vehicles, there will be an important need for connectivity to download the latest software, the latest algorithms for driving, the latest maps and information about weather. There are a couple of options.
One is Wi-Fi. Many people have Wi-Fi at home, which is then connected to high-speed Internet, obviously. Frankly, I don't want my self-driving car in the future to download new software and reboot when I am on Highway 417, but if it downloads and reboots in my garage overnight, that's fine.
The other big development is 5G. You have heard of 3G and 4G mobile phones. 5G is an active development by a number of companies worldwide, three of them in Kanata. That will provide very high-speed communications. That will be very important, and the mobile phone companies understand the importance. That will be a big thing.
In terms of the rural and remote areas, that is a separate issue that ties into this. That is important, but I don't know much about providing Internet in rural areas.
Senator Duffy: If we are going to have 5G, that is part of it.
Finally, on the question of infrastructure, will we have cables in the highway, some kind of sensors? Will they be on telephone poles or lighting poles? How does that all work? Should that be planned now for highways that are being rebuilt?
Mr. Kirk: The first commandment of autonomous vehicles is, "Thou shalt have no special infrastructure.'' The reason is you will put all the technology, all the artificial intelligence into the vehicle, but to put sensors and cabling on every bit of highway across the country is horrendously expensive, and no combination of organizations would be able to afford it. You put the AI, the sensors, into the vehicles.
Senator Duffy: How does it know when it is coming up to a stop sign?
Mr. Kirk: One of the prerequisites at the moment is high-definition GPS mapping. Work is going on now with Uber, Google, GM and others to provide high-definition GPS maps that are stored in the vehicle. That provides the information they need.
That is how they work at the moment. In the future, as artificial intelligence improves, you won't need that. You will have artificial intelligence that can see the road ahead and the vehicles the same way we humans do and they will navigate on the basis of that.
[Translation]
Senator Saint-Germain: Welcome, Mr. Kirk. Your presentation was very insightful and dynamic — let's put it that way.
Speaking of your presentation, in your third bullet, you say:
[English]
The global mobility services market is estimated to be US$10 Trillion and Canada's technology and auto sectors are well positioned to get a significant slice of this market.
[Translation]
On the second page, in the first bullet:
[English]
I urge that your report contains recommendations that the Government of Canada organizes itself for this major opportunity and significantly increases the support to industry.
[Translation]
Can you specify what kind of support the industry would need, and why it may need government support in the context of the potential market you described?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: Two points there, senator. One is on the regulatory side there is a close relationship between attracting industry and having a relaxed, friendly regulatory environment for testing. That goes back to what I said before. It goes back to the whole idea of removing the silos so that the regulatory framework is in sync with the economic objectives and innovation.
The second is purely financial. The U.K. government, which I keep referring to, has invested £400 million in research, development and testing. The Government of Canada has committed $100 million to Ford, only part of which will be used for autonomous vehicles; there are other uses, including electric vehicles. The level of financial support by the U.K. government for its industry is an order of magnitude greater than what the Government of Canada has committed to so far.
[Translation]
Senator Saint-Germain: Do your actuarial economic studies help you estimate how long it will take for the government to see a return on investment? Is the time frame 10 years, 20 years, 30 years? Will there be a return on investment, and if so, how much?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: The best answer I have is the study and report we did for the Conference Board of Canada that was published about two years ago.
Senator Saint-Germain: In 2008?
Mr. Kirk: No, 2015.
Senator Saint-Germain: I see.
Mr. Kirk: We and the Conference Board of Canada estimated that if we have full deployment of autonomous vehicles in Canada, the Canadian economy would benefit by $65 billion a year. We have said that in a number of different ways, and no one has really picked up on that number. But that is a huge return on the overall investment. A lot of that will be due to the reduction in collisions and the cost of collisions, but there are also economic development and innovation benefits if we can get the auto and technology sectors really involved and succeeding on a global scale.
[Translation]
Senator Saint-Germain: My second question is about public policies. Do you think that the arrival of fully autonomous vehicles will be a determining factor in public transit? Do public policies on transportation have to be revised accordingly?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: The simple answer is yes to both of your questions. The Canadian Urban Transit Association has a vision document called "Transit Vision 2040,'' I believe. In it, they say very clearly that autonomous vehicles will have a significant impact on public transportation in Canada. It urges transportation authorities to include that in their planning.
At the moment, that is not happening. Most of the public transportation master plans across the country do not refer to this. I certainly have recommended that change.
There has been some resistance. One general manager of a large transit company in Canada says the thing that scares him the most is the pushback from the unions.
Senator Eggleton: Mr. Kirk, good to see you again.
Mr. Kirk: You too, senator.
