“Smart Cities” is one of the key topics at CES this year and Ford sees how it can play a role in making cities less congested. Erica Klampfl, the director of Ford’s Greenfield Labs in Silicon Valley, says the key to improving mobility is make it people-centric, not tech-centric. For example, she says that commercial drivers may not be eliminated by autonomous vehicles. Instead their jobs will change from drivers to other kinds of on-board workers, such as school bus drivers becoming student monitors. When you make people the focus, she says it will become easier to integrate mobility services into cities.
John McElroy is an influential thought leader in the automotive industry. He is a journalist, lecturer, commentator and entrepreneur. He created “Autoline Daily,” the first industry webcast of industry news and analysis.
