It’s one thing for an autonomous car to strut its stuff on smooth, warm California tarmac, and quite another to do so on the frozen winter mix of northern Finland. Martti, a self-driving vehicle system homegrown in Finland[1], demonstrated just this in a record-setting drive along a treacherous (to normal drivers) Laplandish road.
Martti is one of two cars designed by VTT Technical Research Center; it’s designed to handle rough and icy conditions, while it’s “spouse” Marilyn is made for more ordinary urban drives. Different situations call for different sensors and strategies — for instance, plain optical cameras perform poorly on snowy roads, and lidar is less effective, so Martti will rely more on radar. But Marilyn has a rear-mounted lidar for better situational awareness in traffic.
Recently Martti accomplished what the researchers claim is a world first: driving fully autonomously on a real snow-covered road (and hitting 25 MPH at that). Others from Yandex[2] to Waymo[3] have tested cars in snow, but from their reports these seem to have been more controlled conditions. Martti’s drive took place in Muonio on a public road almost totally obscured by snow.
“It probably also made a new world record in fully automated driving, making 40 km/h in a snowfall on snow-covered terrain without lane markings,” said project manager Matti Kutila in a VTT news release. “It could have had even more speed, but in test driving it is programmed not to exceed the limit of 40 km/h.”
I’m not sure going any faster would be wise even on straightaways. But winter driving isn’t my specialty.
The point isn’t to make a perfect consumer car for snowy weather, but to tackle the unique...