According to Bloomberg Green, there are now at least three car manufacturers -- Tesla, Hyundai-Kia, and GM -- with electric vehicles that (1) have a range greater than 300 miles (480 kilometers) and (2) cost less than the average price of a new vehicle in the US (which is currently around $47,000). This means that we are now approaching price parity:

This is an important adoption milestone, even if it does, at this point, feel totally expected. The International Energy Agency (IEA) is forecasting full price parity by 2030. But in my mind, I'm already done with ICE vehicles. When I bought my current car over 6 years ago, I knew it would be the last internal combustion engine I ever own.

Earlier this month, the new Hudson's tower in Detroit "topped out." Meaning, they laid the last steel beam at the top of building. This, to me, is fantastic news. (Here's the official project website in case you're interested.)

The tower, which was designed by New York-based SHoP Architects, is just over 685 feet tall. This makes it the second tallest building in the state of Michigan, after the Renaissance Center. And when it's complete, it will house 1.5 million square feet of office, retail, food, residential, hotel, and event space.

This week it was also announced that General Motors will be moving its headquarters and its 5,000 downtown employees to this new tower. I don't know who will backfill their old space in the Renaissance Center, but that's a topic for a different day. Today, I think we should be talking about the grit and resilience of Detroit.

This is a city that reached a peak population of approximately 1.85 million people in 1950, had its population decline by more than 65%, and then became the largest city in the US to declare bankruptcy (2013). Now they're building a big ass mixed-use tower in the center of downtown.

👊

Cruise, the autonomous taxi service owned by GM, is working toward offering 24/7 service in San Francisco. I wrote about that here. And so it recently came out with some supportive data suggesting that between September and November of last year, it completed 2,800 rides covering some 27,000 miles, and that it did so without a major collision or injury.

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, however, disagrees. They are opposing Cruise's service expansion plans, and have reported 92 incidents where Cruise's autonomous taxis have obstructed traffic, caused delays to transit, blocked lanes and, apparently in two cases, driven over firehoses.

These two things are not all that surprising. Firstly, autonomous vehicles are still in their infancy and they are known to do silly things. Part of this, I'm sure, is because they're programmed around road and life safety. And so if they don't know what to do, they're going to default to what is deemed safe, even if it means blocking a lane or obstructing traffic.

Secondly, transit agencies are suffering in our post-pandemic world. So this is an obvious and understandable case of self-interest. And it's not new. But at the same time, we've all seen this movie many times before, from Napster to Uber. Progress is disruptive. But does it really make sense to stop?

According to Bloomberg Green, there are now at least three car manufacturers -- Tesla, Hyundai-Kia, and GM -- with electric vehicles that (1) have a range greater than 300 miles (480 kilometers) and (2) cost less than the average price of a new vehicle in the US (which is currently around $47,000). This means that we are now approaching price parity:

This is an important adoption milestone, even if it does, at this point, feel totally expected. The International Energy Agency (IEA) is forecasting full price parity by 2030. But in my mind, I'm already done with ICE vehicles. When I bought my current car over 6 years ago, I knew it would be the last internal combustion engine I ever own.

Earlier this month, the new Hudson's tower in Detroit "topped out." Meaning, they laid the last steel beam at the top of building. This, to me, is fantastic news. (Here's the official project website in case you're interested.)

The tower, which was designed by New York-based SHoP Architects, is just over 685 feet tall. This makes it the second tallest building in the state of Michigan, after the Renaissance Center. And when it's complete, it will house 1.5 million square feet of office, retail, food, residential, hotel, and event space.

This week it was also announced that General Motors will be moving its headquarters and its 5,000 downtown employees to this new tower. I don't know who will backfill their old space in the Renaissance Center, but that's a topic for a different day. Today, I think we should be talking about the grit and resilience of Detroit.

This is a city that reached a peak population of approximately 1.85 million people in 1950, had its population decline by more than 65%, and then became the largest city in the US to declare bankruptcy (2013). Now they're building a big ass mixed-use tower in the center of downtown.

👊

Cruise, the autonomous taxi service owned by GM, is working toward offering 24/7 service in San Francisco. I wrote about that here. And so it recently came out with some supportive data suggesting that between September and November of last year, it completed 2,800 rides covering some 27,000 miles, and that it did so without a major collision or injury.

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, however, disagrees. They are opposing Cruise's service expansion plans, and have reported 92 incidents where Cruise's autonomous taxis have obstructed traffic, caused delays to transit, blocked lanes and, apparently in two cases, driven over firehoses.

These two things are not all that surprising. Firstly, autonomous vehicles are still in their infancy and they are known to do silly things. Part of this, I'm sure, is because they're programmed around road and life safety. And so if they don't know what to do, they're going to default to what is deemed safe, even if it means blocking a lane or obstructing traffic.

Secondly, transit agencies are suffering in our post-pandemic world. So this is an obvious and understandable case of self-interest. And it's not new. But at the same time, we've all seen this movie many times before, from Napster to Uber. Progress is disruptive. But does it really make sense to stop?