Infrastructure Technology Podcast: How the 2026 FIFA World Cup will impact public transit, technology and infrastructure Part II

Part II of the World Cup infrastructure series shifts from physical transportation systems to the technology that will help manage them. Gavin Jenkins, Brandon Lewis, Jessica Parks and Noah Kolenda explore how artificial intelligence (AI), smart-city technology and connected infrastructure could shape the fan experience during the 2026 FIFA World Cup. The discussion focuses heavily on the growing use of AI in transportation, including adaptive traffic signals, transit signal priority, real-time route optimization and crowd management systems. The hosts explain how cities are increasingly relying on digital twins—virtual models of transportation networks—to simulate event-day conditions and identify potential bottlenecks before they occur.

Episode length

26:05

Here is a transcript from the episode:

GJ: And welcome to the Infrastructure Technology Podcast. I'm Gavin Jenkins, head of content at Roads and Bridges. With me. We got a full cast, a full lineup with us. We have Jessica Parks. She is the staff writer at Roads and Bridges. We have Brandon Lewis, the man, the myth, the legend, the associate editor of Mass Transit. And then we have our data guru, Noah Kolenda, editor at Mass Transit. Alright folks. Brandon, tell 'em what day it is.

BL: It is Tuesday. It is podcast day and it is also World Cup Day, part two.

GJ: World Cup Day part two. We're going to be talking about how the World Cup will be impacting infrastructure in North America at certain cities across North America. We got Boston, we got New York, we got Atlanta, Houston, LA, Seattle, Dallas. What other cities am I forgetting?

JP: Houston?

GJ: I said Houston.

JP: You did?

GJ: I would never forget Houston. Houston's my new favorite city. We went there, we went there for the ATSA Traffic Expo. We're going back there for PWX later this year. I love Houston. I'm going to rent a moped again and drive around the city. It is great. That is a great city. Alright, so let's get into this. First off, I want to start this discussion talking about how much can AI actually improve traffic flow during a mega event like this? And the short answer is quite a bit, but it isn't magic, right? And so there are three main ways that it can, and it's adaptive signal timing, digital twin modeling, real-time crowd analytics. Traffic management during major events has relied on pre-planned signal timing and static traffic control plans. AI power traffic management changes that by allowing agencies to react to conditions as they unfold. With digital twin modeling, cities can create virtual replicas of their transportation network and test different scenarios out, and I imagine all of the cities I just mentioned are doing that. And then you got real-time crowd analytics. They can combine the data from cameras and sensors, mobile devices, transit systems and they can identify congestion points, points before they become dangerous bottlenecks. So AI's biggest value isn't eliminating traffic, but it's really helping agencies make smarter decisions. What do you think, Brandon?

BL: Yeah, I think too, the biggest thing in terms of public transportation as well is that AI can also detect when buses are stuck in traffic. And what it can do is with these lights that they can automatically trigger green, especially in these cities where they have bus only lanes such as in New York, and that'll help keep the buses moving as well.

GJ: Jess, what do you think? Hop on in.

JP: Yeah, I mean I think that AI can definitely be a huge help in improving traffic flow during these events, especially with everything's constantly changing, and I think AI lets the cities make data-driven decisions in real time. So instead of sticking to a fixed plan that might not match what's actually happening, I think it allows you to really just adjust and have the data needed to make those decisions in the smartest way possible.

GJ: Now the cities that I forgot were Kansas City. I forgot Kansas City, you guys covered me and said Philadelphia. That's correct. I forgot San Francisco and Miami, but I got Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Houston, LA, New York/New Jersey, Philly, Seattle. I got those right and missed three. So Noah, the data aspect is huge. You're a data guru. In what ways can you get that data, especially with the real-time crowd analytics? I mean, is that instantaneous? I mean, how quickly can you take that data and just make it into use and effective?

NK: So this is definitely going to depend a bit on the region and the technology that they've implemented ahead of the games, but in a lot of these spaces, they are implementing a lot more of these automated passenger counters that are able to detect passenger levels in real time and report those back into central systems, and that's being paired with a lot of other software platforms to run these games. So whether it be the transit signal priority that we've already talked about or other, what's the word? Telematics management platforms that will track bus statistics throughout their roots and stuff like that. All of this data is going back to a central hub and is allowing transit agencies to make decisions in real time because while we can lay the best plans we can, things are going to happen in real time, traffic's going to get worse in other areas and other unexpected things could come up, but these softwares will be able to deliver real time views into the amount of passengers on a specific route or the amount of traffic coming into a certain area and allow the retiming of signals, and it will also allow for bus schedules to stay updated because we've got a lot of those real-time information platforms implemented and a lot of other softwares are being pushed into, I'm blanking on it's official name, but it's like a location based SDK to give you a view of not just passengers on transit, but just congestion in the city as a whole. That will give you a view of, ‘Okay, we can anticipate that this bus route's about to get really full because we can see there are a ton of people at the stop or nearing this stop’. And so pulling those data feeds together will really help adjust demand response as needed.

