齊默說，已經到了圍繞人而不是汽車來重塑城市的時候了。

是時候了：該圍繞人，而不是汽車來重塑城市！最近，打車服務供應商Lyft聯合創始人約翰?齊默向眾多汽車和科技企業高層發出了挑戰。

汽車廠商的業務當然是制造和銷售汽車，但齊默看到了一個機會，而且是一個10年前看來還不可能的機會。

在Connected Car Expo大會、也就是洛杉磯車展開幕式上發表主題演講前，齊默接受了《財富》雜志的采訪。他說：“對于新一代人來說，汽車界需要用新的方式來對待汽車，因為這一代人并不重視汽車的所有權。我覺得我們城市的未來（我隨后就會談到這個問題），我們所有這些公司的未來真的取決于對待汽車的全新方式。”

齊默本身并非汽車業界人士。但Lyft要依靠轎車和卡車，而今還要依靠駕駛這些車輛的人。

成立于2012年的Lyft目前估值達到25億美元。在《財富》的獨角獸公司排行中，也就是價值達到或超過10億美元、前途光明的初創企業名單上，它排在第42位。Lyft的最初產品是一款把駕駛者和乘車人聯系在一起的App。

2015年，該公司將業務延伸到了拼車領域，推出了作為公共交通替代渠道的Lyft Line服務。2015年9月，Lyft宣布和滴，滴快的結為合作伙伴，這家來自中國的打車服務公司向Lyft投入了1億美元資金。

如果沒有汽車，Lyft就沒什么生意可做。但齊默相信，城市以汽車為中心的時代即將結束。

他說：“這一代人更看重手機的移動性，而不是只在4%的時間里才會用到的資產。這對汽車行業來說是個警示，它表明世界正在發生改變，而且我們將共同迎接一個千載難逢的機會，從而圍繞人而不是汽車重新設計我們的城市。”

“進入城市的人越來越多，交通越發擁堵。城市人口已經是原來的兩倍，今后還會再翻一番。我們不能一直這樣下去。修的路越多，車流量就越大。我們需要從新的角度來考慮這個問題。”

齊默認為，車輛是硬件，Lyft則是操作系統。這樣的看法暗示了這家公司的發展方向。比方說，Lyft會不會在某一天和汽車廠商共同經營自動駕駛汽車租賃業務呢？

齊默說：“我們的系統里一直都要有硬件，這對乘客的體驗非常重要。因此，今后要談到的一大問題，也是要向聽眾提出的一個問題是我們怎樣進行協作？我想這方面還沒有定論。”

汽車廠商方面幾乎看不到舉棋不定的跡象，而且似乎也不需要Lyft這樣的合作伙伴。一些廠商仍在因美國月度汽車銷量打破紀錄而沾沾自喜。但齊默堅持認為，汽車行業正在走下坡路，至少是正在改變，銷量上升只是短暫反彈而已。他指出，80后、90后以及更年輕的人群并不像之前的幾代人那樣看重汽車。

齊默還說，包括自動駕駛在內，科技的進步已經帶來了一個獨一無二的機會。

“如果能預見到未來，這對汽車行業來說就可能是一個很棒的機會。”齊默還介紹說，目前Lyft每周為逾100萬人次提供打車服務。

雖然氣氛有些緊張，而且近期的強勁銷售數字帶來了一絲否定意味，但齊默指出，一些汽車廠商知道今后會出現什么樣的情況。Lyft和汽車制造商有些關系。福特家族的比爾?福特就是Lyft的投資人之一，Lyft還在和多名汽車廠商高層進行會談。

齊默說：“總的來說我們的對話具有建設性，但我覺得雙方的運行步調不同。我們認為這種情況將很快出現，而且希望所有人都采取行動，共同為之付出努力。我想他們仍在考慮大家要怎樣進行合作。”

汽車技術領域中的其他成員認為，傳統汽車廠商正在朝著更全面、更現代化的方向轉移。

聯網汽車服務公司Airbiquity首席收入官大衛?賈姆帕說：“在這方面，這些公司的推進節奏將體現出它們的歷史和目前的經營模式。新出現的企業必然很有想法，而且這些想法可能有顛覆性。其中一些手握大量現金來保障他們的想法落地，它們帶來的壓力將成為催化劑，進而推動今后的競爭。”

汽車廠商則表示，它們已經投資于多個著眼于未來城市交通的項目。舉例來說，據福特汽車GoDrive項目負責人艾麗西婭?阿吉烏斯介紹，該公司目前正在實施25個移動性項目。GoDrive是福特2014年在倫敦啟動的按需車輛共享試驗項目。

阿吉烏斯說：“這個領域的哲學已經有了變化，而且將繼續發生改變。人們已經意識到，在人口稠密的城市里，根本做不到人人都有車。但人們在一定情況下依然需要用車。對于這些無法擁有私家車的人，我們希望讓他們得到使用車輛的機會。”

譯者：Charlie

校對：詹妮

It’s time to shape cities around people not cars, Zimmer says.

