Bill Ford: A future beyond traffic gridlock

http://www.ted.com Bill Ford is a car guy -- his great-grandfather was Henry Ford, and he grew up inside the massive Ford Motor Co. So when he worries about cars' impact on the environment, and about our growing global gridlock problem, it's worth a listen. His vision for the future of mobility includes "smart roads," even smarter public transport and going green like never before.

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at http://www.ted.com/translate.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• TED
• TEDTalks
• Bill Ford
• smart roads
• global gridlock
• green
• cars

[calebd87]

Cmon TED for over a year I've been seeing comments about your unnecessarily loud intro...

[VivekRajcoomar]

1. Communist cars? :P

2. Search "bicycle rush hour Netherlands". That's how you do it. Watch and learn.

3. If we're going to have more people, the obv sol'n is not increased personal transit efficiency, but increased mass transit.

I know this might come as a shock to Americans, but you really don't need a car in some European countries. Cars are just seen as inconvenient and expensive compared to the public transit options, bike & walk.

Their cities r designed to make it convenient.

[ricer888]

snowflakes will solve the problem.

[won20529jun]

I don't know about North America and Europe, but in Asia there are already navigation systems that direct the driver to the least congested road!! :D

[monkeyrecordsnz]

2-4 billion cars for 9 billion people? I really hope not. After 20 years of vehicle ownership in New Zealand, I am very happy to now be living in a city (Berlin) where I don't need a vehicle. I bike, walk or take public transport. Instead of more cars, what we need is better public transport and more compact cities which are made for people not cars...

[H1TMANactual]

@VivekRajcoomar America isn't a small European country.

[52imcool]

BUILD A MASS TRANSIT MONORAIL

[badjer1785]

his sniffing is hurting my brain

[axelasdf]

@GraeHall

What did I do to deserve that? I'm saying, if Ford ruins themselves financially doing what they think is best, it doesn't mean that I owe them ANYTHING. It will ruin my trust in them, and I won't support them. What is wrong with that? What if someone else has a better solution (by my thoughts) and I invest with them in that idea. If I choose poorly, are you required to pay for them screwing up in their (and my) decisions? You need to grow up, Sir. Also, I don't owe anything.

[Barbarian74]

@alackofoxygen89 That type of commute is a reality for most Americans though. On Average Americans live 16 miles from their place of work, that isn't a reasonable bycicle commute distance for most. As for groceries, sure a single person going to the store to buy groceries for themselves for a few days could do that, but for a family. Even groceries for a family of 3 will fill up the trunk of a car, let alone a bike. It's not a reasonable option for most people.

[AntonSlizzardhands]

@alackofoxygen89 "bad weather doesn't exist, only bad clothing." Huh?