Amy Korte
Over the past few years there has been a shift in how people move around in cities. Driven by the popularity of ride-sharing services such as UberPool and Bridj, and now the technological development of driverless cars, these changes are beginning to impact almost every aspect of our built environment.
Throughout the development community, people are examining how changes in mobility will impact Boston. Below are some takeaways we have identified for how driverless cars are impacting development in Boston and beyond.
Changing Metrics
Cities and companies are rolling out pilot projects to test various technologies and analyze how societal behaviors change with vehicle fleets and driverless cars. For example, in Somerville, Audi’s Urban Future Initiative partnership with Assembly Row in Somerville is testing to learn how people’s behavior would be impacted if they had access to a fleet of vehicles. What would it mean for the urban environment or nearby parking requirements? What does the business model look like?
A U.S. Department of Transportation pilot with New York City is installing Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) technology in 10,000 city vehicles to gather data that can guide smart infrastructure, and eventually smarter cities. In 2017, the world’s first large scale autonomous vehicle pilot project is expected to hit the road in Sweden, with 100 customers using self-driving Volvos on public roads as part of Volvo’s Drive Me research program.
Build Differently Now?
Developers can’t easily adapt the parking structures in the pipeline today for anticipated changes later without metrics from these pilot projects. Those that have taken a decade or more to permit, and were designed prior to the recent shifts in mobility, however, are being reevaluated. As part of an Urban Land Institute Boston/New England panel discussion in June, Wes Guckert, chief of the Traffic Group, a national consulting firm, reported that Westfield is looking at increasing the height of the first few levels of their garages to 17 or 18 feet so they can easily be converted to commercial space in the future.
There is general consensus that valet or drop-off zones will need to quadruple in length to accommodate a greater increase in ride-sharing and the eventual adoption of self-driving cars. Kris Carter, co-chair of the Mayor’s Office for New Urban Mechanics, said Boston is looking at the real estate that two, 7-foot parking lanes take up on most of city streets and evaluating whether the space could be used for wider sidewalks, bike lanes or flexible streets that can support different activities at different times of the day.
In The Future
We expect to see an increase in strategic partnerships between ride-sharing companies and real estate projects, as developers look for creative ways to minimize and even eliminate the need for parking within projects. In May, Uber announced a partnership with Parkmerced in San Francisco, one of the largest multifamily developments in the city. Located miles from downtown, the development boasts “car-free living,” providing monthly stipends for residents to use Uber to reach nearby public transit stations. Uber and Parkmerced Labs will analyze the results to determine how residents could be encouraged to live at the complex without cars and use this data to inform future phases of the development.
We are also likely to see City Autonomous Zones in the future. These are downtown urban districts, or other densely populated sections, which only allow access to driverless vehicles. Cities like Milan, Madrid, Copenhagen and Helsinki have already adopted car-free zones in urban areas. Some believe we will see them locally within five years.
Amy Korte is principal at Arrowstreet and co-chair of ULI’s Urban Development Council.