John Zimmer, co-founder of ride-hailing service Lyft,looks at out at a sea of automotive and tech executivesand issue a challenge: It’s time to redesign cities around people, not cars.

Automakers are in the business of making and selling vehicles, after all. But Zimmer, sees an opportunity that didn’t seem possible a decade ago.

“A new approach to cars in the automobile world is needed for this new generation—a generation that doesn’t value car ownership,” Zimmer told Fortune ahead of his keynote speech at the Connected Car Expo, an auto tech conference that acts as an opener to the Los Angeles Auto Show. “I think that the future of our cities (which I’m going to talk about), the future of our companies really depends on a brand new approach to the automobile.”

Zimmer isn’t in the automotive industry, per se. But Lyft relies on cars and trucks—and for now, the people who drive them.

Lyft, founded in 2012, is valued at $2.5 billion, an amount that puts it at 42 on Fortune’s unicorn list of high-flying startups valued at $1 billion or more. The company started by creating an app that connects drivers and riders.

It expanded its service last year with Lyft Line, a carpooling service that provides an alternative to public transit. In September, Lyft announced a partnership with DidiKuaidi, a China-based ride-hailing service that invested $100 million in the company.

Without cars, Lyft doesn’t have much of a business. Still, Zimmer believes the era of car-centric cities is ending.

“This is a generation that values the mobility of their cell phone more than ownership of an asset they use 4% of the time,” Zimmer says. “This is a wake up call to the auto industry that the world is changing and together we have this once in a lifetime opportunity to redesign our cities around people instead of cars.”

“More people are moving into cities and traffic is getting worse—it’s doubled and it’s going to double again. We cannot keep going down this path. When you build more roads, you get more traffic. We need a new way of thinking about this.”

Zimmer sees cars as the hardware and Lyft as an operating system—a viewpoint that offers a hint at where the company is headed. Could Lyft someday partner with an automaker to provide a fleet of self-driving cars, for example?

“We’re always going to have hardware in the system, and it’s very important to the experience that the passenger has,” Zimmer says. “And so, in the future one of the big questions in the talk and one of the big questions for the audience is how do we work together? I think that’s still being decided.”

Automakers hardly seem to be struggling or in need of a partner like Lyft. Several are still basking in the success of record monthly U.S. sales. But Zimmer insists this is a short-term blip on an otherwise downward, or at least changing, trend. Millennials and those younger than them don’t value cars as much as previous generations, Zimmer says.

Advances in technology involving autonomous driving has created a unique opportunity, he added.

“This can be fantastic for the auto industry if they see the future before it happens,” says Zimmer, who notes that Lyft is now providing well over 1 million rides weekly.

And while there is some tension and a bit of denial because of recent strong sales numbers, Zimmer says some automakers understand what’s coming. Lyft has ties to car companies—Bill Ford of the Ford auto family is an investor—and has had multiple and ongoing discussions with automotive executives.

“It’s generally been a productive conversation, but I think we’re operating at different paces,” he says. “We see this happening fast and we want everyone to move and work on it together. I think they’re still trying to figure out how we all work together.”

Others in the auto-tech space see traditional automakers shifting towards a broader, more modern approach.

“But they’re going to do it at a rate and pace that reflects where they’re coming from and their current business models,” says David Jumpa, chief revenue officer of connected car services company Airbiquity. “The newcomers will definitely have big ideas with potential for disruption, some will have large cash hoards to fund their efforts, and the pressure they create will serve as a catalyst to nudge the scrum forward.”

The automakers themselves say they’re already investing in a variety of projects that focus on the future of how people move in and around cities. For example, Ford Motor Co. has about 25 different mobility projects going on right now, according to Alicia Agius, project lead of GoDrive, an on-demand car-sharing pilot the company launched last year in London.

“The philosophy has changed and is continuing to change,” Agius says. “There’s a realization in these densely urban cities that it’s just simply not practical for everyone to own a car. And yet people still have a need for cars in certain circumstances. We want to give those people, living in situations where ownership isn’t an option, the opportunity and access to a car.”