Autonomous Driving in Public Transportation Is Becoming a Reality – ABSOLUT II Successfully Completed!

On August 27, 2026, three years of joint research and development came to a head in Leipzig: At the public closing event for the ABSOLUT II funding project, the consortium presented its findings—and we, as the Chair of Vehicle Mechatronics at TU Dresden, were there with our own presentation and a live demonstration.

The project focused on one central question: How can autonomous shuttle services be integrated into public transit in the future in a way that is safe, cost-effective, and does not require safety drivers? The answer: The shuttles operate autonomously and, when necessary, are supported by technical supervision from a central control center. This has laid the groundwork for supplementing Leipzig’s public transit services in suburban areas with driverless on-demand shuttles.

Here’s what we demonstrated as a chair on-site:

• The integration of the ABSOLUT e-Crafter into a technical supervision system via a manufacturer-neutral communication interface we developed based on VDA 5050
• A live demonstration of indirect teleoperation: If the vehicle detects an obstacle, it proposes an evasive maneuver. Only after approval by the technical supervision team does the shuttle execute the maneuver on its own.
• The “ABSOLUT e-Crafter” test vehicle from the predecessor project—with all modifications for automated driving in public transit
• Our commitment to Autoware, a freely available, open-source software stack for automated driving, in whose further development we are actively involved

ABSOLUT II thus continues the success story of the predecessor project and demonstrates that automated public demand-responsive transportation is technically feasible and has great potential for expanding mobility in suburban areas. The insights gained are already being incorporated into the follow-up project, SIAS-ÖV, which aims to integrate a production-ready Level 4 shuttle into Leipzig’s public transit system.

ABSOLUT II is funded by the Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space as part of the “ICT for Electric Mobility” program—which is part of the federal government’s strategy for autonomous driving on public roads.

A heartfelt thank you to all project partners for their inspiring collaboration:
ANavS GmbH – Advanced Navigation Solutions, BitCtrl Systems GmbH, FSD – Central Office, glts cotech GmbH, IKEM – Institute for Climate Protection, Energy, and Mobility, INIT Group, Leipziger Verkehrsbetriebe, Sedenius Engineering GmbH, and the City of Leipzig, as well as to our associated partners Leipziger Messe and the BMW Group Plant in Leipzig.

Further information about the project can be found on the project website. The chairs involved at TU Dresden are:

Chair of Vehicle Mechatronics
Chair of Transport Systems Information Technology
Chair of Traffic Process Automation
Junior Professorship in Mechatronics / Vocational Didactics