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Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority has launched the trial operation of the Dubai Glydways automated transit system at Bluewaters, the authority said in a statement. Mattar Al Tayer, director general and chairman of the board of executive directors of the RTA, marked the occasion by taking a five-minute ride in one of the autonomous vehicles along a designated route at the Dubai Holding destination. The four-week pilot will assess technical and operational performance while examining opportunities for future expansion, according to the RTA.
The Glydways system uses driverless electric pods that seat four to six passengers and travel at up to 50 kilometres per hour with a 250-kilometre range on a single charge, RTA specifications show. Each vehicle deploys 20 high-resolution LiDAR sensors along with radar and cameras that feed into artificial intelligence and autonomous driving systems to navigate dedicated guideways. The authority added that the pods can virtually link more than 10 vehicles at headways of less than one second.
RTA figures place system capacity at more than 20,000 passengers per hour in both directions while projecting capital cost reductions of up to 90 per cent and operating cost savings of up to 70 per cent versus comparable modes. The project operates under a public-private partnership with Glydways and Dubai Holding that supplies infrastructure and evaluation support. Public transport, shared mobility and taxi ridership reached 348.1 million in the first half of 2026 with average daily usage near 1.9 million, according to RTA data.[[1]](https://www.rta.ae/wps/portal/rta/ae/home/news-and-media/all-news/NewsDetails/348-million-public-transport-shared-mobility-and-taxi-riders-in-the-first-half-of-2026)
“The start of trial operation for the Glydways system marks an important step in RTA’s journey towards adopting and developing future mobility systems, in line with the directives of our wise leadership to strengthen Dubai’s global leadership in smart and sustainable mobility,” Mattar Al Tayer said. He added, “RTA is committed to transforming promising innovations and technologies in the transport sector into practical applications, and to testing and evaluating them within Dubai’s urban environment. The trial operation marks an important stage in assessing the system’s operational and technical aspects, evaluating its ability to provide a safe, seamless and reliable mobility experience, and exploring opportunities for integration with the public transport network, particularly for first- and last-mile journeys.”
Routes under study include a 2.8-kilometre connection between National Paints Metro Station and Bluewaters plus links serving Jumeirah Village Circle, Festival City, Business Bay and Mohammed Bin Rashid City, the RTA reported. These connections would strengthen integration with the Dubai Metro network and improve access to residential, commercial and tourist sites. The authority noted that first- and last-mile solutions remain a core objective of the Glydways project.
Mark Seeger, founder and co-chief executive officer of Glydways, stated, “The start of trial operation in Dubai marks an important milestone in our collaboration with RTA and a significant step in demonstrating the potential of automated transit networks to meet the needs of modern cities and deliver flexible, high-capacity, on-demand mobility services.” The trial at Bluewaters, a retail and entertainment hub, will generate data on passenger experience and system reliability in an operational setting. Dubai recorded 802 million public transport, shared mobility and taxi journeys in 2025, a 7.4 per cent rise from 2024, RTA statistics show.
