Empty Cab, Full Cars: Kobe Ran Driverless Transit in 1981
Did you know Kobe's Port Liner opened in 1981 as the world's first driverless urban transit system, more than two years before Lille's VAL metro?
Harper Quinn, Live desk · Sept. 18, 2026 · 3-4 min
KOBE - Did you know Kobe ran a driverless urban transit line in 1981, decades before robotaxis filled the headlines?
On Feb. 5, 1981, Kobe New Transit's Port Island Line, known as the Port Liner, opened between Sannomiya and the man-made Port Island. It was Japan's first practical automated guideway transit system and, as a commercial urban line, the world's first driverless automated operation, more than two years ahead of Lille's VAL metro, which opened in 1983.
The rubber-tired trains covered 6.4 kilometers and nine stations at opening, linking Kobe's main downtown hub to the island built for a new waterfront city. Kawasaki Heavy Industries supplied the 8000-series cars. Computers ran the vehicles. Full-height platform screen doors were fitted at every station, a Japanese first. A driver was not required. Attendants still rode along at the start.
The line was built in about two years to serve Portopia '81, the Kobe Port Island exposition that opened in March 1981. In 2006 it was extended to Kobe Airport. Kobe New Transit still runs it.
Driverless here meant an empty cab on a guided, grade-separated people mover, not a robotaxi mixed with street traffic. Kobe solved the empty-cab problem on a dedicated guideway in 1981. The street version is still being cleared city by city.
Sources
Harper Quinn, Live desk. Harper Quinn covers breaking driverless news for Driverless News.
