Blog: The Legalization of Transport Innovation

My name is Nick Garzilli. I am a Sustainable Transport Entrepreneur and I am a candidate for West Hollywood City Council for the March 5 election. I currently have a proposal being looked at by Weho for the city to have the first privately financed solar powered Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) in the world. This will be the beginning of a network that will spread like a web throughout Los Angeles. People and cargo will travel non-stop 30-40mph above our city streets, no drunk drivers, no traffic, no oil.

I am the L.A. Director for JPods and the EVP of Global Development for Evacuated Tube Transport Technologies (ET3). In the past month JPods has secured funding from Equility Capital to build a $100M-$2B+ network in the first municipality that can deliver a shovel-ready project with all of the permits and permissions taken care of, and the only thing missing is the financing.

I want Weho to be that city. JPods wants to pay 5 percent of the revenue, like cell phone companies, to operate these pod cars in the empty right-of-way above the streets. That new revenue can then be used for hiring the three extra librarians needed to increase the hours at the library, increasing subsidies for renters and giving greater social services to assist our neighbors living with HIV.

If someone were to have told me on November 5 that I was going to be running for Weho City Council, I would have told them they were nuts. However something happened on November 6 when the voters of Washington and Colorado legalized marijuana. It got me thinking maybe I could go directly to the voters of West Hollywood with the initiative needed to legalize innovation in transportation.

After a little research I realized that I had missed the deadline for the initiative, but the filing period for becoming a candidate was right around the corner. I completed the paperwork from the City Clerk and hit Santa Monica Boulevard talking to residents about my vision of the future. I got the 20+ signatures to qualify and not surprisingly the two biggest complaints I heard from them are traffic and parking, which PRT deals with directly.

A new generation of leadership at Weho City Hall will bring the next generation of transport. That is why I ask for your support in what will be a difficult bid to unseat the entrenched incumbents. In my view the greatest thing about being on the ballot is the voters of West Hollywood who want this sustainable future can vote for it on March 5.