Engineering cultures can be revolutionary even if the core ideas are the revolution. The startup community knows this well as it is repeated ad naseum - ideas are worthless (mostly), and its largely about the execution. Calling a cab from a phone is not new or original. Uber didn't think of it nor did they execute it first or probably even technically best. But their combination of technical execution and business acumen allowed them to raise shit tons of money, aggressive loss lead into users and grow internationally rapidly. And Taxis drivers in France are lighting cars on fire. Engineering itself can be revolutionary.
Second, and more pedestrian I suppose - It seems odd in the time of intelligence being move to the cloud, Waze and autonomous cars, to predict that the 101 will be a parking lot and investing in yesteryears mass transit is the right move. It would seem that autonomous fleets will be optimized to move people with less resources including energy, roadways, and vehicles. If anything one could argue that we should be pumping money and engineering into vehicle autonomy as its likely a better long term (something he should be able to get behind) investment than more lanes and asphalt. Sure we need to maintain roadways, but I would rather plan for more efficient and safer transport.