Senator Eggleton: Much of the discussion we have about autonomous vehicles is centred around a vision of an end state and the fact that we will save lives from traffic accidents, that it will mean less parking because the vehicles will be constantly moving around, and that we may have shared vehicles. You quoted a former Secretary of Transport as saying that it could increase the capacity of the road system as it is now.
I think you are right that we are not too many years away from seeing these fully autonomous vehicles appear. Perhaps, initially, only people who have a lot of money will be able to afford them, and perhaps there will be few of them.
It seems to me that we will have a transition period that could be decades where we have a combination of the vehicles that we have today, or similar vehicles, maybe more connected systems within them but still driven by humans. So we have to integrate this and the government has to determine how this is all going to work hand in hand. People out in rural areas would be more likely to keep within the current system than move to something that is far more expensive and not as advantageous to them in rural conditions.
How do we go through this transition period? What are the issues that we have to consider in this transition period that government will have to deal with?
Mr. Kirk: You mentioned, senator, the cost of self-driving cars. If I am right that there will be a trend in the 2020s towards driverless taxis, people who use driverless taxis don't buy the vehicle; they buy a ride.
The same study that we did with the Conference Board of Canada and published two years ago points out and calculates that the average Canadian family could save $3,000 a year by using driverless taxis rather than by owning their own vehicle.
I would recommend, senators, that you don't get too focused on the actual cost of the hardware and software.
During the transition, it will be messy. My colleague Paul Godsmark is a safety engineer. The thing that scares him the most is having computer driven cars and human driven cars on the same roads at the same times.
Senator Eggleton: And bicycles and everything else.
Mr. Kirk: The experience by Google and others testing AVs is that when a human driver sees an AV, they know that the computers are really good natured, very passive drivers, and human drivers in fact take advantage of the computers. They cut in front in a way they never would with another human driver. We need to counter that. One of the things I have always said is that I would love to see self-driving cars look the same from the outside as a human- driven car. We have to get away, in the production world, from all of those sensors.
As well, we need to look at how we are going to evolve the infrastructure and the regulatory framework. It is complex.
Volvo is a wonderful car, a wonderful company. The thing that really bugs me about Volvo is that they have run some advertisements about a crash-proof car. There is no such thing, senators. I am an engineer. I know that all hardware, all software, fails occasionally. Even in that future I spoke of earlier, out of the 2,000 or so traffic deaths in Canada each year, if we can save 80 per cent, we will save 1,600 lives; but it also means that 400 people will still die in a world full of autonomous vehicles because there are other factors at play. We need to explain to the public, the media and the industry that the technology is not and will never be perfect.
The final thing we need to think about for the future is that — and I am looking a bit further ahead — let's suppose by 2030 that the data is in and that computers really are better drivers than silly, stupid humans. At what point in time do we ban those silly, stupid humans? Is it ethical to allow humans to go out and drive and cause all of that carnage when there is a better technological alternative? I know it will take a very brave politician to push that through, but I think that in about 13 years' time we should be having that sort of conversation.
Senator Eggleton: Maybe the politicians will be robots by then.
The Chair: More than today?
Senator Eggleton: No. Today we are wise owls.
Senator Mercer: You continue to challenge us here. I want to go back to the discussion about rural versus urban. I see your world in the future in an urban community where people are not buying cars but are buying taxi time and buying rides in taxis and saving money. I live in a rural area. I live in a small village of a few thousand people about 40 kilometres outside of a major city, but I can't see how I would benefit from this. I am going to be penalized because I live in a rural area. I'm always going to have to own a car. I may be able to buy a vehicle that will drive itself, but I'll still have to buy the vehicle. There won't be a market for those taxis in the small community that I live in because the people in my community, in the morning, scatter in hundreds of directions to go to work, not in an organized way that happens in an urban community.
Mr. Kirk: Two thoughts there, senator. First of all, I agree that the deployment in rural areas will be slower than in urban areas — there's no doubt about that — for exactly the reasons you are saying.
Second, there is a benefit. The mother of a friend of mine lives in Arnprior up in the Ottawa Valley. Her mother is a senior, slightly disabled. There's no public transportation in Arnprior; it's too small. She can't afford regular taxis, and therefore she is lacking in the opportunity to get around. If we have driverless taxis that are roughly half the cost of an Uber ride today, and especially if it's subsidized by the city, which is a possibility, then people who are retired and/or handicapped in rural and remote areas would have increased mobility. I think that's an important benefit for people who live in those smaller communities.
Senator Mercer: You have just created another major problem for the municipality. If the municipality is now in the business of subsidizing the transportation of residents, the tax base has to be there to support that. I don't see the tax base in the small community in which I live being able to support that if they're going to subsidize taxis that will be available to people in my community who might not be able to afford that service.
