University of Michigan to Build Test Center to Test Autonomous Cars

A new $6.5 million, 32-acre site will be built on the north campus of University of Michigan as a test center for self-driving vehicles. The testing center will be made into a fake downtown that will feature buildings, parked cars, traffic signals, a tunnel, bicycle lanes and more.

Director of University of Michigan’s Transportation Research Institute, Peter Sweatman, said the idea behind the fake downtown is to test self-driving technology in realistic conditions can be measured and controlled with precision. The new test center is to be built on grounds that were previously used by Pfizer for their pharmaceutical research center.

Read more about how the test center will see how self-driving cars will respond to a variety of environments before testing the cars in general traffic conditions.