The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and the Korea Transportation Safety Authority announced on the 16th that they will be promoting the 'Autonomous Driving Living Lab City Selection Competition' (hereinafter referred to as the 'Living Lab Competition') to integrate and verify technologies and services developed in autonomous driving technology development innovation projects with the participation of inter-ministerial departments.

The autonomous driving technology development innovation project is a multi-ministerial (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, Ministry of Science and ICT, National Police Agency) research and development project worth 1.1 trillion won that was launched in 2021. It is a project that aims to commercialize convergence-type level (Lv.) 4/4+ autonomous driving by 2027, including basic technologies such as vehicles and parts, as well as infrastructure, laws and systems, and services.

The Living Lab Competition is a project to create the world's first autonomous driving demonstration area at the city level by investing a budget of 45 billion won by 2027 to demonstrate the research results of all ministries, including eight major public services.

The eight major public services are: △Mobility support service for the transportation disadvantaged, △Demand-responsive public transportation service, △Shared car, △Urban environment service, △Road maintenance, △Emergency dispatch and road control, △Route-type public transportation service, and △Traffic accident prevention patrol.sp;

The target of the contest is a metropolitan or basic local government that satisfies the contest requirements, a metropolitan local government + basic local government (n adjacent ones), or a basic local government + basic local government (n adjacent ones).

△In the case of a metropolitan government + basic local government (n adjacent ones), in the case of 'metropolitan + basic', it is limited to the metropolitan government and the city, county, or autonomous district that is the basic local government within its jurisdiction.

The evaluation method is conducted by an evaluation committee comprised of external experts, and local governments are selected through written evaluations, on-site inspections, and presentation evaluations.

The evaluation criteria are as follows: △suitability for application of the eight major public services for written evaluations, △verification of authenticity for on-site inspections, and △compliance with essential conditions, service suitability, and local government’s will to promote for presentation evaluations.

The evaluation committee will individually evaluate the business plan contents, on-site inspection, and presentation evaluation results, and select the winners based on their highest score rankings.

We plan to not only verify the technologies developed through inter-ministerial research and development projects, but also promote them so that the public can experience various autonomous driving technologies and services in their daily lives.

▲Business-specific competition schedule (Image source: Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport press release)

The selection of the autonomous living lab city will be carried out through a 40-day public offering from August 17 to September 25, followed by a written evaluation of the proposed city, an on-site inspection, and a presentation evaluation, and the final candidate city is planned to be selected in October.

Detailed information regarding the contest can also be found on the Korea Transportation Safety Authority website (www.kotsa.or.kr).

Meanwhile, the Korea Transportation Safety Authority plans to hold a ‘Living Lab Competition Briefing Session’ for local governments across the country on August 28.

Park Jin-ho, director of the Autonomous Driving Policy Division at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, said, “The ‘Autonomous Driving Living Lab’ is a core project of the government-wide research and development project and will be a milestone in achieving the government’s goal of ‘commercializing Lv. 4 autonomous driving by 2027. ’ We will take meticulous care of it from the public offering stage so that it can remain as a successful case leading the future mobility era.”