It has to be part of the mix here to look at what it does to the tax base, because the taxpayers will only tolerate so much and the return has to be a lot greater than I've seen so far.
Mr. Kirk: There is a community at the far side of Toronto, whose name I have forgotten — I've got it in my notes back in the office — and there's no bus service. The residents were clamouring for a bus service. The city council did an analysis. They looked at the cost of providing a bus service, even during peak periods, and they also looked at the cost of subsidizing Uber rides. There were two outcomes. First, if the city subsidized Uber rides, it would cover all areas of the city rather than a few select routes. Second, it was cheaper in this analysis for the city council to subsidize Uber rides rather than to pay for a traditional bus service.
If the need is there and the residents are willing to pay, that model could work in many other places.
[Translation]
Senator Dagenais: Mr. Kirk, I would like to come back to a specific element. Those who have been manufacturing vehicles for decades make safety errors that sometimes lead to massive recalls. Just think of the onboard computers that have been added to vehicles over the past few years. Many of those computers involved massive recalls.
Can we anticipate what will happen with those vehicles and their new technology when a component fails to operate as expected?
[English]
Mr. Kirk: There are two parts to the answer, senator. The easy part is software. All of these vehicles — I call them ACE vehicles; autonomous, connected and electric — will have the ability to download software, and initially there will be fairly frequent downloads of new software as the driving algorithms are improved. Tesla and others do that now, and that will continue. Certainly BlackBerry QNX has been working on over-the-air downloads of software. That's the easy part.
The other part is if the hardware fails or is poorly designed, we would still have the same kind of recall approach as we have now, but I would anticipate that the majority of the upgrades and problems would be handled through the software route.
Senator Bovey: I would like to go back to another comment you made, which I found really interesting. It is your recommendation that federally funded transport and transit infrastructure should include an analysis on the impact of the ACE vehicles. Given that so much infrastructure is municipally and provincially funded, as well as federally funded, I guess it becomes a tri-level issue. However, I wondered if other countries have required that type of analysis. Is there a template of the issues that should be considered in that analysis, or has anybody begun to define what those issues are? I find this a very interesting aspect as we look forward and plan sensibly for the short term, mid-term and long term.
Mr. Kirk: To be frank, I'm not aware of any country that has implemented that. I know a number of them are looking at that. I know that the U.S. especially is looking at that. It's really a work-in-progress, but at this point in time, no. That's one area where I think there's a regulation that needs to be looked at, but nothing is in place at this time.
Senator Bovey: So nobody has tried to define the aspects that should be included in this kind of analysis?
Mr. Kirk: Not yet, senator. One of the issues that is troublesome is that a lot of the planning tools that transit and transportation planners need to do the analyses are not yet in place. The mathematical modelling that's required isn't in place yet, and it's a known issue that is being worked on. I know a company in Paris that is doing work on that, but rather than just look at things from a qualitative view, it really helps to have it modelled to look at it in more detail.
Senator Duffy: We haven't talked about platooning of trucks. Many people find driving on the 401 surrounded by tractor-trailers going at 100 clicks an hour to be quite terrifying. How would platooning trucks help? How would it work? Would it be feasible only on large highways? What about other areas?
Mr. Kirk: The platooning of trucks works using the technology I mentioned earlier, DSRC, dedicated short range communications. Typically you would have, in the early years, one human in the front vehicle and the others would be in a slave mode following behind at a predetermined distance. In fact, that technology is here now. There have been a lot of demonstrations in Europe, and last month there was a demonstration in Blainville, Quebec, at the Transport Canada test site.
I don't know if any of you heard the presentation by the Minister of Transportation at the conference. In Blainville, they had three tractor-trailers going around the circuit. The Minister of Transport, in fact, was in the middle truck, and he lived to tell the tale. The technology is there, but it's not in commercial use.
One of the things about platooning and autonomous vehicles — and this goes back to Secretary Foxx's comment — is with that technology, we can have vehicles moving, travelling closer together, taking up less road real estate, and that's a plus. It means we get more traffic on the same road, and that's one of the big benefits, plus of course there is the whole question of a savings in driver salaries.
The Chair: Mr. Kirk, it always a pleasure to hear from you.
Colleagues, we how have with us Franck Bonny, Director General, Motor Vehicle Test and Research Centre, PMG Technologies.
[Translation]
Mr. Bonny, I invite you to make your presentation. Afterwards, senators will put questions to you.
