June Technology Updates

It's been another hard month. Let's get right to it.

? COVID-19 & Transit

Coronavirus pandemic causes Via ride-share service to temporarily shut down in Chicago by Mary Wisniewski, Chicago Tribune

"Via, the smallest of the city’s three ride-share providers after Uber and Lyft, has temporarily suspended its Chicago operations due to the coronavirus pandemic."

Mobility Data Sharing Merges with COVID-19 Response by Greg Rodriguez and Annie YJ Chang, National League of Cities

TNCs/Ride Sourcing Companies

?Uber cuts 3,000 more employees amid month of shakeups by Cailin Crowe, Smart Cities Dive

?Lyft lays off 17 percent of its workforce and furloughs hundreds more by Andrew J. Hawkins, The Verge

?Uber to require drivers and riders to wear face masks, open windows for ventilation by Coral Murphy, USA Today

?Uber Hourly: New $50 ride option lets you make as many stops as you need within 60 minutes by Dalvin Brown, USA Today

Autonomous Vehicles

The State of the Self-Driving Car Race 2020, Bloomberg Hyperdrive

Baseball cards for the big players, with an analysis that includes the impacts of ? COVID-19

Poll: 3 in 4 Americans say AV tech 'not ready for primetime' by Chris Teale, Smart Cities Dive

Incredulity that points to AVs moving into freight and fleets well before they reach cars.

Watch Out For Those Looming AI Oligopolies, Including For Self-Driving Cars by Lance Eliot, Forbes

"There is a rising tide of concern that state-of-the-art AI is heading toward a type of oligopoly, meaning that the markets served by AI will be dominated by a small number of firms."

Trustonomy: building the acceptance of automated mobility by Stefano Bianchi, Intelligent Transport

Trustonomy: Your coined term of the day.

Experts dispel 5 common AV myths by Kristin Musulin, Smart Cities Dive

A good quick read for those who still think AVs are going to solve all our problems for us.

Vehicle Electrification

GM says it is 'almost there' on million-mile electric vehicle battery by Paul Lienert, Reuters

The race is on to get longer-lasting batteries on the streets. "Current electric vehicle batteries typically last 100,000 to 200,000 miles."

E-Fare

Uppsala’s mission to develop a ticketing system in-house for national interoperability by Jonathan Bernhardt

A regional transit provider in Sweden decides to develop its own e-fare system, "partly due to bad experiences with suppliers of ticketing solutions and partly due to a new national ticketing standard, BoB, which is owned by the public transport sector in Sweden."

Mobility as a Service and New Mobility

? Collaborative project studies place of micromobility in future transit systems by Sam Mehmet, Intelligent Transport

Two universities "are studying the potential for micromobility services, such as shared bikes and e-scooters, to fill the void in mobility presented by COVID-19."

?Bike-share and e-scooter companies, hit hard by the pandemic, may come back stronger by Luz Lazo, Washington Post

A key factor seems to be whether cities will actively support their survival.

?How the Novel Coronavirus Is Speeding the Scooter Apocalypse by Andrew J. Hawkins, The Verge

"The scooter sharing industry is getting killed by COVID-19, but something better may emerge"

The hot seat: 10 questions with Lime's chief policy officer by Kristin Musulin, Smart Cities Dive

On Uber's investment in Lime and transfer of its Jump e-bike sharing service to Lime.

Mobility Apps

LA Metro replaces agency-built app with Transit by Kristin Musulin, Smart Cities Dive

(That's the somewhat confusingly named Transit mobile device app.)

Find wheelchair accessible places with Google Maps Sasha Blair-Goldensohn, Google

Google Maps adds an "accessible places" feature to its popular mobile device app.