3 things we learned about transit trends at the ‘Transit in Transition’ panel

On Wednesday night, as a light snow began falling outside, a group of transportation tech enthusiasts gathered at cove on K Street to talk about trends in mobility.
The panel discussion was part of cove’s ongoing “cove presents” series, this time focused on looking at how we all get from point A to point B. The panel itself was full of D.C. transit all-stars, including Faye Dastgheib from the District Department of Transportation (DDOT), Scott Hall, general manager of ZipCar, Sara Pierce, head of marketing and communications at Split, Steve Taylor, general manager at Lyft, and Kyle Weidman, manager at Riide.
Michael Schade, organizer of the Transportation Techies Meetup group, served as moderator.
The discussion covered all number of things ranging from urban planning to open data. Here are the most interesting things we learned:

1. DDOT is partnering with ridesharing companies. By getting data on pickup/dropoff hotspots, DDOT hopes to potentially create regulations that would make this safer. Dastgheib was clear that this is in very early stages, but down the road it could mean seeing ridesharing as a more mainstream part of our city infrastructure.
2. People are more likely to have multi-modal commutes today than in the past. Did your commute involve some combination of bikes, trains, busses and cars? Many of the panelists said data shows that mix ‘n’ match commutes are becoming more popular.
3. Riide, the electric bike company, offers free three-day demos. The idea is to allow people to fall in love with the motorized bike experience by trying it out for a few days. Apparently you just sign up online, and then pick up a bike at their 9th Street NW showroom. Um, sign us up!