Building an Electric USA - Insights from CoMotion LA

The development of future mobility is at the heart of the CoMotion event programme, and this year’s function in Los Angeles saw a gathering from every corner of the eMobility ecosystem. Dodona’s David Patterson was there and gave us the low down.

Thinking of future mobility in the context of moving people, packages, goods and services in an efficient, green, and safe way, underpins the CoMotion event series.

My colleague, Co-Founder and VP Americas, Chris Chamberlain, and I were pleased to be alongside six other UK-based companies sponsored by the British Consulate Department of Business and Trade to attend this year’s LA event. These delegates covered a range of key areas in eMobility services and technology, including electric vehicle charging, mobility planning and management, sensor, camera and AI technology, and road defect detection and repair technology.

Chris and David meet the team at the British Consulate

As varied as this sounds, it reflects the scope of the agenda. Over the course of three days, it was possible to speak to and hear from a range of influential and innovative mobility companies worldwide. With interactions between impressive leaders, including policymakers, public transportation agencies, technology founders, disruptors and VC investors, there was a lot to go at.

Building a sustainable mobility system for metropolitan cities

How can we go about building a safe and environmentally sustainable mobility system for our cities? As well as suburban and rural America? The challenges faced by our cities in this regard are not to be understated but many potential and viable solutions we explored and discussed by the event agenda:

Micro-mobility 

A small but essential piece of the puzzle is mico-mobility. For those living city-center, who perhaps do not own a car or simply wish to get quickly from A to B covering only a small distance, then the solution comes in the form of shared-use scooters and e-Bikes. Such schemes are already successfully in action in cities all over the world, and can form the basis of a green mobility system at a very individual level.

Zero Emission Delivery Zones 

This step towards a cleaner mobility system offers the quickest and biggest win when it comes to the quality of life for city-dwellers. By offloading freight and other deliveries to smaller electric or hydrogen-fueled smaller delivery vehicles before it enters the city limits will make a significant difference to air quality. With the smaller delivery vehicles taking the form of cargo bikes and autonomous carts, traffic density will also look very different. Alongside lower zero emissions, less heavy truck traffic would also contribute to increased public and personal safety.

Electrification of autonomous and non-autonomous vehicles

The electrification of vehicles is of course a central milestone in the journey towards a sustainable future. The purchase and manufacture of electric vehicles can be significantly encouraged by the set up of a successful and sustainable charging network, and this is where Dodona can play a key part. 

Of course, this charging infrastructure needs to support a wide range of vehicles,  some types of which are already on the roads in one form or another, but others are yet to come.

The list includes:

• Traditional Light passenger EVs
• Medium and HD EV and Hydrogen vehicles
• Light duty delivery infrastructure: Cargo bikes, autonomous delivery carts, micro-mobility vehicles such as shared scooters, ebikes, and EV shared-ride resources for urban living such as EV Ubers and Waymo

With metropolitan areas like Los Angeles, Miami, Seattle and Portland engaged in piloting new technologies in a very open minded manner, the building of a healthier, environmentally sustainable mobility system for metropolitan cities seems to be well on its way. The public sector approach in the US, and its mobility strategy is well funded, open minded, and open to experimentation through pilot activity. Our role will be to support governing bodies and charge point operators in ensuring a charging infrastructure which underpins the daily mobility needs of communities across the US, both during initial EV uptake and for the long haul. 

We would like to give a huge shout out to the LA-based team at The British Consulate - Department for Business and Trade - for their support and sponsorship in what was a valuable and insightful experience for Dodona Analytics.