Indicators of Success in AV Trials and Helping Public Transport Workers Transition to AV-related Roles

Mr Edward Chia Bing Hui asked the Acting Minister for Transport (a) what key performance indicators will be used to measure the success of autonomous vehicle trials; (b) what safety benchmarks are in place; and (b) how legal liability and system security risks will be addressed.

Mr Edward Chia Bing Hui asked the Acting Minister for Transport (a) what system-level benefits such as (i) improved accessibility (ii) reliability of public transport and (iii) congestion and emissions reductions, Singapore anticipates from autonomous vehicle (AV) deployment; and (b) whether such efficiencies may enable more affordable public transport in the future.

Mr Edward Chia Bing Hui asked the Acting Minister for Transport (a) how will the Government’s autonomous vehicle (AV) strategy affect driving-related jobs; (b) what new job opportunities are expected; and (c) how the Ministry plans to support workers in transitioning to AV-related roles.

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) can enhance connectivity and create good jobs for Singaporeans.

AVs will add to our public transport network without running up against fundamental manpower constraints. We will start by deploying autonomous shuttles to operate scheduled, fixed-route services within our towns. These shuttle services can directly connect residents to key transport nodes and amenities such as the market and polyclinic.

There are three pilot routes in Punggol. If successful, we intend to expand the service to other towns that are further away from the city, such as Tengah. Besides AV shuttles, we will be piloting AV buses as public buses, starting with SBST bus services 400 and 191, which serve Marina Bay and one-north respectively.

The Ministry of Transport (MOT) and the Land Transport Authority (LTA) have put in place safeguards to ensure safe AV deployment in the regulatory sandbox as provided for in the Road Traffic Act. Every AV must pass a safety assessment before it is authorised to operate on public roads. The vehicle must be able to respond safely to the behaviour of other road users and adhere to traffic rules. For a start, a safety operator will be on board the AV at all times. All AVs deployed on roads must have third-party liability insurance, covering death, bodily injury and property damage. Third parties would be compensated in the event of accidents, similar to conventional vehicles.

The AV industry will bring new job opportunities for Singaporeans, including for our transport workers. There will be roles such as safety operators, remote operators, engineers and technicians.

As the supply of AV vehicles will be limited at the start, there will be no displacement effect for our taxi and private-hire vehicle drivers in the short term. That said, we recognise their anxiety. The Government and AV operators will roll out training and reskilling programmes to help drivers to take on opportunities in the AV sector, or to move into other sectors if they prefer. We will put these programmes in place early to provide drivers with options and time to go for reskilling.

I declare I am the Executive Secretary of the National Transport Workers' Union. The announcement of the roll-out of the AV shuttle trials in Punggol has been met with both excitement and curiosity. I thank the Ministry for putting in a phased approach for the roll-out with safety mapping and terrain customisation of Punggol streets, before passengers services start. This will no doubt allow our Punggol residents to be familiarised with the technology and services, and to be more confident of the use of AVs in their daily commute.

What are the safety key performance indicators to be achieved during the non-passenger phase of the Punggol AV trials before graduating into passenger services? And will there be a town-wide consultation with Punggol residents during the various roll-out phases?

In addition, I note that there has been some identification of new jobs that would be created with AV trials, such as safety drivers and remote operators which the Senior Minister of State has talked about. How will the Ministry direct the appointed AV service providers to work with the transport unions and associations on prioritising these jobs for existing transport workers and to make more accessible the application for such jobs to a wider group of transport workers?

I thank the Member Ms Yeo Wan Ling for raising these questions. She has been a very, very active proponent for workers in the transport industry – in particular, after we have shared about our AV plans.

First and foremost, safety is a key priority for MOT and LTA. And that is why we are taking a phased approach to deploy the use of AV services. Firstly, before AVs are allowed on public roads in Singapore. They are subject to LTA's AV assessment framework, which requires them to pass a closed-circuit test at the Centre of Excellence for Testing and Research of Autonomous Vehicles (CETRAN).

Secondly, all AVs are required to undergo a preparatory phase with a safety operator on board at all times to map the routes to calibrate the sensors and fine-tune relevant artificial intelligence (AI) models. All shuttles are also monitored in real-time with performance data collected and analysed to ensure safe and reliable operations.

Apart from that, when we first identified the routes for trial in Punggol, we have taken care to identify what we call as "PUDOs", pick up and drop-off points, where there is adequate safety distance for onboarding as well as disembarking of commuters. At the same time, we are looking forward to having a bigger and engagement, a more widespread engagement with residents in Punggol, in particular those who go to the preschools, the schools as well as Active Ageing Centres to sensitise them to the use of the AVs on the roads.

