One of the value propositions that i see for automation in the long term is on rout charging a. It's still immature technology, its commercial technology, yet we've got its employed. Both conductive with these big overhang pan graph chargers and its a 450 or 350 o, 450 kilowat charge,. Really super fast charge. Yet light rail jist, politically, has immediate challenges. M and in it, they are tend to be a longer term projects. So if you can achieve the same efficiency without tearing up a road and adding, you know, the inv structure piece to it, it really starts to look very compelling.
Transit advocates have made autonomous vehicles something of a boogeyman lately, framing the emerging technology as a way to perpetuate the car's mobility monopoly and starve public transit of funding. In reality, transit is one of the most compelling applications and automation is a huge opportunity to dramatically improve public transit. To help explain this opportunity, Nathaniel Horadam of the Center for Transportation and the Environment joins the show to discuss a light-rail style automated bus rapid transit project he's been working on, and the automated transit opportunity more broadly.