Zag Talk

Jonah Bliss

Jonah and Greg give you the low down on all the week's latest urbanism, delivery, mobility and tech policy developments. www.thecurbivore.com

  1. The McKinsey Center for Future Mobility’s Bold Claims About the Coming AV Revolution

    1D AGO

    The McKinsey Center for Future Mobility’s Bold Claims About the Coming AV Revolution

    As the world transitions to autonomous mobility, consumer uptake rests on four core pillars: affordability, accessibility, safety and sustainability. In a bold new report, Ani Kelkar and Darius Scurtu, from our partners at the McKinsey Center for Future Mobility, argue that AVs will perform so well, that they will in fact be deflationary, driving down the cost of transportation and disrupting car ownership. In today’s podcast, Jonah Bliss chats with Ani and Darius, as they get into why they think this is the moment that robotaxis truly take off. And the three of them dive into the tricky downstream effects that could come along for the ride: would cheaper mobility just mean endless congestion? Are voters and policymakers ready for these sorts of massive changes? Also in the episode, Jonah, Greg and Athena analyze Q1’s financial reports, assess Lime’s pending IPO, discuss all the latest American transport trends headed to Europe and celebrate riding the D. Listen in! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    47 min

  2. MAY 7

    Could a New Mayor Transform LA’s Streets, Housing and City Services? Councilmember Nithya Raman Wants a City That Works

    Los Angeles has always been the city of the future, offering the world a vision of what’s to come, for both better and worse. Lately, while the region has still delivered on some audacious goals — building dozens of new transit stations, transitioning the nation’s largest municipally owned utility to green energy while maintaining reasonable rates — many feel local leaders have come up short when it comes to the day-to-day items that make a city feel livable. Streets, even when they have new bike lanes, are often pockmarked; permits for housing take forever despite the need to house a large homeless population; local businesses are struggling. The city is now at an inflection point, with voting in the first round of a mayoral election set for June 2nd. The three most viable candidates are Karen Bass, the incumbent mayor and a former congressperson; Nithya Raman, an urban planner turned city councilperson; and Spencer Pratt, a reality TV star who’s punched his way into the conversation thanks to high name recognition and money to burn. In today’s episode, we hear from Councilmember Raman, who currently represents District Four, stretching from the iconic Hollywood Hills to the beautiful San Fernando Valley. In her six years in office, she’s built a progressive track record, working to improve governance, build safer streets, create housing and push towards a greener economy. Before we get to the interview, recorded at Curbivore 2026, Jonah chats with Greg and Sela about the ITS European Congress, Helsinki’s glamorous new car-free bridge, Amazon’s supply chain push, Spirit’s bankruptcy, robotaxi pricing and more. Listen in! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    32 min
  3. Reverse Logistics: So Hot Right Now! Uber's Head of Grocery & Retail Partnerships Talks Returns Launch & 10 Years of Growth

    APR 23

    Reverse Logistics: So Hot Right Now! Uber's Head of Grocery & Retail Partnerships Talks Returns Launch & 10 Years of Growth

    Third party delivery has gone on a wild ride over the last decade, going from an urban niche to a worldwide must-have. Along the way, the array of items that consumers can get at the push of a button has grown from restaurant meals, to grocery items, to just about any SKU you can dream of: hardware, toys, liquor, electronics, you name it. Beryl Sanders, Uber’s Head of Grocery & Retail Partnerships, has led that charge, scaling up Uber Eats into novel verticals with new merchant relationships. Jonah Bliss sat down with her, live at Curbivore 2026, to hear what’s next for the delivery and mobility giant, including its just-launched returns feature (reverse logistics: so hot right now!) Also on the pod, Jonah, Greg and Sela dig into the latest robotaxi news, share what’s working for micromobility operators in LatAm and Europe, and chew over Upshift’s pivot to tele-ops. Listen in! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    43 min

  4. APR 9

    AVs' Impact on Cities, Mobility & Delivery

    As AVs start to impact everything from traditional ridesharing, to mobility more broadly, to even delivery and city-scale systems, it's time to think about how public and private players can best prepare for this new autonomous future. In today's podcast episode, Jonah Bliss and Harry Campbell (founder of The Rideshare Guy and The Driverless Digest) tear into these heady trends, tease which of them will get center stage at Curbivore, and retrace how the industry has evolved since the pandemic. Also on the pod, Jonah, Greg and Athena dig into Also's latest fundraising haul for autonomous cargo bikes, WeRide's move into Dubai, Manna's $50M haul, encouraging road safety stats and more. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    47 min

  5. MAR 26

    This Fighter Pilot Knows Why Autonomous Machines Shouldn't Settle for Anything Less Than Perfection

    There’s nothing worse than an almost perfect machine. If a machine misbehaves consistently, users will know not to trust it. But if it works right 99.9% of the time, by the time it fails, most humans will have given up on closely monitoring it. Professor Missy Cummings knows exactly how high those stakes can be — having famously served as one of the U.S. Navy’s first female fighter pilots, before moving on to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and now serving as Director of George Mason University’s Autonomy and Robotics Center. In today’s episode, we dive deep into what she sees as the hidden dangers lurking behind AVs: humans that are too quick to trust fallible machines, too much latency between vehicles and their remote operators, incomplete regulations and a desire to keep costs in line. (These are topics so important that we’ll be revisiting them at Curbivore in April, where we’re bringing together regulators from the CPUC, alongside AV and delivery bot leaders.) Also on the pod, Greg, Sela and Jonah dive into London’s new microhub alliance, Florida’s senile new speed limits, delivery cos pushing into physical AI, high gas prices and more. Listen in! Curbivore is just three weeks away, and we’re excited to share more of the iconic speakers joining us April 16 & 17 in Downtown Los Angeles. Hear from leaders pushing delivery robotics, micromobility, gig work, next-gen parking, and even the Olympic Games forward! Check out all our speakers, and secure your tickets now! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    37 min

