A hybrid network is a walled garden with two kinds of car
The London Assembly Transport Committee published its report on autonomous transport in London in October 2026. Omnia was one of 44 organisations that submitted written evidence.
The most revealing passage is one of the shortest. Uber told the Committee it envisions a hybrid network, with autonomous and human-driven cars bookable on the same platform, and Freenow described the same model for its own launch, planned for 2027. It is a sensible plan for each of them. It is also a description of how London's market will be divided: each platform blending its own robotaxis with its own drivers, and a passenger who wants to compare them doing it the way they do today, by opening several apps.
The evidence on empty miles shows what that costs. A study cited to the Committee found that close to half of the miles driven by Waymo's vehicles carried no passenger. Every platform says it wants fewer empty miles, but each can only reduce them within its own fleet. The Committee's response — recommending that TfL make empty miles a core reporting metric for permits — is the right first step. Once it is measured, the cost of fragmentation becomes visible.
The Committee's real alternative is in its final chapter. In Oslo, the public transport authority runs a small autonomous shuttle service built into its own travel app. The authority decided which problem it wanted solved, owns the relationship with the passenger, and procures the vehicles. The Committee clearly prefers this, and asks TfL to study whether autonomy could serve the Mayor's Transport Strategy rather than simply arrive in it.
TfL told the Committee it is not planning for that now. That is understandable: the private operators are arriving first, and somebody has to license them safely.
But the question will come back, probably first outside London, where combined authorities already run their own networks. We will be watching TfL's response to Recommendation 13.
Where we sit
When a public body owns the passenger and several fleets compete to carry them, someone has to decide which vehicle takes which journey, on terms every fleet can see and every passenger can trust. That decision cannot sit inside any one of the fleets.
That is the layer Omnia has built. The party with the passengers sets the rules, each fleet sets its own terms, and every allocation can be explained afterwards. No fleet decides for the others.