A transport revolution is happening

Thought provoking ideas around transportation and city living were presented by keynote speaker Greg Lindsay to about 150 delegates at the T-Tech Conference in Auckland.

It’s the first day of the March 19 and 20 event.

The New Cities Foundation senior fellow outlined a possible future where city residents could use a variety of transport from ride-share and autonomous shuttles to cycling or other alternatives.

He says cities will change as a result.

Dwellings are already being built with no car parks, such as Auckland’s “Daisy” apartment block, and businesses are developing mobile services to bring their products to people’s doors.

Lindsay suggests forming steering committees to ensure people get the transport they want rather than waiting for companies like Uber to just provide them.

He also urges people to know what data is needed and what can be done with it, to cross-train staff and build opportunities, to rethink community benefits and strategies, to explore demand and reshape people’s approach to transport, to create a mobility as a service roadmap, launch a microtransit pilot, transition from transport operators to mobility managers and to embrace connected mobility.

He broadly labelled transport as taxis, ushers, conveyors, buses, rovers and shuttles.

Lindsay says AVs can drop people off and park themselves, but operators needed to work together to ensure “no zombie AVs” where empty shuttles take up street space.

He painted a picture of many possibilities, and says it’s up to us to decide.

Lindsay says more about mobility will feature at the Global Laboratory for Future Mobilty Conference in Los Angeles on November 15-18.