From Parking Gluts to Charging Shortages, AVs' Second Order Effects Loom
Urban Autonomy Summit - recordings and top takeaways
Last week the mobility world came together for our invite-only Urban Autonomy Summit and the results were electrifying. It’s rare to gather so many top tech companies, regulators like the CPUC and SFMTA, media, investors and more in one spot — I’m just sorry we didn’t reserve a larger venue! We’ve released the recordings from the three panel conversations — although we must apologize for our vendor’s tech issue that truncated some of the footage — find those below, alongside some of the top takeaways.
Responsibly Scaling AVs in America’s Mega-Cities
It’s always fun to see some sparks fly between speakers, and Jeffrey Tumlin, former Director of Transportation for the SFMTA pulled no punches about what he sees as the downsides to robotaxis, having been on-hand to deal with the Cruise fallout. There’s still a lot of work to be done when it comes to standardizing how AVs respond to emergencies and first responders, although recent work coming out of the OMF and Seattle are pushing the industry towards a standardized direction.
Jeff does see AVs as a great opportunity to fix America’s long-standing parking issues, as they might both decrease demand for popular spots (the car can drive itself away) while giving cities a reason to finally rationally price their curb spaces. He noted (and we’re swooning):
One of the reasons why I love the Curbivore team is they point out a current regulatory failure, which is our inability to manage the curb for the highest public good, and to get autonomous vehicle companies to be able to partner with cities, in order to direct them to the most efficient places to do pickup and drop off as well as the most efficient or least impactful place to store the vehicle while it’s waiting for its next trip.
Jeremy Bird from Lyft highlighted all the ways AVs can be great partners to cities, while working in tandem with gig workers as well — robotaxis can supply the fixed base while humans cover the peaks — and Andrew Chapin from Nuro made the point that even if AVs increase congestion a bit, that still means more people are getting taken where they need to be, while doing so safely and economically. Rounding things out, the CEOs of Obi and Terawatt reminded us that we’re already seeing some real market impacts from AVs, in terms of changes to average ridehail prices and demand for charger-friendly urban real estate.
Charged Up Cities: Operating Affordable & Sustainable Urban Fleets
Speaking of charging… our second panel went deep into what it’ll take to retrofit big cities’ infrastructure for scaled up AV fleets. Building these charging depots can take years, and operators are already finding that by the time they open, their power needs have outstripped their earlier projections.
Fleet operators, including Vay (which currently does tele-operated driving) are already finding it difficult to fully staff their charging depots, which is why we’re seeing companies like Voltera and Rocsys collaborate on hands-free charging solutions.
Inside AVs: Safety, System Design, Data, and Training
I thought our final panel of the day was particularly fascinating, because we put the full spectrum of AV applications on one stage. From small to large: DoorDash’s Ashu Rege shared the company’s fully integrated approach to delivery bots, Nexar works with both OEMs and robotaxi services, May Mobility’s taken a differentiated approach whereby it partners with public transit providers, and Bot Auto is building autonomy for heavy-duty trucks. All the while, Gridwise’s Ryan Green kept everyone on their toes, making sure that even in the most tech-forward outcome, someone still needs to be thinking about the humble gig worker.
Each of those require different operating rules, different tech stacks, different levels of redundancy, and different business models. With their strong tech and safety backgrounds, it was refreshing to hear Matt Wood and Luc Vincent really get into the nitty-gritty of what it takes to build these systems.
I’m already looking forward to building off these conversations, and getting into the nuances of what the coming wave of autonomy means for all other mobility, delivery and urban systems, at our Curbivore 2026 gathering in April.
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HOT INDUSTRY NEWS & GOSSIP
Free as in beer, or free as in speech? Now that he’s sworn in, NYC Mayor Mamdani’s campaign slogans have to meet the harsh reality of municipal politics. One of his big talking points was that the MTA’s buses should be free, which would mean convincing the state to forego over $1 billion in annual ticket revenue. Now NYU’s Marron Institute of Urban Management is pushing back with a new report, finding that riders would be far better served if that money went towards system expansion: paired with some cost reforms and matching funds, that same subsidy could add up to 41 miles of new subway over a four-decade period. Add in some new housing and that could truly transform NYC. Of course this conversation could all be moot if the USDOT goes through with a new plan to prohibit free buses (so much for local control!)
