What makes a downtown work?
Save the Date
Join us for CoMotion LA ‘26 this November 18-19 for our 10th edition: Cities on the Move: Mega-events, AI & Shaping What’s Next — featuring the OMF Summit Track.
The enduring post-pandemic shift to remote work has presented a serious challenge to downtowns but it also presents an opportunity for local governments to think critically about how to nurture a thriving city center. In many cases, the answer is simple: let more people live there! Those are among the many recommendations in the new State of Downtown Index by Downtown Vital Signs, a data analytics platform that assesses the health and vitality of U.S. downtowns. Check out how your city ranks.
Also: eVTOL startups are increasingly looking to military work to keep the lights on during the long journey towards the air taxis, Uber breaks up with another AV partner, and more money flows into India’s electric two-wheeler revolution.
What you need to know
The traits of thriving downtowns: If you’re interested in exploring the keys to a vibrant downtown, check out the State of Downtown Index by Downtown Vital Signs, an analytics platform that incorporates over 250 data points to assess the health and vitality of U.S. city centers. It’s unsurprising to see the top of this year’s list dominated by old pre-automobile cities like New York, San Francisco, Boston and Chicago, but there are many examples of newer, auto-oriented cities that shine in certain categories. Fort Worth is lauded for creating an attractive retail district but suffers from the near total absence of housing nearby. Downtown San Francisco, meanwhile, is a “#1 downtown” by just about every urbanism metric but that has largely been abandoned by the city’s many wealthy residents.
In a separate article, Patrick Kennedy, a partner at DVS, identifies five common characteristics of downtowns that score higher than expected based on their size. Some of the standouts include Albany, N.Y., Eugene, Ore., Lancaster, Pa., and Boise, Idaho and Portland, Maine. One common feature: they largely kept highways out of downtown.
Joby plays Defense: Joby Aviation acquires defense tech company Resonant Sciences for $500 million, the latest effort by the Santa Cruz-based startup to branch out into ventures that can generate revenue while it works on its long-term plan to build an air taxi business. Last year Joby acquired Blade Mobility, an existing luxury helicopter service. Joby rival Archer Aviation similarly recently acquired a Boeing subsidiary that specializes in military drones. It may take a while for air taxis to become a thing, but in the meantime the Pentagon is always big business.
The Future of Batteries is Shared with David Hammer
Battery fires are a nagging (and growing) problem in New York City: while they've fueled the e-mobility-enabled rise of delivery apps like Doordash, they often exist in black market, underregulated spaces, where fires are common. But what if you disintermediated the system, by offering shared batteries swappable at a moment's notice? That's the model of PopWheels. Fast Forward host Nick Perloff-Giles sat down with co-founder David Hammer to discuss the company's success in moving towards a shared, safer battery future.
India can’t get enough electric mopeds: Yulu, a Bengaluru-based startup that rents electric mopeds to delivery workers, raises $93 million to expand its fleet from 50,000 to 200,000 over the next two years. It’s the latest sign of the incredible growth potential for e-mobility in India, where two-wheeled vehicles are by far the most common form of individual motorized transport.
Another Uber breakup: The ride-hail giant discloses that it has sold off its stake in Serve Robotics, the startup whose food delivery robots have become familiar sights on sidewalks in Chicago, Los Angeles and Miami. Serve CEO Ali Kashani similarly says the company does not plan to renew its formal partnership with Uber next year. The two companies reportedly did not see eye-to-eye on strategy, although details remain murky. This follows a falling out with Waymo, which operates on the Uber platform in certain cities.
Nigeria’s EV ambitions collide with the electric grid: Africa’s largest country has implemented tax incentives to encourage EV adoption, but in a country with one of the lowest per-capita levels of power availability, hardly anyone is making the switch. What’s interesting is Nigeria’s stated EV plan calls for 60% adoption by 2050, a sharp contrast with plans in western countries (with the notable exception of the U.S.) that barely contemplate the existence of combustion vehicles 25 years from now.
Less than 100 days to go!
This November 18-19, we celebrate the special 10th edition of CoMotion LA, bringing together the leaders, innovators and decision-makers reshaping how cities move, connect and grow. See the latest confirmed Speakers here.
Join the movement in November to hear how:
- Autonomy is optimizing traffic flow and solving last-mile connectivity.
- LA is preparing for one of the world’s largest sporting events, and how mobility lessons from the World Cup can create a lasting urban legacy.
- Public and private sector collaboration is central to unlocking the capital needed for sustainable, large-scale infrastructure projects - and what’s changing.
- Payment systems can seamlessly connect transit, parking, and multimodal travel.
- Real-time data can transform contested curb space into a dynamic, efficiently managed asset for parking, delivery, and micromobility.
We’re giving away 2 FREE Premium Passes for CoMotion LA!
Here’s what you have to do to enter:
- Subscribe to our Substack and mailing list.
- Follow us over on LinkedIn.
- Fill out the survey below and tell us what you would like to see in our newsletter.
The winner will be selected at random by August 31st. If you are drawn we will contact you via the email address provided upon entry.
What we’re reading
Waymo keeps finding new edge cases: The New York Times looks at the increasing number of “edge cases” Waymo is encountering as it expands its robotaxi operations. Although the evidence suggests that Waymo’s autonomous vehicles are involved in far fewer serious crashes than human-driven cars, its struggles with certain situations (emergency vehicles, construction zones) threaten to undermine public confidence and political support for autonomous driving.