GJ: Alright, so Noah, let's stick with you. Let's talk about coordinating transit. How difficult is it going to be to coordinate transit rideshare parking and pedestrian systems in real time?

NK: So this is actually really cool and interesting to me because there are so many new platforms that have emerged specifically to manage these crowds at the World Cup. So take Uber for instance, that's a platform that you're supposed to be using on your phone. And so if you come to a country where you don't have cell service, the second you step off of a plane, you may not be able to access Uber immediately. Well, they thought of that and have kind of brought back the old style of hailing a cab where instead of you waiting on a taxi line per se, they've put kiosks at major airports and at major event hubs so that people can request rides without phones or data plans in the local country. And then onto the transit side of things, just at APTA Mobility, there was a discussion about the expansion of their platform that is for fixed root services that's able to monitor and manage demand and any errors kind of as they come up. So if the system sees a slow down and that trips are getting delayed, it can kind of pair that system together or pair systems together to find out how it can speed up the route can handle customer service by issuing transit credits to affected passengers and handle all of the inner management between those departments for the agency so that it can resolve those issues a lot quicker. So software is really stepping in here to help aid in management in ways that it might take several people.

GJ: And it's sharing and making sure everything is connected and coherent with each other. Brandon, I got to ask you on that same topic, walk us through how that would look if everything is sharing data and everything is connected.

BL: So I took this, too from sort of a transit perspective when you're actually at the stadium match wise because the difficulty with it is with all these schedules, obviously a bus schedule is going to be different. You have bus schedules that are different from Uber schedules, and they're using all of those different algorithms as well. But then the problem comes when you also have parking availability down there at these match sites, and you have all these different buses, Lyfts, Ubers, taxi exits, general parking and they're all fighting for curbside space basically. And of course, buses also, they require dedicated zones to load and unload or ride servers that also need quick pullover access. So that is the physical bottleneck taking place right outside the stadium.

GJ: So if I'm hearing you correctly or essentially what you're saying is that if there is a disruption in one system, then there's a ripple effect, and it affects the others. So that's why real-time data sharing is so crucial to any city. 

BL: Correct. 

GJ: Okay, so modern traffic management centers increasingly rely on integrated dashboards, and you want them to combine transit vehicle locations, parking, occupancy data. If a parking garage is full, you want to be able to tell people that ride share demand, pedestrian movement information, traffic conditions, events, schedules. How do you think curb management will play into that, Jess?

JP: I think curb management is, it's a little bit, that area is I think definitely going to be one of the hardest areas to get data on just because I'm not really sure how you'd quantify or calculate that into an app. I think that I kind of agreed with Brandon what he said when I was looking into this question. Everything I thought definitely one of the most confusing parts of this is when there's a sudden spike in a certain transit mode and how does that get relayed across all the other modes of transit. I think curb management is going to be, you can quantify it a bit by just understanding how much traffic is going through that area, Uber, bus shuttles, everything like that, and just kind of gathering what curbs going space is going to be needed from that, but I do see curb management being a major issue during the World Cup. That's going to probably just be inevitable.

GJ: The technology exists, but success for this aspect is really going to depend on the software and more on, well, no, well, less, on the software. It's really going to boil down to whether agencies and private operators will be willing and able to share that information in real time, and I'm not sure. It’s not that they're going to be able to, I'm a little pessimistic when it comes to that, but Brandon is an optimistic person, so let's turn to Brandon here, and let's talk about autonomous shuttles and how realistic they will be at scale.

