Toyota Unveils Ambitious Sustainable City Project
Toyota’s Future City
Toyota, the world’s best-selling car manufacturer, has announced its ambitious plan to build a sustainable city at the base of an active volcano in Japan. This groundbreaking project, known as Woven City, aims to be a fully autonomous community that will serve as a testing ground for new technologies such as autonomous driving, robotics, and artificial intelligence (AI) in a real-world environment.
Woven City is expected to welcome its first 360 residents by the end of 2024, with a projected population of 2,000 people. Toyota plans to conduct initial tests in 2025. With an estimated worth of billions of US dollars, Woven City will cover an area of 708,000 square meters and serve as a living laboratory for Toyota to develop and test reusable, energy-efficient autonomous vehicles, thus expanding human mobility potential.
The city will collect extensive data from self-driving vehicles guided by sensors embedded in streetlights, buildings, and roads, providing valuable insights into traffic patterns for both cars and pedestrians. This connectivity will enable Toyota to test advanced AI technologies with minimal risks.
Woven City’s fully integrated and interconnected ecosystem will be powered by clean energy sources such as solar power, hydrogen fuel cells, and geothermal energy. Furthermore, the majority of buildings in the city will be constructed using traditional Japanese wood craftsmanship, with specially programmed robots taking on labor-intensive tasks, reducing the need for human intervention.
According to experts, by 2040, over 33 million self-driving cars will be sold worldwide. However, even today, the most advanced autonomous vehicles still require some level of human supervision. To operate fully autonomous vehicles, cities need to establish comprehensive data networks that can transmit vast amounts of information. Sensors and cameras scattered throughout the city, including traffic lights and buildings, will provide data to the vehicles, ranging from weather conditions to cyclists’ behavior. With this data, autonomous vehicles can navigate the city safely.
Woven City is Toyota’s response to this need for a fully connected city from the start. It represents an unparalleled opportunity for Toyota to develop future technologies, including a digital infrastructure for the city, where humans, buildings, and vehicles are connected and communicate with each other through data and sensors.
Akio Toyoda, Chairman and CEO of Toyota, stated: “Building a complete city from scratch, even on a small scale like this, with sensor-based infrastructure and in a connected way, will give us the unique opportunity to develop future technologies, including a digital operating system for the city. With people, buildings, and vehicles all connected and communicating with each other through data and sensors, we will be able to maximize the potential of AI technology in both the virtual and physical world.”
Woven City is set to redefine urban living, combining cutting-edge technology, energy efficiency, and environmental sustainability. It will be a city where residents are transported by autonomous vehicles and breathe clean air, surrounded by smartly designed buildings equipped with state-of-the-art technology.
To learn more about Woven City, visit Business Today.
References: Forbes, Toyota/Woven City, Metro.co.uk