A safety staff member observes as a robotaxi of Pony.ai, a Chinese autonomous driving solution provider, steers automatically at the Canton Tower, a landmark in Guangzhou, south China's Guangdong Province, March 11, 2025. [Photo/Xinhua]

GUANGZHOU -- In the southern Chinese metropolis of Guangzhou, the future of urban mobility is arriving ahead of schedule.

Upon arrival at Baiyun International Airport, a simple online reservation summons a driverless taxi to the curb. Within the city, autonomous minibuses shuttle passengers around landmarks like the Canton Tower, while low-altitude flight routes are set to bring "air buses" into everyday use.

Since February this year, Pony.ai, a Guangzhou-based robotaxi service provider, has run a robotaxi line between the city's downtown area, the airport and the high-speed rail hub. Riders notice the calm: no lurching stops, no creeping over crosswalks, just a spacious cabin gliding at a measured pace.

"Our fares match ordinary taxis," said Chen Haosheng, a staff member of Pony.ai. "Each car now handles up to 15 trips a day, and demand keeps rising." The difference is invisible -- dozens of radars and high-definition cameras, not a human hand, judge every lane change.

Another Guangzhou-based tech firm, WeRide, has launched its autonomous minibus service at the Canton Tower. The futuristic service has become a must-try for tourists visiting Guangzhou.

The 9-kilometer Canton Tower loop, operating 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily, carried 1.13 million passengers over 2.01 million kilometers from December 2023 to the end of 2024.

As of the end of April 2025, 12 similar driverless bus routes have served 1.17 million riders safely and logged 2.17 million kilometers across Guangzhou, said the city's bus authorities.

The launch of these demonstration routes highlights Guangzhou's steady progress in autonomous driving policies.

As one of the earliest cities in China to explore autonomous driving, Guangzhou offers a rich variety of road test scenarios, creating a favorable environment for the application and demonstration of intelligent connected vehicles (ICVs).

Since 2018, Guangzhou has been actively developing the ICV market, introducing policies and standards related to road testing, demonstration applications and operation, and gradually opening up its urban roads.

The city is also expanding the boundaries of autonomous driving by actively developing "air transportation." In late March, EHang Intelligent, a Guangzhou-based drone maker, obtained the operation certificate for autonomous passenger drones from the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC). This means that consumers will soon be able to purchase tickets at designated operating spots in Guangzhou to experience low-altitude tours, city sightseeing, and a variety of commercial passenger services.

The carrier, EH216-S, developed by EHang, is a pilotless electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. It has completed more than 60,000 safe flights worldwide and can be applied in scenarios such as manned transportation, air tours, air logistics, and even emergency medical response.

"In the future, aircraft will have fixed stations like buses, and these stations will be very close to people's homes and travel destinations. People will also be able to book an aircraft via their mobile phones," said Xue Peng, vice president of EHang Intelligent.

According to Guangzhou's low-altitude economy development plan released in May 2024, by 2027, the overall scale of Guangzhou's low-altitude economy is expected to reach 150 billion yuan (about 21 billion U.S. dollars), with commercial manned flight operations being one of the core directions.

Data released by the CAAC shows that by 2025, the market value of the low-altitude economy sector is expected to reach 1.5 trillion yuan, and could soar to 3.5 trillion yuan by 2035.