transportation

Here’s Our Closest Look at Alphabet’s Plans for the City of the Future

The smart city is on the horizon, and if Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs has anything to do with it, it’ll have subsidized ride-sharing, “Airbnb for cars,” and AI that helps parking cops fine the most people. We’ve long known that Sidewalk, owned by Google parent company Alphabet, is working on the “city of the future.” It…

Tech News Angela Chen Jun 27

This 1938 Magazine Cover Showed Britain a Shinier, Happier Future

The late 1930s were dark times for Britain. War was on the horizon, and things were about to get very, very tough. But some periodicals tried keeping things light with utopian visions of tomorrow. Like this March 5, 1938 cover of Modern Wonder which featured the streamlined transportation of the future. The magazine reads: Our…

Tech News Matt Novak Jun 24

Your Self-Driving Car Will Be Programmed to Kill You—Deal With It

A recent survey shows that people want self-driving cars to be programmed to minimize casualties during a crash, even if it causes the death of the rider. Trouble is, the same survey shows that people don’t actually want to ride in cars that are programmed this way. That’s obviously a problem—and we’re going to have…

Tech News George Dvorsky Jun 23

Why Columbus Just Won $140 Million to Become the Transportation City of the Future

Of the seven cities chosen as finalists for the US Department of Transportation’s Smart City Challenge, Columbus, Ohio may have seemed like the underdog. (It was the only finalist that has no rail system whatsoever.) But today, USDOT announced Columbus as the winner of over $50 million in cash that will transform its transportation system…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 23

Penn Station Would Be So Much More Fun As a Roller Coaster

Many New Yorkers have schlepped to Penn Station to take a train out. We’ve sat in the waiting room, bored, and said to ourselves, I know what would improve my experience. If only I could go on a 1,200 foot amusement-park ride before my train arrived. One group—Brooklyn-based design studio AE Superlab—had the bravery to…

Tech News Angela Chen Jun 23

Watch This Apocalyptic Timelapse of the DC Metro Flood

Last night, a DC subway station turned into a surprise water park ride. It wasn’t a huge deal—the station was closed for a few hours, the water drained, and service went back to normal—but it certainly looked like it. Seeing a timelapse of the whole thing from the station’s entrance shows how this happened. The…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 22

DC’s Metro Should Probably Just Take the Whole Summer Off

Washington DC’s subway is scheduled to be shut down for an extended period of time to deal with a slew of deferred maintenance. But after today’s service problem—literal waterfalls in one station—maybe DC’s Metro needs a vacation sooner than that. https://gizmodo.com/watch-this-apocalyptic-timelapse-of-the-dc-metro-flood-1782453501 Due to very heavy rain, commuters at the Cleveland Park station were greeted with…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 21

The New NASA X-Plane Will Be Fully Electric

Last year, NASA casually announced its intention to disrupt the aviation industry by sticking fully electric commercial passenger planes in the sky in 20 years. In a small step toward that goal, space agency director Charles Bolden has just announced plans for the X-57, the first all-electric addition to the famous X-plane series. The single-seater…

Tech News Maddie Stone Jun 17

One of These US Cities Will Get $40 Million to Make Commutes Suck Less

Earlier this year, seven cities were named as finalists for the Smart City Challenge, a chance to win $40 million from the US Department of Transportation to become a connected, automated city of the future. Today, the mayors of Austin, Columbus, Denver, Kansas City, Pittsburgh, Portland, and San Francisco made their final arguments for why…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 9

Larry Page Has Been Secretly Investing in Flying-Car Start-Ups

Forget self-driving cars. For years now Google co-founder Larry Page been thinking ahead by personally—and secretly—investing in two start-ups that promise something much more exciting: flying cars. One of the startups, called Zee.Aero, launched in 2010 with a plan to make, as Bloomberg describes it, “a small, all-electric plane that could take off and land…

Tech News Angela Chen Jun 9

Los Angeles Is Hiring a Sound Artist to Help Make its Streets Safer

After years of decline, the number of deaths on American streets are starting to rise again, a troubling statistic for many cities that are working hard to get more people walking and biking. Now Los Angeles’s Department of Transportation (LADOT) is trying something new: Enlisting a sound artist to bring attention to the city’s traffic…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 6

You Might Not Able to Buy a Gas-Powered Car in Norway After 2025

The oil-rich nation of Norway could be the first country to ban gas-powered cars for good. According to CNBC, that’s basically the headline on today’s Dagens Næringsliv, a Norwegian business publication. “Stop sales of diesel and gasoline vehicles in 2025” it says, noting that the four political parties have come to an agreement about making…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 3

Evidence That Elon Musk Is an Alien

Last night, Elon Musk suggested that Earth is simply a simulation from an alien race’s video game. Why would Musk say this? Because he is one of those aliens. It’s easy to get a kick out of Musk’s quirky quotables. But the closer you look at his words and actions, the more you’ll start to…

Space & Spaceflight Alissa Walker Jun 2

Elon Musk Called Apple’s Car a ‘Missed Opportunity’

At the Code conference this evening, Elon Musk joined Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher onstage to talk about his varied and eclectic pursuits. And when the talk turned to autonomous vehicles, Musk was sure to share his opinions on what he perceives to be Tesla’s biggest competition. Nope, not Google. Musk doesn’t consider Google’s self-driving…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 2

