Railway 2.0

Fraunhofer AutoTram: electric tram + bus of tomorrow

Electric and hybrid vehicles will take over the cities: cars, bicycles, buses and streetcars. New concepts are needed for individual and local public transportation. In the large-scale project “Fraunhofer System Research on Electric-Powered Mobility“, researchers are developing solutions for mobility of the future. The first results have now been presented.

Closing time: the passengers are patiently waiting at their bus stop. Over and over, whenever a bus stops and pulls away again, they are subject to the smell of exhaust fumes. This scenario could soon be a image of the past . The city traffic of the future will be different: buses will not be the only vehicles propelled by electricity, hydrogen or a combination of hybrid propulsion methods. One of these vehicles of the future is the AutoTram®. As long as a streetcar and as agile as a bus, it combines the benefits of both vehicles: with no need for rails or overhead contact lines, the “bustrolley” rolls on rubber tires and follows a simple white line on the road surface.

In the large project “Fraunhofer System Research on Electric-Powered Mobility,” it serves as a research platform. The vehicle is part of the overall Fraunhofer System Research effort, a research cooperative involving 33 Fraunhofer institutes. “We want to offer workable solutions and advance electric-powered mobility in Germany. With our two research platforms – the AutoTram® and a passenger car – we are demonstrating that the new components can interoperate well,” says project coordinator Professor Holger Hanselka. The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is funding this project with a total of EUR 44 million from the Economic Stimulus Plans I and II for a period of two years. The project is broken down into four areas of focus: Vehicle concepts; energy generation, distribution and conversion; energy storage technology; and technical system integration and social issues. After a year spent in extensive research, the first results are now available.

[More in the press release]