When delivery robots enter public spaces: A longitudinal study of Starship robots in Stockholm

Drive Sweden project funded by Sweden's Innovation Agency Vinnova
(May 2025 – May 2027; grant no. 2025-00420)

How does society adapt to a new transport technology in the form of autonomous delivery robots?

Team

A photo of a Starship robot on the streets of Stockholm, Sweden — A delivery robot on the streets of Stockholm, Sweden

Hannah Pelikan (PI) Department of Culture and Society, Linköping University, Sweden
Stuart Reeves (Subcontracting partner) School of Computer Science, University of Nottingham, UK
Daniel Rudmark (Co-PI) VTI, Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute
Starship Technologies (Partner)
City of Stockholm (Partner)
Transportstyrelsen, Swedish Transport Agency (Partner)
Urban Robotics Foundation (Partner)

What this project is about

The project follows the first deployment of a fleet of delivery robots in Sweden. We use empirical evidence in the form of video recordings of the behaviour of people who encounter the robots and interviews with people on the street to inform policies for the deployment of autonomous public delivery robots in Sweden, and the development of standards for public mobile robots globally.

The project will deepen our understanding of:

how the robots and their operations integrate with local communities
how the robots impact and are impacted by the behaviour of people who encounter them on the street

From these trials, we will:

develop policy implications
prepare a larger implementation project building on these first deployments