Franck N'Diaye Bonny, Director General, Motor Vehicle Test and Research Centre, PMG Technologies: I will make my presentation in French. For 21 years, PMG Technologies has been managing Transport Canada's only motor vehicle test and research centre. Our main activity consists in performing tests to ensure that the vehicles on our roads comply with Canadian safety standards. We test for compliance. We also perform research tests with Transport Canada, as well as tests to help the department set standards or ensure the evolution of transportation and safety standards. The centre has a service vocation toward Transport Canada, which is our main client.
Our clients are also industries. We help innovative industries ensure that vehicles comply with Canadian and U.S. standards. We are one of the only centres in North America that perform compliance testing on vehicles to ensure that they meet Canadian and U.S. standards.
The centre is unique for two reasons. First, it provides a single-access point. There are many centres in North America, but very few of them have the facilities that enable them to conduct a full safety assessment for a vehicle. For example, we have an environmental chamber to assess vehicle behaviour in response to temperature changes. We have a renowned crash lab. We conduct structural testing. We consider all the dimensions, except for the emissions aspect.
Canada holds a unique position in North America, since the U.S. doesn't have a similar centre. All the centres across the U.S. are private. That is important in terms of the economic aspect of the changes we are talking about. Aside from that aspect, over the past few years, PMG Technologies has made significant efforts to market the centre abroad. In addition, we have proposed investments to Transport Canada, which has helped this centre become a globally recognized organization in 20 years. It is actually one of the most accurate centres in the world. In 2012, it won the crash lab of the year award.
Today, we are conducting research on new technologies. We are the first test centre in North America to establish partnerships with China and the United States. We are currently negotiating with Europe. We exercise leadership, even though Canada, at first glance, is a country with no automotive industry. We are well ahead right now.
I have taken note of your committee's various meetings. You have been given a nice overview of autonomous vehicles. We should be very happy. This is magical. We are on the cusp of a revolution, but we are still a bit anxious. Why are we anxious? We keep hearing about technologies that will help decrease the number of deaths, improve the economy, and so on. That will be wonderful. Tomorrow, we will no longer need to worry. Our car will pick up our children and bring them home. We could be at the office and watch our children playing in the car on our cellphone as they head home. Children will no longer be getting on buses. It's wonderful, but why are we anxious? Because something is missing from this nice picture. How will we make sure that it is working? What is the plan? Who announced the plan to determine whether it works? No one did. We are told that cities will be built where people will be able to move around.
Manufacturers are telling us that they will do tests in one part of a city, but what is the scientific approach of those tests? Are the following questions being asked? How many ADAs are there? There are 16 of them. Okay. How many warning systems are there in terms of connectivity? There are 25 or 26 of them. How will they be tested? Do we have the ability to test them? Can people be assured that it will work? Do we have the infrastructure to deal with the new systems that will be marketed? By 2020, there will be other systems, other warnings that will be created, such as flying cars. Are we ready for all that? Are we preparing for it? We find ourselves in something of a miracle phase, and we are telling ourselves that manufacturers will run tests and that, miraculously, everything will go well.
As it was mentioned earlier, recalls are still being made today. How long have cars been on roads? How long should we have had total control of the situation? Yet vehicles are still being recalled. But we assumed that, all of a sudden, because we install computers, connected systems, and so on, vehicles will no longer have problems. No.
I will give you an example. Some are saying that we can now do simulations, and that crash tests are a thing of the past. Okay, great. Let's take a vehicle, which is now a living room. Perfect. The vehicle is running, and it's great. A system malfunction causes an accident. Inadvertently, the vehicle has a collision. How are those on board protected? Before, it was clear. The person was sitting down and wore a seat belt. Now, vehicles' configuration is being completely changed. What will happen in the event of a crash? There will never be any crashes? That's not true. But who must look into that? What plan has been developed to examine that aspect? Currently, it's Far West; it's the same principle.
When the West was conquered, things were straightforward: everybody headed out with their horse and buggy, their sleigh or what have you. When they got somewhere, they drove four posts into the ground to stake their claim over that piece of land. That is what we are doing now. Everyone is off, planting their flags to declare that they are capable of doing this or that. At some point, however, the sheriff has to come along and tell everyone that it's time to stop playing around because he's going to regulate their activities. The problem is that, today, the sheriff needs to be educated. The time to learn how to evaluate these vehicles and technologies is not when problems arise. That is not the time to do it. It is now. The way to really move innovation forward is to accept the need to oversee these new technologies and to figure out how to evaluate them.
I am speaking from a business standpoint, because even though we run a testing centre, we are business people. Everyone always forgets one thing: without testing, there is no innovation. If you have a great idea but you aren't able to show that the vehicle works and can be operated safely, the project won't go anywhere and you won't make any money. To make money, you need objective evidence that the project works. In terms of the products on the market today, it's a free-for-all. You will appreciate, then, that, at some point, testing is absolutely necessary.
