
Move: The innovations reshaping how we get around
Optimizing Travel in the Cloud
As the population swells in urban centers, cities across the globe are looking for innovative solutions to outpace the need for mass transit.
We’re a species that’s drawn to urban living. Fifty-six percent of the world’s population lives in cities, and by 2050, that number is expected to jump to 66 percent.
As urban populations continue to boom, public transit systems in some places are lagging behind—many of them were built in an era where technology was rudimentary and expectations were lower. Since growth in these areas isn’t projected to slow any time soon, and we live in an era where speed and productivity reign supreme, mass transit has to find a way to catch up.
The good news: There is an abundance of technological advance currently happening in the world of transportation. Most of this advance has been focused on the private sector, such as driverless cars and the hyperloop, but could also be applied to public transportation such as roads, highways, subway systems, trolleys, and bus lines.
Three cities in particular have made changes to help fix what their citizens deal with right now. These changes are esoteric in their immediate effect—a good subway in London pretty much only benefits people who live in London—but their implications are broad.
What can we learn from the way these cities are using technology to improve their public services? And what else can we expect from them in the future?