On her second question, when it comes to jobs, I had shared in my main reply that the Government will work actively with the unions to identify new job roles and to also put in place training and reskilling programmes early. Just very broadly, at this point in time, we see that there are potential new job roles in the ecosystem relevant to AV operators. These would be, for instance, in the areas of engineering and software development, depot operations, vehicle and fleet operations. There are also potential roles with the AV tech providers in the areas of software development, cyber security and compliance. And lastly, for enablers of the AV ecosystem, such as, in the areas of safety testing and accreditation, actuary or claims processing, as well as, cyber security and compliance.

So, these are just very broadly some of the roles that we have identified, but this would be an evolving journey and we hope to do this together with our transport workers.

Thank you, Speaker. I would like to say that the introduction of AVs means exciting opportunities also for our young. So, I would just like to ask Senior Minister of State, how is our Institutes of Higher Learning (IHLs) participating in these trials and are there learning opportunities for students in our IHLs?

My second supplementary question is with regard to system-wide benefits, such as, accessibility, in particular. For routes that are currently not viable, does the Ministry see that introduction of AVs create new opportunities for new routes? For example, night riders, bus services and if so, does the Ministry intend to run pilot trials for night rider bus services on AVs?

My last supplementary question is with regard to technology convergence with light rail systems. Does the Ministry see there is an opportunity for AVs to be running on tracks that will lead to better system reliability on light rail systems?

I thank the Member for the questions that he has raised. Firstly, indeed, we are working closely with our IHLs. I had mentioned in my reply earlier that we are already working with the Nanyang Technological University's CETRAN, which is a centre of excellence when it comes to AV testing. So, there are opportunities for us to work with IHLs when it comes to safety testing, as well as making sure that their curriculum looks into areas of AV technology to prepare them for when AV becomes more commonplace in our ecosystem.

Secondly, when it comes to accessibility, indeed, we are looking at routes that are less well served by the public transport system, for a variety of reasons. They could be further away from the main transport nodes. Also, ridership could be lower. There could also be instances where they are not being served because we face difficulties in finding drivers for night rides, for instance. So, there will be particular operational hours which are deemed to be less popular with drivers and we see that there is an opportunity for us to use AVs in those circumstances.

On his last question, we will take a look at AV technology. It is evolving rapidly and we would remain open and see how we could use AV technology in as broad a range of transport vehicles as possible.

I would like to thank the Senior Minister of State for answering questions on AVs. Two supplementary questions from me. Thank you for sharing that AVs must meet the AV safety framework. Can I just confirm that the framework also includes assessment on capability of the system under adverse weather conditions and also redundancy of system, in particular, for cybersecurity?

My second question is, and the Senior Minister of State mentioned it earlier, AVs have the potential of helping us serve the quieter areas in towns. One possible area is the area in Jalan Loyang Besar. Can the Senior Minister of State share a bit more about the timeline to scale up these pilots and how can we learn quickly and scale the use of AV in our towns?

I thank the Member for his supplementary questions. First and foremost, definitely, I think we are seeing quite extreme weather conditions happening all around the world and in Singapore. So, the AV technology and what we are deploying on our roads is as tested, able to manage adverse weather conditions.

On the second question that he asked was on cybersecurity, if I am not wrong. So, the operators must implement robust security measures and protocols which are regularly reviewed to address evolving threats and to maintain system integrity. This is further guided by Technical Reference 68 (TR 68) in Singapore, Part Three, which sets out the cybersecurity principles and the best practices for AVs, covering areas, such as, secure communications, intrusion detection and resilience against remote access attacks.

The Member's last question was on timeline. Because the use of AVs in the community is quite novel still, we are taking a more phased approach.

So, for instance, for the pilots in Punggol, we are taking about one or two months to collect the data to conduct mapping with the use of the sensors, to collect the data to make sure that the AVs have all the data necessary. And the safety operators on board are also familiar with what to do, if there should be emergency situations. So, that is the first phase, always with a safety operator on board. The second stage we are inviting those who are interested to take the AVs to try out the technology. It will be definitely safe by then, because the AVs would have been running around the roads for some time conducting mapping.

But apart from the technical performance indicators, what we are also doing through the pilot deployment is to socialise people to the idea of having the AVs on the road. That is why we are taking, really, a step by step approach to make sure that not only do we have the technical specifications, the performance indicators in place, that also our members of the public are socialised to the AVs. And that is why the roll-out is not as fast as some of us would like it to be, but we think that overall, this is safer and more acceptable to the public.

So, after we do this pilot trial in deployment in Punggol, we are definitely thinking of rolling it out to more areas, and that is why I have shared about Tengah. And if there are other suggestions from other Members in this House as to what are the other areas that we can roll this out in, we are more than happy to take in that feedback.