Israeli Start-Up Founder Pushes Vision for People-Centered Cities
Shaul Zinger, who for years analyzed Israeli innovation from the outside, has now joined it as a founder of Line Mobility. In a podcast conversation with Dr. Yossi Maaravi, dean of the Adelson School of Entrepreneurship, and student Itay Baron, he argued that Israel’s cities are too car-centered and need a system built around people instead.
Zinger said Israel’s population is expected to double by 2050, and that current answers, including the metro and light rail, are “too little and too late” to solve congestion at its root. He described urban transport as stuck for 100 years in the same model since the shift from horses to cars, and said it suffers from limited real capacity, extremely high construction costs, and major disruption to the city during implementation.
His company’s proposed fix is an autonomous, electric elevated network with narrow tracks about 5 meters above street level and small cars the size of private vehicles. Passengers would order rides by app, board an elevated station, and travel directly to their destination without stops, reaching up to 150 km/h on intercity routes. Zinger said the system can be built four times faster than light rail, at about a quarter of the cost, and can operate profitably. He said it would free ground space for narrower roads and wider bike lanes, creating what he called “Copenhagen on steroids.”
Zinger said Rwanda is expected to be the first country to adopt the system at scale, while hoping Israeli bureaucracy will not block Tel Aviv from following. He also said Israel needs similar paradigm shifts in health and education. In health, he wants a system focused on early detection and prevention, using data, AI and biomarkers to identify diseases like cancer and heart disease earlier. In education, he called for a more “Israeli” school model inspired by youth movements, pre-army academies and the military, with more responsibility, initiative and mentorship. He said that in an AI era, curiosity and motivation matter more than information, and imagined each child having three “teachers”, AI, an older student and an adult guide. In his new book, “The Israeli Genius,” he says Israel’s strength lies not just in intelligence but in community, cohesion and the ability to act together.