The real question now is how does Canada want to position itself in this field. Does it want to be a leader or not? If so, it can, because we have the tools.
I will stop there and gladly answer any questions you have.
The Chair: You are going to have a plethora of questions because the list is long. We have our own sheriff here, Officer Dagenais of the Sûreté du Québec. Senator Dagenais will start off the questions.
Senator Dagenais: Thank you for your presentation; it was quite informative. The Senate needs a sheriff as well.
I was quite fascinated by what you said, having recently had a problem with a vehicle equipped with a lot of computer technology. All of the indicators lit up, sending me straight to the dealer. I can tell you that I miss the days when all you had to do was turn the key in the ignition, some 35 or 40 years ago. You turned the key and opened the door. But there I was, in this intelligent vehicle, and nothing worked, from the wipers to the transmission. The dealer called the people in Germany and they eventually found the problem. Let me tell you, it was a hefty bill because computers aren't cheap to fix. I try to imagine what the situation is like for manufacturers who have been making cars for decades. You called it a free-for-all, and that is true.
We are given these vehicles, some of which will be autonomous, but what happens when they stop working? The dealers will make money because they are the ones who will be doing the repair work. I hope they will have all the necessary knowledge because, right now, there are cars on the road that rely heavily on computer technology, and it's not pretty when that technology fails. Perhaps that is the downside of all this technology, not to mention the repair bill.
Will we be able to plan ahead for these new technologies? When something in an autonomous vehicle malfunctions, what will we do?
Mr. Bonny: Quickly, I would just point out that an autonomous vehicle is a connected vehicle. Rather than alerting the driver, the vehicle alerts a system. If we continue to think that testing an autonomous vehicle simply means putting it on the road, and making sure that it responds to traffic lights, and stops and goes when it is supposed to, there is no denying that the loss will be tremendous. As humans, we are rich with skills. We have the ability to identify what we call risk and opportunity. Knowing how to evaluate risk is key. Some of the risks that arise when a problem occurs with a vehicle matter little, but others have major consequences. That isn't the responsibility of manufacturers. Are manufacturers responsible for protecting people? That is the question we need to ask. Is their primary role to protect the public?
I think that, at some point along the way, the Canadian government made the decision that it was going to protect the public when it decided to invest in the Blainville test centre. The government was very clear about that, and it did it. We did it even though we are not officially a car-making country, such as Sweden, Japan, China, France or the United States. As you said, we have to stay on that track.
A new technology is not necessarily tantamount to an improvement. Of course, it is supposed to provide a benefit, and the purpose is to move towards improvement. But, for goodness' sake, let's make sure it really is an improvement. We have the capacity to turn that corner. The previous witness talked about what is happening around the world, but look at China or India. India has invested in six test centres, and France and Germany are making investments as well. The U.S. has nine centres, only one of which is comparable to ours. Korea is making the investment. Today, it is important to understand one thing: humanity depends on transportation. Look at all the countries that have been successful. Why have they been successful? Because they each have an auto industry. Sweden, Germany, France, Korea, China and the U.S. all have their own auto industries.
What this new technology does is bring a major shift. A revolution is taking place. Some say that happened when we went from horses to cars, but that's not at all true. For the first time in our history as humans, we are going to relinquish the reins, so to speak, giving up the control. It was decided that humans were the problem. This is the first time we have relinquished control. Even when we transitioned from horses to cars, we may no longer have had reins in our hands, but we still had a steering wheel and we were still the ones driving. Now humans will no longer be the ones driving, and that raises many questions and important considerations. That is why we have to focus on this issue.
Nowadays, when we talk about new technology, we are also talking about shifts in the industry. What do I mean? Ten years ago, Detroit was the automotive capital of the world. Thanks to new technology, that automotive hub has shifted to California, which now holds the title. There is, however, an alternative to California: the Windsor-Montreal corridor, known as North America's Silicon Valley of the East. The area is home to the largest concentration of expertise in new automotive technologies. What does that mean? Just imagine the appeal of such a centre. Think of Silicon Valley's global appeal from an economic standpoint. The Windsor-Montreal corridor could have the same appeal and generate the same benefits. If we don't show that we have a plan to test our vehicles, to help the industry through innovation testing, how can manufacturers be expected to improve? If they have to pack up and leave, moving everything to the U.S., France, Sweden or England for testing, how can they be expected to compete? More than 50 universities between Windsor and Montreal are active in the automotive sector. Where will they go if meaningful infrastructure to conduct robust testing is lacking? How are we supporting them? We aren't.
To answer your question, yes, there are risks, but they can be controlled. We can at least make sure that the impact flaws have on safety is minor, not major.
