Smart Cities

China’s investment in AI business, infrastructure, and research could pay off big over the next decade.

Autonomous aircraft in the United Kingdom are getting their own superhighway. The UK government approved Project Skyway, a 165-mile system of interconnected drone-only flight routes.

Dormant robotaxis are snarling traffic on the streets of San Francisco.What’s new: Cruise self-driving cabs lately have stalled en masse, Wired reported.

In Beijing, self-driving cars are rolling without a driver behind the wheel. China’s capital city authorized Pony.ai and Apollo Go, a Baidu subsidiary, to deploy self-driving taxis without a human in the driver’s seat.

What if AI-enabled monitoring isn’t just for dictators and despots?The fear: Under the pretext of maintaining law and order, even countries founded on a commitment to individual rights allow police to take advantage of smart-city infrastructure and smart-home devices.

A crime-fighting AI company altered evidence to please police, a new investigation claims — the latest in a rising chorus of criticism. ShotSpotter modified the system’s findings in some cases.

Chinese researchers for the first time swept a competition to develop AI systems that monitor urban traffic. Chinese universities and companies won first and second place place in all five categories of the 2021 AI City Challenge.

Traffic signals controlled by AI are keeping vehicles rolling citywide. Several U.S. cities are testing systems from Israel-based startup NoTraffic that promise to cut both commute times and carbon emissions.

Two European capitals launched public logs of AI systems used by the government. Amsterdam and Helsinki provide online registries that describe the algorithms that govern municipal activities, such as automated parking control and a public health chatbot.

Makers of self-driving cars predicted a quick race to the finish line, but their vehicles are far from the homestretch. A few years ago, some car companies promised road-ready autonomous vehicles as early as 2017.