High-tech cities become living laboratories to test automated vehicles

China's Xiongan New Area project, near Beijing, is part of the central government's ambitious drive to lead in new technologies like AI and 5G communication. Woven City, near Japan's Mount Fuji, is a much smaller project -- just 175 acres -- that is being led not by the government, but by one of its leading industrial giants, Toyota Motor Corp. If the U.S. were to build a similar prototype city, it would need to invest or direct billions of dollars in advanced technologies like 5G, vehicle-to-vehicle communication, electric charging infrastructure and vehicle automation in an area with a high population density. My thought bubble: Why not San Juan, Puerto Rico? Yes, but: Puerto Rican residents have to want to be test subjects, notes Michelle Avary, head of autonomous mobility at the World Economic Forum.