[English]
Senator Mercer: Mr. Bonny, thank you for your interesting presentation. You have pitted California against the 401, the Windsor-to-Montreal corridor. That is an interesting argument, but have we left something out of that argument? Have we left out the automotive sector in China and India?
India has a large company, Tata. These are innovative and aggressive people. They have diversified. The change in technology and the change of driving mode may be the break they need to take the North American market. We continue to only think about the North American market, but the market is much bigger.
I haven't been in India recently, but I was there a few years ago. That market is crazy. There is a lot going on and a lot available. As I told the story before, the driver told us he needs three things to be a good driver in India: a good horn, good brakes and good luck.
Mr. Bonny: That's true.
Senator Mercer: My concern, and I mentioned it to our first witness, is the jobs that are at risk here. You raised a good argument about the corridor from Windsor to Montreal and the intellectual infrastructure there that supports the automotive sector from a manufacturing and an intellectual point of view. How do we capitalize on that and ensure that it is not Tata from India that will be manufacturing our vehicles of tomorrow, or if it is going to be Tata, that they are manufacturing them here as opposed to in India?
[Translation]
Mr. Bonny: I had a chance to go to India, as well — I go often, in fact. I also go to China. We opened an office in China and one in Korea. It's important to understand the facts. I mentioned 50 universities and colleges, and over 3,000 IT companies. Montreal is the hub for deep learning, which focuses on artificial intelligence. Ericsson set up its biggest global information and communications technology centre in Vaudreuil, near Montreal. I won't get into what makes Ontario attractive, since we know that GM and Ford are already making investments there.
The idea was not to attract Indian carmakers so they start manufacturing here. In speaking with the people in India and China, we learned that what they are interested in now is research and development, innovative thinking, ingenuity. I met with representatives of Tata and Mahindra in India, and what they told me was that they want to become world leaders. I asked them how they expected to do that without a presence in the United States or North America. They will not be able to use overly stringent North American standards as an excuse. They will have to challenge those standards. They want to come here not just because they want to sell their products, but also because doing so is a necessity in their eyes.
Imagine the Canada of tomorrow. There are 40 or so manufacturers on a par with GM and Ford elsewhere in the world, in India, China and Korea. If those manufacturers set up their R and D shops here, we could be like Detroit. The Canada of tomorrow could be a hub like Detroit. We could become the global centre for automotive research, without even being a manufacturer.
What is the vehicle of today? It is no longer a vehicle but, rather, a system. It is no longer vehicles that will be sold but, rather, systems. Many of the manufacturers you know today will cease to exist because new ones will emerge. Instead of buying vehicles, we will be buying systems. Why do Apple and Google exist? They were the first, but others will enter the market.
What does this have to do with us? The key to research and development is the ecosystem, the infrastructure and expertise needed to do the testing. Right now, we have the expertise, but we don't have the infrastructure to bring that expertise together. That is the problem facing us today.
[English]
Senator Bovey: I am intrigued by this. Thank you for your presentation. I think the testing you are doing sounds particularly interesting. I liked your line that we will be selling systems, so obviously you are testing systems.
When you mentioned risk and opportunities, we all do risk analysis with so much of what we do. I started to put a couple of words together when you talked about the ethics and who will look after the rights of the passengers or the individuals. Let's call that the ethics of risk. As you know from the previous session, I was particularly intrigued by the concept of analysis impact for anyone doing infrastructure and what that may look like.
Pushing that further, would you think that a risk analysis, or the ethics of risk, would tie into an analysis of the impact for infrastructure funding? I think the risk factor is an important one to be included. If we are talking about impacts regarding infrastructure development, are you testing infrastructure as well?
[Translation]
Mr. Bonny: We have a partnership with Europe, through the Institut français des sciences. The reality is that it will not be possible to separate the vehicle from the infrastructure and it will indeed be necessary to take into account vehicle and infrastructure testing.
I will give you an example. Today's discussion concerns mobility services, vehicles. The government is examining vehicle regulations. That is a good thing. The government is studying regulations for smart vehicles. The question I have is this. Who is looking at the regulations for smart cities? Cities are in the midst of developing their own intelligent infrastructure. What will happen if we do not consider the regulations governing the interplay between vehicles and that infrastructure? The answer is simple. You will be in Montreal and your vehicle will be operating at 60 per cent or 100 per cent capacity and be fully functional, but when you get to Sherbrooke, it will be operating at only 40 per cent capacity. The reason is that Sherbrooke will not have adopted the same protocols or opted for the same IT infrastructure as Montreal.
