Abstract
Autonomous urban passenger ferries are emerging as an efficient solution for public transportation, allowing operators to supervise multiple
vessels from a Remote Operation Centre (ROC). A recent milestone demonstrated the remote operation of MF Estelle, the world’s first
commercial autonomous ferry, from 600 km away. As operations shift from onboard to remote environments, designing a new Human-Machine
Interface (HMI) becomes critical. This paper reflects on three key phases of work informing the development of a robust ROC HMI. (i) Phase
1: The milliAmpere2 trial in 2022 marked the first public demonstration of the ferry’s autonomy system, revealing the need for an HMI to display
system status and decisions clearly. (ii) Phase 2: Building on lessons learned from the trial, a user-friendly HMI was designed for MF Estelle.
However, pursuing a human-centred design approach was challenging due to the undefined operator role for autonomous ferries. Despite these
difficulties, the HMI was successfully integrated on board Estell. (iii) Phase 3: After over a year of operation, the need for a ROC became
apparent. The transition from onboard to remote control presents significant challenges. To address this, a CRIOP workshop was conducted,
identifying critical issues related to human factors, such as the necessity of comprehensive task analysis and the importance of situation awareness
(SA) in supporting the ROC operator. The results emphasize the importance of automation transparency, reducing cognitive workload, and
systematically integrating human factors. Achieving fully remote operations requires both a well-designed HMI and a supporting infrastructure.
This paper consolidates years of work in identifying and addressing HMI design challenges, offering insights to support meaningful human
control and ensure safe transitions from onboard to remote operations.