Give bus a name for the chance to win tech

Transport officials have launched a competition asking the public to name the new selfdriving bus in Inverness – with an £800 robot lawnmower top prize in the contest.

The Navya electric vehicle will soon be shuttling students and staff between Inverness Campus and Inverness Retail Park at 15mph.

The futuristic vehicle will be taking 15 passengers at a time and running for nine hours on one charge. Now, it needs a name. The bus does not have a steering wheel, driver’s seat or brake pedals but there are two ways that it can move.

The first way is all done by an onboard computer whereby the bus is controlled by a satellite navigation system with sensors attached to the vehicle which propel it forward and pull it to a stop when it detects obstacles on the road.

But despite having the capability to drive autonomously, a driver, or operator, must be on board and ready to take over.

And on the Inverness driverless bus, this involves the use of the same controller you would use for an Xbox.

This is the second way of getting the bus to operate – and it is otherwise known as manual mode.

Transport officials now want to give the Inverness driverless bus a name and are looking for submissions from members of the public before June 1.

Visit surveymonkey. co.uk/r/5NJPW7R

And it is not just the prestige of having your name chosen for the bus that is up for grabs.

A range of other smart technology will be given away to the winner and runners-up.

1st prize: Flymo EasiLife robot lawnmower

2nd prize: Eufy robot vacuum cleaner

3rd prize: Smart speaker.