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"Mr. O'Connell is part of a growing contingent of urbanites who have made Ubering (it's as much a verb as "Googling") an indispensable part of their day and especially their night life. Untethered from their vehicles, Angelenos are suddenly free to drink, party and walk places. Even as their business models are evolving, these ride-sharing services, which include Lyft, Sidecar and others, have upended the social habits of the area, and rallied its residents to be more peripatetic. A night out in Los Angeles used to involve negotiating parking, beating traffic and picking a designated driver. Excursions from one end to the other - say, from the oceanfront city of Santa Monica to the trendy Silver Lake neighborhood on the eastern side - had to be planned and timed with military precision, lest they spiral into a three-hour commute. More often than not, they were simply avoided."

" Los Angeles could force Uber and Lyft to go electric. Mayor Eric Garcetti told the Financial Times that the city may force Uber and Lyft to use electric vehicles as a step toward reaching carbon neutrality by 2050. Read more on InsideClimate News Becom"

"It's not news that Metro is considering ending their practice of free parking at their train stations, but now we have intel on what exactly the new policy is going to look like. A Metro document, leaked on the Fans of Los Angeles Metro Rail Facebook page, showed that the agency will soon launch a pilot program that includes parking fees at nine stations-three of which will be on the new Expo Line extension to Santa Monica, which opens in May. From West L.A. to East L.A., anyone will be able to park in Metro's lots and garages, even if they're not hopping on the train. Of course, the non-train riders will pay more for the privilege. "

"piegelman had been studying the economics of riding Uber and Lyft versus a taxi or driving a personal vehicle when he decided to run the math for his own car. He made a spreadsheet outlining the cost of leasing his Volkswagen: $458 monthly for the lease itself, $158 for insurance, $70 for gas, and at least $72 for parking, for a total cost of about $758. Based on those calculations, he said he has saved more than $1,100 in the last three months, spending an average of $3.42 for each UberPool or Lyft Line ride to work in August. Ride-hail companies are betting that in the future - particularly after the introduction of self-driving cars - owning a car will become a thing of the past. LA, a city long known for car dependency, sprawl, and gridlock, has become a proving ground for this shift. More than a half-dozen Angelenos told BuzzFeed News they have ditched their cars recently and instead rely on Uber, Lyft, public transportation, bikes, and, for longer trips, ZipCar, Turo or similar services. And they're part of a growing movement that's slowly reshaping the Autopia that is LA."

"One big goal: to rid the city of traffic-related fatalities by 2025 with a strategic plan called Vision Zero. Safer crosswalks are a first step. "We have a couple of hundred people dying every year just trying to get around town. That's not an acceptable outcome of our transportation system. People will make mistakes, but the system should be designed to forgive those things so they're not fatal. That's a huge multijurisdictional lift that requires funding, but first it requires analysis and data. "

"A hundred years ago, if you were a pedestrian, crossing the street was simple: You walked across it. Today, if there's traffic in the area and you want to follow the law, you need to find a crosswalk. And if there's a traffic light, you need to wait for it to change to green. IN THE 1920S, AUTO GROUPS REDEFINED WHO OWNED THE CITY STREET Fail to do so, and you're committing a crime: jaywalking. In some cities - Los Angeles, for instance - police ticket tens of thousands of pedestrians annually for jaywalking, with fines of up to $250. To most people, this seems part of the basic nature of roads. But it's actually the result of an aggressive, forgotten 1920s campaign led by auto groups and manufacturers that redefined who owned the city streets. "In the early days of the automobile, it was drivers' job to avoid you, not your job to avoid them," says Peter Norton, a historian at the University of Virginia and author of Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City. "But under the new model, streets became a place for cars - and as a pedestrian, it's your fault if you get hit.""

"L'entrepreneur Elon Musk, déjà patron de Tesla Motors et de l'entreprise privée d'exploration spatiale SpaceX, a dévoilé lundi un nouveau mode de transport. Hyperloop n'est encore un concept, mais s'il devait voir le jour, Los Angeles et San Francisco ne serait plus séparés que par un voyage de 35 minutes.   "Hyperloop consiste en un tube à basse pression avec des capsules, transportées à faible et grande vitesses sur la longueur du tube", explique le document de 57 pages destiné à présenter le projet d'un nouveau mode de transport. Le principe s'inspire de celui des capsules qui permettent de transporter, notamment dans les supermarchés, des sommes d'argent vers le coffre au moyen de capsules pressurisées envoyées dans des tuyaux. "Les capsules sont posées sur coussins d'air pressurisés", précise le fascicule.  Des passagers prennent place dans la capsule, elle-même introduite dans le tube.  Elon Musk n'en est pas à son premier essai dans le domaine de l'innovation. Il dirige l'entreprise Tesla Motors qui commercialise une voiture électrique révolutionnaire et qui a développé SpaceX, une société d'exploration spatiale."

"Only this time his offer was different: "Why don't you just UberX it?" A half hour later I'd registered an Uber account, requested an UberX ride, scored a $20 credit which covered the $13 trip, had an interesting conversation with the driver, and met my friend 5 miles away in Silver Lake. The same journey by bus would have taken over an hour, required a transfer, and involved two miles of walking. For this specific trip, the transit option was woefully inadequate, and without UberX I would have foregone the trip. Did travel in Los Angeles - nay, in any American city - just get ridiculously easy? Over the course of three days, UberX enabled me to conquer L.A. on my own terms without reverting to a childlike dependency on someone with a license. UberX isn't free; it's still more expensive than transit. But it's a lifeline in a city that offers few reliable alternatives to car ownership. And if history is any guide, I think it's here to stay."

