U.S. Department of Transportation Awards $2.1 Million to the Virginia Port Authority of Autonomous Truck Ready Project

January 11, 2021

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration awarded a $2.1 million Advanced Transportation and Congestion Management Technologies Deployment (ATCMTD) grant to the Virginia Port Authority for the Autonomous Truck Ready project. The ATCMTD program this year awarded grants valued at $49.6 million to 10 projects that use cutting-edge technologies to improve mobility and safety for America’s travelers.

The Federal Highway Administration ’s ATCMTD program funds early deployments of forward-looking technologies that can serve as national models. This year, in addition to Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) technologies to reduce congestion, the grants will fund projects that support autonomous and connected vehicle technologies.

The Virginia Port Authority will establish the building blocks to make the Port of Virginia the first terminal in North America that is “autonomous truck ready.” The main goal of this project is to develop a proof of concept using a real autonomous truck to access the terminals and deliver and receive containers successfully.

Read more in the Federal Highway Administration’s official release here.