Partners

Michigan Engineering

U-M’s College of Engineering has been a key partner since Mcity was established. As of January 1, 2022, Mcity became a unit of Michigan Engineering. Many Mcity-funded research projects involve Michigan Engineering faculty and students. Another engineering initiative is TechLab at Mcity, a Company-in-Residence incubator for early-stage advanced mobility technology companies in the connected and automated vehicle industry. TechLab is managed by Michigan Engineering’s  Center for Entrepreneurship, with support from Mcity. The program gives undergraduate students an opportunity for hands-on work with TechLab companies to solve real engineering problems.

Mobility at Michigan

Mcity is part of a broader effort at the University of Michigan to advance transportation and mobility research and innovation. In addition to Mcity, Mobility at Michigan includes:

• U-M Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI), founded in 1965, is a global leader in transportation research and a partner of choice for industry leaders, foundations, and government agencies. UMTRI has conducted more than 1,000 multidisciplinary research projects in areas involving social and behavioral analyses, accident data collection, traffic safety analysis, and standards development and testing, as well as the deployment and evaluation of new safety and mobility technologies. Mcity is partnering with UMTRI on research and in the deployment of connected and automated vehicle technologies. Through this work UMTRI has collected over 70 terabytes of data; nearly seven million trips; 45 million miles; and 138.5 billion records. In 2020, UMTRI became a unit of Michigan Engineering.
• Electric Vehicle Center (EVC) funded by a $130M investment in 2023 from the state of Michigan’s Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity. EVC is working to help meet the U.S. goal that half of new car sales be electric by 2030.
• Automotive Research Center (ARC) is a University of Michigan-based U.S. Army Center for Excellence providing research for the U.S. Army Ground Vehicle Systems Center (GVSC) in Warren, Michigan.
• Walter E. Lay Automotive Engineering Laboratory (Auto Lab) has been at U-M since 1957. Today the Auto Lab conducts research on batteries for automotive applications and vehicle autonomy.

Poverty Solutions

Poverty Solutions is a university-wide presidential initiative that partners with communities and policymakers to find new ways to prevent and alleviate poverty through action-based research.

The mission of Poverty Solutions at the University of Michigan is to cultivate action-based research partnerships with community stakeholders and policymakers to find what works in confronting poverty and use that evidence to be a part of positive change in communities.

City of Ann Arbor

The support and cooperation of the city of Ann Arbor at many levels has long been essential to the work of Mcity, and to furthering the progress of deploying advanced technologies for safety, mobility, and efficiency.

A2GO, an autonomous vehicle (AV) shuttle service currently on the streets of Ann Arbor was launched in October 2021. Mcity partnered with May Mobility and Ann Arbor SPARK.

In 2012, the streets of Ann Arbor became the world’s largest test bed for evaluating the potential of connected vehicles and infrastructure technology with the implementation of the Connected Vehicle Safety Pilot Model Deployment. This initial project evolved into the Ann Arbor Connected Vehicle Test Environment (AACVTE) and today is known as the Ann Arbor Connected Environment 2.0 (AACE) receiving an additional $9.8M U.S. DOT federal grant in 2023 to deploy cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) technology, allowing participating vehicles to exchange safety-enhancing data with the world around them.

Mcity’s work within the local civic environment is paving the way for regional and national deployments that are critical to demonstrating the safety and commercial viability of connected and automated vehicles.

Michigan Department of Transportation

Michigan is a leader in deploying intelligent transportation systems (ITS) and U-M has collaborated with the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) in the evaluation of ITS, including the use of probe vehicle data for management of the highway network. MDOT worked closely with U-M on the design of the Mcity Test Facility, a unique simulated urban environment for testing connected and automated vehicle systems, and provided funding to support construction of the facility. In addition, MDOT and U-M work closely on the development and implementation of connected vehicle test beds in Southeast Michigan which provide a platform for research involving vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications on highways across the region.

U.S. Department of Transportation

U-M has had a long-standing partnership with the U.S. Department of Transportation, conducting a wide range of federally funded research in motor vehicle safety and efficiency. Most recently, Mcity supported the Ann Arbor Connected Environment (AACE), a $13 million federally funded project conducted and operated by the U-M Transportation Research Institute. The AACE is a real-world implementation of connected vehicle technologies used by thousands of drivers in and around Ann Arbor, Michigan. Connected vehicle technology allows vehicles to communicate wirelessly with each other and with infrastructure such as traffic signals. The information gathered from this study can be used for certain safety applications – such as collision warning systems – sustainability initiatives, and may one day be used to help guide automated vehicles.