Tesla's Enhanced Summon feature is now available in Canada

Art Lightstone
Art is the Editor in Chief
and main writer
​at Green Neighbour.

On the morning of October 17th, I noticed that Tesla’s Enhanced Summon feature was active on my Tesla app. I gave it a try later that same day, and it worked! I tested it two more times that day, and it worked each time. (Although it did disconnect from my phone on one occasion, in which case the car stopped in its tracks until I re-established the connection, and that only took a few seconds.)

I live in Ontario, Canada, so this must mean that Transport Canada has approved Tesla's Enhanced Summon feature for the entire country. They didn't do this right away. When the highly-anticipated Version 10 update started to roll out in Canada at the end of September, the Enhanced Summon feature was conspicuously absent.

Enhanced Summon now being available in Ontario does not necessarily mean that it’s available in every province, as provincial Ministries of Transportation would also have to approve this feature for use in each respective province.

Ontario was in fact the first jurisdiction in Canada to allow on-road testing of automated vehicles. This originally occurred back in 2016, when a 10-year pilot project launched. Initially, this program was restricted to specified corporate and institutional participants who wished to test their automated vehicles in Ontario. These participants included the likes of BlackBerry's QNX, Magna, Uber, and the University of Waterloo.

​However, Ontario’s automated vehicle pilot program was expanded in January of 2019 to allow members of the public who own cars capable of self-driving to use those cars on Ontario roadways, but only under strict conditions. Those conditions include having either a passenger in the vehicle or a remote operator monitoring the vehicle. Members of the public will be able to drive “Level 3” conditionally automated vehicles, but the driver must be ready to take control of the vehicle at all times. (Learn more about Ontario's Automated Vehicle Program from the Ministry of Transportation.)

We do indeed live in exciting times. Not only because of the improvements to safety, efficiency, and productivity that advances in technology portend, but because the world is clearly waking up to the need to leverage technology, ingenuity, and creativity to address the biggest crisis the world has ever known: climate change.

Let's not forget, Tesla's mission is to "to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport by bringing compelling mass market electric cars to market as soon as possible." I would say they do this in spades. In fact, I would go further to say that the world has rarely been witness to a company that so determinedly pursues and achieves its mission on a daily basis.

What else can I say? Thank you, Tesla.