LA establishes transportation tech zone

Pilots will focus on last-mile deliveries and mini-mobility hubs
By Ben Spencer December 1, 2020 Read time: 2 mins
Zone is expected to help lay blueprint for the city’s green transit plans (© trekandshoot | Dreamstime.com)

Mayor of Los Angeles Eric Garcetti has announced the creation of a Transportation Technology Innovation Zone, an area where companies can test their technology solutions.

The zone is located in West San Fernando Valley and is expected to convert the Warner Center into a mobility hub.

The Warner Center is a neighbourhood and business district development located in the Canoga Park and Woodland Hills neighbourhoods.

Garcetti says: “The first-ever Transportation Technology Innovation Zone will unite local businesses, workers, and inventors around how to revolutionise mobility in the West Valley, and it will serve as a model for what’s possible as more zones come online in areas across Los Angeles.”

The zone stems from a partnership between Garcetti and LA city council member Bob Blumenfield.

Blumenfield represents the 3rd Council District, which covers the northwest portion of LA in the San Fernando Valley. 

Blumenfield says: "Since we rolled out the Warner Center 2035 Specific Plan, the City's boldest and greenest specific plan, the Warner Center has become the focus of intense residential and commercial development.”
 
Blumenfield hopes the transportation pilot programmes will “help lay the blueprints for this city's green, transit friendly future”.

The zone is one of the programmes carried out by Urban Movement Labs (UML), a transportation accelerator launched by Garcetti in November 2019.

UML met with community members and businesses at the Warner Center last winter to choose a pilot at the zone focused on a zero-emissions, last-mile delivery service that connects individuals homebound by the pandemic to food from local businesses.
 
A second pilot project featuring mini-mobility hubs throughout the Warmer Center Campus is expected to launch in Spring 2021.
 
The UML has become a standalone not for profit organisation on its one year anniversary. The Mayor’s Office, Los Angeles Department of Transportation, Port of LA and Los Angeles World Airports will continue to serve as its strategic advisors.
 
Private sector partners include MoceanLab, Tortoise, Automotus, Lyft and Waymo.


 

Mass Transit & MaaS

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Lyft, Uber have mixed impact on San Fran mobility
    May 14, 2018
    The extent to which ride-hailing has become a real force in the mobility landscape of San Francisco is great for consumers – but there are downsides, a report finds. Andrew Stone takes a look. Uber and Lyft, the two major ride-hailing platforms in San Francisco, are out-competing local cab firms in many ways - and are firmly established as a significant part of the daily mobility mix there, a recent study reveals. Researchers mined publicly-available data derived from the application programming interface
    Read More
  • Russia invests in ITS technology
    May 11, 2012
    Russia’s transport systems are developing on a grand scale with ITS central to the plans, thanks in no small part to a recently relaunched ITS Russia. Jon Masters interviews the organisation’s chief executive officer Vladimir Kryuchkov Over coming years many of the biggest deployments of new technology for transport are likely to be seen in Russia. For a political and economic superpower, the world’s biggest country has only recently started to harness ITS for the good of its transport networks. But the sca
    Read More
  • Saving the world, one parking space at a time
    December 7, 2020
    Donald Shoup, professor of urban planning at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), tells Adam Hill about why parking is too cheap – and how Monopoly could seriously raise its game
    Read More
  • Ford AVs on streets of Washington, DC
    October 24, 2018
    Ford is to be the first company to test autonomous vehicles (AVs) in Washington, DC – with a view to starting a commercial service there in 2021. The car company – which already has AV trials in Detroit, Pittsburgh and Miami - will begin testing in the US capital early next year. An operations centre will be set up in the city and Sherif Marakby, CEO of Ford Autonomous Vehicles, says fleet deployment will be done in a way that aids job creation. The company plans to work with local officials to tes
    Read More

Highlighted Content