  6. MAR 12

    How to Build a Winning Coalition for Complete Streets

    Los Angeles is many things, but it’s definitely a town where diffuse power structures make it difficult to build political movements. That’s doubly true when you’re asking both local citizens and elected officials to buck the status quo, and reconsider how they get around the city. That’s why Streets for All’s success at building a coalition for safe streets and multi-modal transport systems is so inspiring, while ideally serving as a template for similar movements nationwide. In today’s podcast, I chatted with Michael Schneider, the organization’s Founder & CEO about how to replicate his group’s success, what it took to get measure HLA passed (including lots and lots of money, something he credits to his days as a startup founder,) why LA is still struggling to reshape its streets (hint: it’s also about money, or the lack thereof) and a few wonkier topics like charter reform. Also on the pod: Greg, Athena and Jonah dive into gender inequity across transport, eVTOLs taking off, World Cup transit troubles, super fast fundraising, Curbivore's latest speakers, and more. Listen in! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    43 min

  7. FEB 27

    Can NYC Build a Sustainable Mobility Startup Ecosystem? LACI BATWorks' Alex Mitchell Is Leading the Charge

    When it comes to sustainable mobility startups, New York City finds itself in a peculiar position. Blessed with a legacy of strong public transit infrastructure, local politicos have crafted an ecosystem that encourages all sorts of clean transport and logistics innovation: bikesharing and cargo bikes, waterborne freight and delivery lockers, to name a few. And while these urban conditions spawn all sorts of fascinating startups that work in the Tri-state, those same companies then struggle when they try to scale up and serve other parts of the country. Equally vexing: many concepts that work well in Europe or Asia might want to use NYC as a beachhead for a U.S. launch, but are then stymied by the fact that U.S. regulations or other localization factors might be too byzantine to navigate. NYC leaders set out to solve this problem with launch of BATWorks, teaming up with the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator and Cambridge Innovation Center, effectively pairing the nation’s three biggest tech hubs outside of the SF Bay Area in a shared mission to incubate, pilot and commercialize clean technologies. In today’s episode of Zag Talk, Jonah sat down with Alex Mitchell, Senior Vice President of LACI BATWorks, to talk about the mission, how startups can better work with governments, and his unique background in the mobility ecosystem. Plus, Sela, Greg and Jonah dig into the latest Waymo news, Egypt’s fast-growing delivery startup, gambling on traffic, and the Citrini report that temporarily popped the stock market. Listen in! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    42 min

  8. FEB 12

    Are Rising Insurance Premiums Eating the Mobility Industry Alive?

    Some days it feels like insurance is devouring the entire mobility economy, with rising premiums taking down transportation options new and old alike. Auto insurance premiums have jumped a whopping 64% in the past five years, driven partially by a labor shortage but even more by the fact that cars have become computers on wheels, and your average sensor + chip stack doesn’t take kindly to being in a fender bender. Re-calibration of driver assistance systems in late model cars has quickly climbed to 36% of total repair estimates, averaging around $1.2-2.5k per claim. While this can be a headache for individual car owners, collectively it can be the death knell for a fleet or shared operator. Last week, Zipcar announced it was shutting down its Boston HQ, as owner Avis streamlines its carsharing arm into its larger operations; this comes after its slow retreat from once-promising markets like the U.K. New entrants aren’t immune from these challenges either. While robotaxi operators are aiming to be safer than human drivers, they’ll need to rack up years of driving data to realize those risk-adjusted pricing benefits. In the meantime, fixing the damage to a $100k+ AV is going to be a lot spendier than when a human TNC driver decides the 10th little dent on his or her old Camry isn’t even worth getting buffed out. There are, of course, things that both regulators and corporate actors can do to ameliorate these issues. On today’s podcast, Jonah chats with Ed Walker, Practice Leader of Shared Economy, New Mobility and Autonomous Vehicles at Hub International, about recent state level reforms, like California’s SB 371, or a new bill in the works in Florida, that should help bring some relief to insurance prices. He and I also dig deep into what steps mobility startups can take, especially as they’re getting off the ground, to bake in the best practices that should lead to lower costs over the course of their businesses. Elsewhere on the pod: Greg, Athena and Jonah jump in to the market’s reaction to Lyft and Uber’s latest earnings, Waymo’s latest fundraising haul, Uber Eats’ foray into Turkey, and how Jamaica is using drones to recover from Hurricane Melissa. Do tune in! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thecurbivore.com

    49 min
See All (34)

Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
2 Ratings

About

Jonah and Greg give you the low down on all the week's latest urbanism, delivery, mobility and tech policy developments. www.thecurbivore.com

Information

  • Creator
    Jonah Bliss
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    34
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Curbivore
  • Show Website
    Zag Talk

You Might Also Like