You saw what I proposed in terms of having a city. There has to be a link between innovation and the urban reality. The issue has to be examined scientifically, using a city where real and simulated scenarios can be enacted, in order to determine whether the technology works and can be operated safely. Knowing what recommendations to make to cities is important. For example, if Sherbrooke wants to adopt technology X, the city needs to know that it will have to incorporate a certain element into the specifications to avoid problems.
Consider a scenario where the public demands more signage to indicate bus arrivals. The municipal authority then looks for a supplier. If there are two, great; they set their price. If there is only one, the market determines the price. Eventually, though, that will be detrimental; a scientific evaluation will be needed.
The situation can't be left to chance. The government really has to have a plan. I was under the impression that the departments were in charge, but after doing some research and approaching the departments, I realized that where things really happen is at the policy level. A very clear policy announcement is needed to indicate that the government is going to invest in ensuring that intelligent and sustainable mobility services are safe. Why? Because, if they are safe, the economic return will be long-lasting. The idea is not to focus on safety in order to prevent advancement but, instead, to ensure that products remain profitable over the long run.
Canada could become a leader in this field. You are all familiar with the Five Star label in the United States. Why shouldn't Canada have the Five Star of new technology? What is stopping us? Right now, we have the best tech minds around. If we didn't, GM would not be here. Why did GM set up here? Why did Ford and all the U.S. manufacturers set up in Canada? Because our engineers cost 30 per cent less? That is the argument, but the real reason is that we have highly educated and highly skilled people. Google and Apple are in Canada; everyone is coming to Canada. Why? Right now, we have the expertise to be a leader in this field. Why would we not leverage that? Why should we lag behind?
The world's eyes are on us. Forgive me for saying so, but it has to do with the political situation in the U.S., so the world is looking at us. This is also the case when members of the francophone community who reject France turn to Canada and Quebec for support and leadership in the global francophone community.
Where I come from, we have an expression that says, "when the good Lord cheers you on, dance.''
The Chair: That brings me to a question about the government's role. Your centre is in Blainville. You work with Transport Canada's centre, so there is funding and participation. How do we delineate the responsibilities? We will have to talk about that in our report. We will have to indicate what measures the government needs to take in the coming years to ensure Canada becomes a major player.
How much of the responsibility falls on government, and how much falls on the private sector? As you said earlier, whether we are talking about the Windsor-Montreal corridor or smart cities, the private sector plays a huge role. What role should the government have? Should it focus solely on funding or on partnership?
Mr. Bonny: As I see it, Canada's approach, as far as the testing centre goes, is quite compelling and original. It's a good approach, and I am realizing that outsiders are quite drawn to it. The fact that the government invested in infrastructure like the Blainville test centre leaves a neutral impression, as seen from the outside.
Here's an example. One of the largest centres in North America, in the United States, is the TRC. It's owned by Honda, and it's where Nash Technologies, the equivalent of Transport Canada, is found. I'm an Indian manufacturer, and I still have a few doubts about moving here. I'll give my money to Honda, even though I may not really want to.
Like for all infrastructure under its responsibility when it comes to the protection of citizens, the government must take a proactive approach. It must decide to protect citizens and invest in their safety, and make sure that competent people will work on the infrastructure.
Now, regarding innovation and the creation of test infrastructure, it's important, since innovation falls under the private sector. It's commercial. However, we can support the manufacturer by helping it avoid the need to travel to the other side of the world to have its vehicles assessed.
In Quebec, some manufacturers would never have made it without access to the test centre. This includes Volvo. If Volvo hadn't had the test centre, it would have cost the company a fortune. Today, it develops vehicles, and we work with the company to develop vehicles. The infrastructure is available for manufacturers, and the test is very important. It's one of the key areas of innovation. Without tests, there's no innovation. There are just ideas. If you don't have the ability to test, you won't sell anything. For example, some companies boast about having an automatic braking system. We know very well which ones, and we won't name them. Everyone says they have the system, but the tests don't produce the same results. The performances aren't the same at all. Yet, we see the system on paper and in the advertisements.
The Chair: Senator Duffy asked a question earlier about platooning. In his response, the previous witness mentioned that the Minister of Transport participated in the activity. Did you participate?
Mr. Bonny: Yes, it was at our company. The National Research Council, or NRC, participated. That's what I want to talk about. What happened with the platooning test? PMG, people from the NRC, and people from UC Berkeley worked together on the test. We didn't really assess the thing, but we could work together. Why? Because there was a synergy. We know the tests. The people from the NRC have expertise and major research potential.
We can start simply. We don't need to create a department right away. However, we should at least decide that the NRC, people from PMG and people from Transport Canada will work together. They will examine all vehicles and create programs to make sure they have all the tools needed to test the 25 connectivity components and the driving aids. When we have the expertise, we can legislate, and even help the entire world legislate.
