Columbus, Ohio, is bucking trends when comes to mass transit — and not everyone is happy about it.

In June, the city won a $40 million Smart City grant from the Department of Transportation, beating out 71 other cities also vying for the money. But whereas most of the other cities proposed using the money for rail-based mass transit options like street cars, monorail, and light rail, Columbus plans to spend the money on a network of autonomous vehicles.

The city is calling this move “leap-frogging,” as in leap-frogging over existing technology that has already been proven to reduce both congestion and pollution.

“I don’t know, maybe light rail is technology of the past,” said Alex Fischer on the Columbus Business First podcast. Fischer is CEO of the Columbus Partnership, a group of local CEOs that secured an additional $90 million in the push for driverless cars. He continued: “You just absolutely leap-frog past it if you believe as I do that the autonomous vehicle – we’ll all be in one the next decade. I guarantee you that.”

But can he? 

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