Why self-driving cars will cause sprawl (according to an Italian Physicist)

At 99mph, we think about the second-order effects of self-driving cars (aka autonomous vehicles or AVs). Last time we wrote about how AVs will bring about a $1 trillion shift in real estate across 13 major US metros — a phenomenon we call “The Great Flattening.”

In this post, we want to delve into the core claim— that AVs will result in massive sprawl — a bit deeper

To do so, let’s get historical. AVs aren’t the first new transit tech to come onto the scene. How have previous changes in mobility impacted the size of urban footprints?