The Chair: Who's the client in a platooning operation?
Mr. Bonny: In this case, the NRC led the operation.
The Chair: The NRC asked your company to take trucks and test them?
Mr. Bonny: Exactly.
The Chair: You referred to Volvo. We're talking about buses, when we refer to Volvo, in Blainville? What portion of your testing is conducted on vehicles for multiple users or public transit as opposed to individual use?
Mr. Bonny: Good question. Including transportation and the private sector?
The Chair: Bus?
Mr. Bonny: The private sector and transportation?
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Bonny: Everyone? I would say a growing portion, because today there are the Chinese. We've managed to attract Chinese manufacturers that come to Canada to conduct their tests. The Chinese manufacturers are here. As a result, the bus, public transit and multi-passenger vehicle portion of our testing is growing significantly, along with our income.
I want to clarify something. When we arrived in China three years ago, we were the last ones. There are major test facilities, such as IDIADA. We can't even compare ourselves with them, because they're Goliaths and we're very small. The Chinese government decided to establish a partnership with us instead of with all these major international laboratories, just for North America. That's why, if I tell you it's possible, it's because we already did it. We went there as a small company, yet we showed that, even if we were small, we were original.
In Canada, we have something the others don't have, and Minister Garneau gave it to you. It's multi-climate technology. Today, we're known for it. We conduct winter tests in our centre. It's very important, especially for new technology, since people want to sell worldwide.
Northern China also has cold regions. It may be worthwhile to develop prototypes in places that have two climates. California can't provide this, whereas we can.
Senator Dagenais: I have one last question, Mr. Bonny. You have a centre where you conduct tests, trials, and so on. However, at the start of your presentation, you said that transportation is the backbone of a country's economy, and that transportation depends on infrastructure.
The strength of the United States lies in the ability to get around with all the fast lanes, because on the roads, trucks are used to transport goods.
It's fine to invest in research on vehicle safety, but if you had a recommendation for the government, could an investment be made in infrastructure? You and I know that, in major centres, people are currently having trouble getting around. There are electric trains, and in the United States, Amtrak goes everywhere.
I live in Blainville, like you. In the Montreal region, there's a desire to install an electric train. Some people are against it, some don't want an electric train, and some think the electric train doesn't go far enough. The bridges and tunnels need to be restored.
Do you agree that, along with the importance of tests to have the safest vehicles possible, the safety of vehicles depends on our infrastructure? At this time, unfortunately, in the Montreal region, the infrastructure is outdated. A bridge is blocked because a heavy truck didn't see the signs, and traffic is stalled for hours. This results in many vehicle accidents.
I want to know how you think the government should invest in infrastructure, since investing in infrastructure means investing in the economy.
Mr. Bonny: That's somewhat outside my field of expertise. I can give you an opinion, but it's simply an opinion.
For infrastructure, I would say people are still living in the past. We still think the old way. We're still planning roads today and components that may no longer exist in 10 years.
When it comes to self-driving vehicles, like in many cities, we're moving toward closing cities to drivers. It has already started. There will be multimodal transportation. You'll have just one card for cycling, taking a bus, taking a taxi, renting a car, and so on. There will be what's called multimodal transportation. The average driver will no longer be allowed to drive in the cities. In Quebec, a distribution centre is being created so that trucks no longer pass through Montreal. The trucks will arrive at the distribution centre, where their cargo will be unloaded. The cargo will then be delivered. We're in another world.
People are wondering how we'll drive, and so on. Who says there will still be traffic lights in 10 years? A small box may serve as a traffic light or stop sign and send signals to vehicles. In these cases, we'll no longer need lights, signs, and so on.
People must sit down to reconsider the maintenance of our systems and the way infrastructure must develop. It's necessary because there are many things to reconsider. We can greatly reduce maintenance costs, which would provide a little more money for road maintenance and a little less money for signs.
People from departments and municipal governments must ask themselves how they can use technology the most cost effectively. Today, we choose technology for its results, not its maintenance costs. People must take this into account.
To an even greater extent than the car, the infrastructure must expand. There's genius today. When I talk about genius, I mean brilliance. There's an ability to really change our environment and infrastructure, which would help us invest money where it's needed and spend less elsewhere. We don't have the means to maintain everything, but today, we can reduce costs. If we eliminate signs, we can reduce costs. Today, the information can travel to the car. Do I need a sign? No. Yet, it's money.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Bonny, for your participation today, which was very enlightening for the committee members.
[English]
Honourable senators, we will have two meetings next week, one Tuesday morning and one Wednesday night. For our meeting on Tuesday morning, we will hear from the representatives of the Canadian Automobile Association and the Automobile Protection Association.
(The committee adjourned.)