Not so rad… Rad Power bikes just sold out of bankruptcy for a measly $13.2 million, less than one percent of its peak valuation of $1.65B. If you look at its list of top creditors you see a lot of very normal sounding names (Bruce Rebold, D. Barber, etc.) — no these aren’t family offices you’ve never heard of, they’re sadly the names of people injured by Rad’s bikes (or in even sadder cases: relatives of the deceased.)
As above, so below: Elon Musk’s Boring Co has reached an agreement with Tennessee to bore below Nashville, connecting the airport with the downtown convention center zone. Skeptics point out that the company’s aggressive timeline sounds unrealistic for Music City’s ground conditions, and the supposed throughput would require wild vehicle operating speeds for a course that has a big 90 degree turn in its middle. Up in the sky, Musk’s ambitions are far more modest: he merely wants to put launch thousands of orbital data centers. Oh and at ground level his company town in Texas is getting its own police department; nothing to worry about!
Uber’s global AVs: Uber’s stock fell lightly, as the company’s profit for the year came in below expectation, despite an 18% rise in MAUs, due to to increased equity investments. Most of those investments are of course into AVs, which are of course only likely to continue under the guidance of the company’s new robotaxi enthusiast CFO. In fact, the company’s getting ready to launch AVs into Hong Kong, Madrid, Houston and Zurich.
Waymo’s autonomous cash machine: Elsewhere on the AV front, Waymo just raised a whopping $16 billion, with the likes of Dragoneer Investment Group, DST Global, and Sequoia Capital joining Alphabet in valuing the robotaxier at $126B. While the co. has now driven 127 million miles autonomously, it’s in a bit of hot water over one particular ride: a Waymo hit a child by a school in Santa Monica. While the kid is okay, and Waymo makes the case that a human would have responded slower, there are questions about if a human driver would have behaved differently knowing they were by a school during drop off hours, and also why the vehicle was going 17 MPH when the speed limit was 15. I got to discuss the nuances of the story with Fox 11, but they sadly trimmed out most of the interesting stuff…
One man’s congestion is another man’s economic activity: Tom Tom released its newest Traffic Index, showing that the world’s most congested countries are Colombia, Malta and the Philippines. Stateside, the most congested cities are LA and Honolulu, but the actual slowest travel speeds belong to NYC and SF.
Plugged up! Good news for anyone with an EV, as America’s fast charging network continues to grow. The U.S. now has just over 70,000 public fast-chargers, with 18,000 new ones coming online last year. Tesla Superchargers represent 52% of the market, but the competition is quickly catching up.
Curb mismanagement? Cities continue to struggle with humble ol’ parking, with 27% of cities still managing their programs’ success off of “compliance,” as opposed to maximizing revenue (and thus turnover.) Excuses for not modernizing systems include limited enforcement resources and public resistance or perception.
A few good links: Our fund, MobilityVC, announced a new investment — Leasy — a car subscription platform for gig workers in LatAm. Mercedes and Nvidia team up on AVs. New congestion pricing data shows its improving drive times in the ‘burbs too, not just the commercial core. NY, NJ sue Trump Admin over Hudson River tunnel funding freeze. For my fellow dorks: LA Metro shares progress on expanding Transit Signal Priority and shifting to a cloud-based system. Colorado Springs releases parking and curb management plan. LACI BATWorks to host “Towards Emissions-Free Microfreight” workshop on 2/19. Bedrock Robotics raises $270M for AV excavators. Machina Labs raises $124M for software-defined mobility + aerospace manufacturing. U.S. federal gov’t to build $11.7B stockpile of critical minerals. SNAK Venture Partners raises $50M fund for marketplace startups. Why LA stopped repaving its streets (although it neglects to mention Measure HLA.)
Don’t forget to score your Curbivore tickets!
- Jonah Bliss & The Curbivore Crew