That Time New York City Almost Banned Cars

The public plazas and bike lanes now found throughout New York City have affectionately become known to detractors as the “war on cars.” But amazingly, a 1973 plan got very, very close to banning cars in Manhattan outright, thanks to a man known as “Gridlock Sam.” Over at The Guardian, Aaron Renn profiles Sam Schwartz,…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 1

The Longest, Deepest Rail Tunnel on Earth Just Opened in the Swiss Alps

After 17 years of construction, the Gotthard Base Tunnel opens today. This feat of engineering is a 35-mile high-speed rail connection beneath the Swiss Alps and is now the longest transit tunnel in the world. You better believe that Hyperloop engineers are paying attention. The Gotthard Base Tunnel is actually several tunnels—about 94 miles total—burrowing…

Tech News Alissa Walker Jun 1

Google Is Opening a Detroit Office to Poach Auto Talent

Just few weeks after Google got us all excited about its impending fleet of autonomous Chrysler minivans, the company’s Self-Driving Car project announced that it’s packing up at least part of its operation and moving it to Detroit. Ford, hide your engineers! In a short post on its Self-Driving Car blog, Google confirmed that it…

Tech News Alissa Walker May 25

Six Freeway Removals That Changed Their Cities Forever

It seems counterintuitive, right? Rip out eight lanes of freeway through the middle of your metropolis and you’ll be rewarded with not only less traffic, but safer, more efficient cities? But it’s true, and it’s happening in places all over the world. Many freeway systems were overbuilt in an auto-obsessed era. It was decades later…

Tech News Alissa Walker May 25

How San Francisco Plans to Use Self-Driving Cars to Fix Its Housing Crisis

For a minute, try to forget the hype you hear about self-driving cars and think about the single-occupant, human-driven vehicle like this: A very inefficient way to use expensive city land. Not only do extra-wide roads take up a lot of space, there’s far too much property allocated to parking—about 20 percent of the land…

Tech News Alissa Walker May 24

NYC Built Two Yankee Stadiums in the Time it Took to Build the Second Avenue Subway

New York City’s Second Avenue Subway is scheduled to open on December 30, 2016—an astounding 96 years after it was first proposed. A lot has happened since 1920. In a charming infographic, DNAinfo looks at all the major infrastructural milestones which NYC accomplished in the time it took to get one subway line built. It’s…

Tech News Alissa Walker May 23

Here’s Our Closest Look at Alphabet’s Plans for the City of the Future

This 1938 Magazine Cover Showed Britain a Shinier, Happier Future

Your Self-Driving Car Will Be Programmed to Kill You—Deal With It

Why Columbus Just Won $140 Million to Become the Transportation City of the Future

Penn Station Would Be So Much More Fun As a Roller Coaster

Watch This Apocalyptic Timelapse of the DC Metro Flood

DC’s Metro Should Probably Just Take the Whole Summer Off

The New NASA X-Plane Will Be Fully Electric

One of These US Cities Will Get $40 Million to Make Commutes Suck Less

Larry Page Has Been Secretly Investing in Flying-Car Start-Ups

Los Angeles Is Hiring a Sound Artist to Help Make its Streets Safer

You Might Not Able to Buy a Gas-Powered Car in Norway After 2025

Evidence That Elon Musk Is an Alien

Elon Musk Called Apple’s Car a ‘Missed Opportunity’

That Time New York City Almost Banned Cars

The Longest, Deepest Rail Tunnel on Earth Just Opened in the Swiss Alps

Google Is Opening a Detroit Office to Poach Auto Talent

Six Freeway Removals That Changed Their Cities Forever

How San Francisco Plans to Use Self-Driving Cars to Fix Its Housing Crisis

NYC Built Two Yankee Stadiums in the Time it Took to Build the Second Avenue Subway

Two Songs We Really Wish Were the Anime Outros for ‘Steel Ball Run’

AI Training Data Giant Mercor Is Reportedly Looking to Buy the Work You Did at Your Old Job

Utah Is Giving Dr. AI the Power to Renew Drug Prescriptions

Here’s the Perfect Excuse to See ‘Project Hail Mary’ Again

US Airlines Are Hiking Bag Fees Amid Iran War Oil Crisis

This Ridiculously Simple Trick Might Stop Gulls From Nabbing Your Lunch

‘Starfleet Academy’ Season 3 Could Have Done the ‘Voyager’ Sequel Episode of Robert Picardo’s Dreams

Judge Kills Lawsuit Against Infamous Study That Might Have Increased Teen Suicides

AirPods Max 2 vs. Bose QuietComfort Ultra Headphones (2nd Gen): Which ANC Headphones Win?

The Best Gadgets of March 2026

AirPods Max 2 Review: Still Ridiculously Expensive and Ridiculously Nice

DJI Osmo 360 Review: The Best 360 Camera for the DJI-Pilled

Aqara Smart Lock U400 Review: Hands-free Unlocking at Its Best

MSI Prestige 14 Flip AI+ Review: A Solid 2-in-1 Laptop With Some Glaring Flaws

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

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