How driverless cars will affect young people

 A street view by 2025AD author Raven Brookes and her team who take to the trendy streets of Digbeth to understand how driverless cars will affect Birmingham and its young people

Think of Birmingham, and chances are you think of bustling city streets and shopping centres, an eclectic and colourful nightlife, or perhaps a legacy in industry. But soon, Birmingham will be at the forefront of what the UK is making possible with driverless infrastructure, and will inspire some very different paths of thought.

It’s the UK’s second city, with the wider metropolitan area being where 3.8 million people – nearly 6 per cent of the entire UK population – call home. In 2017, the city itself had 1.1 million inhabitants, with a projected increase of 500,000 expected by 2021. And a city this big plays host to a lot of cars: 1.79 million to be exact. It’s also a popular city for commuting workers too, with over 166,000 coming in from the surrounding areas.

Needless to say, transport is essential to the dynamics of such a place, and it’s investing heavily. It has an extensive metro network, a newly developed major rail station now known as Grand Central, and cycle routes. It’s also gearing up to take on driverless technology. The initiative Midlands Future Mobility has been awarded a new £11 million programme to evaluate connected and autonomous vehicles which will impact on the city enormously.

But what do the young people of Birmingham think of the city’s plans to go driverless? We take to the trendy streets of the iconic Digbeth to find out. Hey, Mike!

Mike, 29, social media executive: Birmingham is a proactive city, and not afraid to do things differently. It invests in growing with the times. It stays current and offers a lot. It pushes […]

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