BL: Yeah, so this answer honestly depends on the city. Gavin, I know on the podcast we've talked about Waymo's a lot and in LA and also in Houston. Houston just deployed the Waymo's a few months ago and it is a patient for this World Cup, and both cities are going to be expanding their Waymo footprint to nearly 50 square miles for the World Cup. Also in Arlington in Dallas, they're going to use a $350,000 grand from the Federal Transit Administration, and they're going to be running an expanded on-demand autonomous rideshare service to annual match day transit around AT&T stadium. And then also in Atlanta, they have deployed a shared level for autonomous electric shuttle that's going to operate on a fixed route. And so some of these cities that already have this infrastructure in place are going to be using it. But also there's cities like Philadelphia that say that they're not going to have any autonomous transportation. So it really is going to depend on where you're at. What I'm going to find interesting is for the international travelers who maybe aren't used to these autonomous vehicles or shuttles, are they going to be willing to take these transit options?

GJ: Yeah, it's a great question. So the World Cup environments involve heavy pedestrian traffic, temporary infrastructure, unpredictable traveler behavior, right? Multiple languages and frequent roadway changes, so these conditions remain difficult for autonomous systems to navigate, and that's probably why Philadelphia is not going to have it, not because of their angry sports fans as I joke, but Jess, what do you think of this? Do you think that autonomous shuttle technology has matured considerably? Do you think that it's ready or would you say that moving out of the World Cup that this will be the landmark where we say, ‘Oh, autonomous shuttles actually work’.

JP: So I think that they're very promising, but I don't see them at a World Cup scale yet because I think that these events really do create really unpredictable high congestion environments, and I think that they might struggle in that. I think that they're great in controlled or semi controlled settings, but a post-match surge with thousands and thousands of people in traffic changing constantly, I am not sure they're going to be able to keep up.

GJ: It’s possible.

BL: I completely agree with that, and I somewhat disagree with the notion that they're ready, and I know that these agencies have obviously been using them and testing them, and they've been in these environments. I get it. But if I was just a regular person, and again, I use trains all the time, but if I was a person down there with a World Cup match, unless it was literally the only option to get me out of there, I wouldn't even think twice. I would not hop in one of these AVs.

NK: Yeah, I completely agree. I think every time I see them come up on social media or on the news or anything like that, granted it is always the worst of the worst cases, but I just see that all too frequently to trust it during such a heavy point of congestion, and I've seen Waymo's unable to handle another Waymo on a cul-de-sac street, and so I don't fully trust that it's going to be able to handle thousands of pedestrians and fans outside of a stadium and be able to not just panic so severely it just shuts down and doesn't move.

GJ: Yeah. Well I think connected infrastructure is critical to this. When you have a connected vehicle system, it allows vehicles to communicate with a signals roadside equipment, traffic management, and it can really improve safety and operational performance. Autonomous shuttles are realistic for targeted deployments, but I think I agree with you guys that it's unlikely to replace traditional transit service during the World Cup, but it's fun to see. We'll have to keep an eye on Houston and Los Angeles and how they perform there. I think that in terms of how each city performs, I think Houston, LA and Atlanta, which are massive metro centers, we will probably do a good job of managing the bottlenecks. I mean, Atlanta's hosted the 96 Summer Olympics. Noah, that was before you were born. You don't remember it. And Los Angeles is a massive city and has hosted things before, so other mega events, so they'll be able to do it. Final question we'll get out of here on this one. Is the World Cup becoming a proving ground for smart city technology? Jess, what do you think?

JP: So I'd say 100% yes. I'd say that the World Cup's basically a real world stress test for smart city technology where you have millions of visitors, huge spikes in traffic and systems being pushed to their absolute limits all at once. So what's really changing is that cities are moving away from fixed traffic plans and towards data-driven decision making. So instead of preset timing, they can adjust signal routes and transit operations to real times based on what's actually happening on the ground. I think that's where AI really comes into play. They'll help operators respond instantly, whether that's adjusting signal timing, managing crosswalks or rerouting transit to handle surges, but if they can handle it, there's going to be a big payoff because they won't just disappear after the tournament. They often lead to smoother, more efficient day-to-day operations for the city after the tournament ends. It also gives cities a reason to heavily invest in infrastructure and technology where maybe they didn't have the, not necessarily the means, but they didn't have the justification to do it before, so they can invest heavily in infrastructure and technology and a lot of those upgrades like new transit systems for example, or integrated digital platforms, stick around long after the final match. And you've seen this in other places, so I think it's just this is, if these persistent prove to work, they're not going to just get rid of them. So I think we will see a lot of changes in the U.S. transit system in all these different cities following the World Cup, and I'm excited.

GJ: Brandon, what do you think?

