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California's GoMentum Station Forges International Partnerships

The Contra Costa Transportation Authority is setting itself up to exchange data and insights from partners around the globe.

The GoMentum Station in Concord, Calif., is expanding its reach and forging new partnerships across international borders.

This month, the Contra Costa Transportation Authority (CCTA), which oversees and operates GoMentum Station, entered into a collaborative agreement with Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) Japan and signed a letter of intent to partner with The Netherlands' Coast-to-Coast Smart E-mobility program.

“Innovation knows no boundaries,” said CCTA Executive Director Randy Iwasaki in a news release. While GoMentum already has working partnerships with international brands including Honda and the France-based EasyMile, CCTA is beginning to work directly with foreign quasi-government agencies.

The Coast-to-Coast initiative is a public-private partnership (P3) among the Dutch and U.S. governments, universities, and private companies set on furthering innovative mobility solutions that utilize electric vehicles. The groups have agreed to share information; launch Amber, a Holland-based autonomous car-sharing startup, in California; and look for opportunities for GoMentum to launch projects in the Netherlands.

ITS Japan, another P3 based in Tokyo, brings together representatives from next-gen transportation-related organizations, industries and academia. ITS Japan is committed to investing in research and deployment, and acting as a liaison among ITS-related public and private organizations and academia.

“This partnership will facilitate sharing autonomous vehicle knowledge between California and Japan as well as accelerate research and development of Connected Vehicles/Autonomous Vehicles through GoMentum Station’s partnerships,” Iwasaki said in the release.

GoMentum allows for companies and interested parties to test self-driving vehicles and vehicle-to-vehicle technology out of the public eye, free from most public data disclosure regulations. In January, the testing facility was named one of 10 Proving Ground Stations by the U.S. Department of Transportation.

Ryan McCauley was a staff writer for Government Technology magazine from October 2016 through July 2017, and previously served as the publication's editorial assistant.