"So there you have it… for the average American who drives 13,476 miles per year, owning a motor vehicle will cost them $12,744 per year to maintain, and the cost of taking UberX everywhere will cost them $18,115 per year. However, Americans who drive less than 9,481 miles in a year should seriously consider ditching their car, because UberX will be cheaper. Whether it's UberX, UberPool, Lyft, LyftLine or Sidecar, the factors that will determine whether these services are actually cheaper really come down to how many miles you drive in a year. If your metrics differ substantially from mine, I encourage you to enter your own variables into the model and come up with your own conclusions."

"Pasadena, Long Beach, Culver City, Koreatown, Hollywood, Santa Monica, Azusa. These are all the L.A. neighborhoods and satellite cities that are part of the Metro rail system, or will be by the summer; eventually even Century City and Beverly Hills will join that list. One area without plans for their own subway or light rail is West Hollywood-a city that desperately wants it. WeHo officials are now actively lobbying for rail transit, forming a coalition called West Hollywood Advocates for Metro Rail (WHAM) that are hoping to convince the folks at Metro HQ in DTLA that they need to get serious about a WeHo line. Specifically, WHAM is calling for a northern extension of the under-construction Crenshaw Line, which will connect the South Bay and the LAX area with the Crenshaw District in 2019 or 2020. The line would likely be completely underground and would terminate at the Hollywood and Highland Red Line station."

"He plans, he says, to construct networks of tunnels throughout cities with faster, more efficient boring technology. The tunnels could carry individual cars or eight- to sixteen-passenger "pods" on electric skates, traveling up to 150 mph. (Longer tunnels, between cities, would be perfect for hyperloop, another interest.) Less than a year after its founding, the Boring Company is already talking about taking its mass transit solution to real, live cities. In July, Musk announced that he had "verbal government approval" to build a hyperloop between Washington, DC and New York City, which could carry commuters between the two in less than 30 minutes. (A White House official later suggested that he had, perhaps, given Musk the wrong idea, and that the project had not been approved, verbally or otherwise.) In November, Musk said the company would bid on a project to build a new, faster rail link between downtown Chicago and O'Hare Airport. And in early December, the Boring Company released a map showing a proposed tunnel network in Los Angeles, which could transport both private cars and shared pods between Long Beach Airport in the south, Santa Monica in the west, Dodger Stadium in the east, and Sherman Oaks in the north."

"For those who are either unwilling or unable to own a home, self-driving van houses could become a convenient and affordable solution.  Soon, our mobile driverless vehicles may allow us to work from our cars and have our laundry and a hot meal delivered at the same time. In Los Angeles alone, it is estimated that 15,000 people are already living in their cars and in most countries it is perfectly legal to live in your vehicle. The consequences of autonomous home living are far-reaching. It could radically reduce carbon footprints and living expenses by combining all transportation and housing needs in one space.  The new need for overnight parking creates new economic and social opportunities. New types of pop-up communities will emerge with charging stations, retail stores, laundry facilities, restaurants, and social spaces. The freedom of a van-home lifestyle suggests new modes of living which include more leisure time and less time tethered to a job. The impact on cities, economies, infrastructures, inter-city travel, and the way we live and organize ourselves are immeasurable and scarcely completely imagined. As Volvo says "Why fly when you can be driven?" Soon you may be able to avoid airport lines and delays. You will be able to arrive at your destination rested and refreshed after being driven overnight in your personal portable bedroom."

"Avant de reconstruire l'espace public et ses règles explicites d'usage il fallait donc bâtir de toute pièce une nouvelle culture pour aligner les pratiques sur les besoins de la révolution technologique automobile. Une culture qui pose comme un état de fait légitime la prise de pouvoir de la voiture sur la rue, le piéton étant prié de ne pas la déranger. Depuis, la ville a été construite sur cette domination, et un compte à rebours indique encore aux rares piétons qui tentent de traverser les rues de Los-Angeles les quelques secondes qu'il leur reste pour traverser, histoire qu'ils pressent le pas."

"Maven, the car-sharing company spun-off from General Motors last year, is launching a new monthly service for its users in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Previously, Maven only offered hourly or daily pricing options for its car-sharing fleet. This new service, called Maven Reserve, is geared toward users who want the feel of car ownership, but only in month-sized chunks. Customers who reserve a GM vehicle through the new monthly service will also receive a dedicated parking space for the duration of the reservation and a personalized walk-through of the vehicle. Insurance and $100 worth of gas are also included, and there are no membership or application fees."

"The best trip to your destination using any mode of transport"

"Uber veut devenir le "one-stop shop" du transport. De tous les transports. L'application proposera désormais des informations sur les transports publics disponibles à proximité. Lancée à Denver cette semaine, la solution fournira des itinéraires porte à porte et des informations en temps réel. Uber Transit. Pour créer cette fonctionnalité, Uber n'a pas négocié avec chaque autorité de transport l'accès à leurs données. Un partenariat avec l'appli Moovit lui permettra potentiellement d'accéder aux données de 2 700 réseaux de transport dans 88 pays. Smart. Uber Taps Moovit For Its Transit Data"

"But that doesn't mean San Franciscans can rent Scoot rides in all parts of San Francisco. The company has drawn a red line around the centrally located but poverty-ravished Tenderloin and in parts of nearby Chinatown, preventing customers from dropping off scooters there. The start-up, acquired in June by Santa Monica-based Bird, says its no-parking zones are "in compliance with the kick scooter pilot program" overseen by SFMTA. But the Tenderloin, which is home to a large homeless population, and Chinatown are two of the seven "communities of concern" that Scoot pledged to prioritize serving as a condition of joining the pilot program."