BL: So I think that obviously it's a test for these technologies, right? I mean, in every aspect that we talked about, whether it's last week when we talked about cybersecurity, whether it's talking about traffic, transit, etc, I think that the issue may come in where a lot of these cities are either expanding transit or trying out new things or using this AI specifically for the World Cup in specific area or in specific situations and maybe out of the World Cup, even though we may think that some of this technology may transfer into normal every day-to-day life, that may not be the case for every city in every situation, so I would be a little weary to say that for sure this technology is going to completely change the game because we really don't know because it takes so on to develop this technology, and again, it's developed for this specific thing.

GJ: Yeah, absolutely, and I think coming out of this World Cup, you're going to see some of these cities using the event to justify further investment in AI, power traffic management, smart signals, connected vehicle systems, real-time transit information, digital twins, advanced analytics platforms and intelligent curve management systems. And so it might not be the proving ground right now, but I think that a year from now you'll be able to look back at the World Cup and say, ‘Oh wow, that was crucial to the future of connected cities. What do you think, Noah?

NK: I would agree that was definitely the vibe that I was getting from operators and planning associates at APTA Mobility. A lot of them were saying that a lot of this technology is going to be proof of concept for other major events that they've got in the future or the previous major events like the Era’s Tour and other sporting events kind of helped prep them, so they would know what they would need for the facilitation of this event or just to what could aid in future facilitation of other major events like upcoming Olympics and stuff like that. And I think too, this is a data heyday both for agencies but also for passengers because now all of this real-time information is plugged into every different mapping app, whether you're a fan of Apple or Google or MoveIt or any of these other apps out there, or even the transit agency specific apps. And so I think it's going to be a benefit to both agencies and operators and to passengers just kind of going forward in new technologies, developing and deploying on both sides out of this.

BL: I was going to say that I think the best direct comparison we will get will be from Los Angeles when they host the 2028 Olympic Games, and I'll be interested to see just two years out from the World Cup how the technology that they use for the World Cup, what adjustments do they make, what do they get rid of in terms of that aspect for the 2028 Olympics?

JP: And what new technology there'll be for those games too that we can't even imagine for the Olympic games?

GJ: And then of course, all of this leads to, like Brandon mentioned earlier, cyber cybersecurity risks. Cybersecurity is becoming just as important as mobility technology itself. It could be a huge issue. I'm sure that all of these cities are taking the proper precautions to prevent any cybersecurity attacks. The World Cup isn't just testing roads and transit systems anymore. It is testing entire digital ecosystems and cybersecurity precautions are part of that and the cities that succeed will be the ones that balance innovation with resilience and security, and you guys are absolutely right. The true test will be what it is moving forward, what are the effects? And we'll see that in Los Angeles during the Summer Olympics. Now, we're airing this on June 16th. The games have already started. The World Cup started last week on June 11th, so I hope that you guys are all watching and enjoying the World Cup. Brandon is a huge soccer fan, as he said last week. So is Jess. Noah, are you a huge soccer fan?

NK: I don't know. I like that it's uninterrupted. I'll give you that.

GJ: Yeah, no commercial break. That's what I like about it. It's just straight action, no commercial breaks. Any closing thoughts?

BL: Yeah, if you are watching the World Cup, send us an email at [email protected]. 

NK: And if you experienced any of the transit at the World Cup, report back your experience, how did it work? What went well? We'd like to hear that too. 

GJ: Absolutely. If you're one of these major cities, send us an email. Alright, well that is it. That is our podcast for today. Jess, who do we need to thank?

JP: We need to thank our listeners.

GJ: Yes.

JP: And all the host cities of the World Cup for giving us some info to talk about.

GJ: Yeah, we also want to thank Endeavor B2B, our parent company, and we want to thank Karina Mazhukina, who is our editor and producer, and who will just, Edward Scissor hands anytime we go off track. Listeners, we had a funny bit about Oklahoma State football that just got ripped out, and Maz was like, this means nothing to our listeners. That was what she said. So we got to end it now before this gets cut out. So for all of us here, I'm Gavin Jenkins, head of content for Roads and Bridges.

JP: I'm Jessica Parks, staff writer for Roads and Bridges.

BL: I'm Brandon Lewis, associate editor from Mass Transit magazine.

NK: And I'm Noah Kolenda, associate editor at Mass Transit magazine.

GJ: Thank you for listening. Enjoy the World Cup, and we will be back next week with another great episode. Until then, goodbye.