The development and testing of self-driving car technology has seen major progress in recent years. But engineers are working on other kinds of autonomous vehicles too -- including some built for water. Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, are leading one such project. The engineers have been developing autonomous water vehicles they call “roboats.” The word is a combination of “robot” and “boat.” The project which began in 2016 aims to create a group of boats to transport goods and people along the waterways of Amsterdam. The Dutch capital has been called the world’s “most watery city” because of its large network of canals. The project was launched in an effort to explore how autonomous boats can make Amsterdam, and other cities, more efficient and improve the population’s quality of life. MIT’s Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, CSAIL, is leading the development in a partnership with the university’s Senseable City Lab. The engineers centered past efforts on autonomous boats designed to transport small goods. But the project’s latest creation, the Roboat II, can also carry passengers.