The Journey Matters: Transportation Lessons from FIFA 2026

With the FIFA World Cup now behind us and the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games less than two years away, transportation professionals have an opportunity to reflect on one of the largest mobility operations ever attempted in North America. Host cities welcomed millions of fans, coordinated dozens of venues across three countries, and managed the movement of people on a scale rarely seen outside of global sporting events. The biggest lesson from FIFA 2026 wasn't about parking or transit. It was that transportation succeeds only when every organization involved delivers one seamless customer experience.

The Lesson

FIFA 2026 transportation planning extended well beyond parking as systems focused on how fans would arrive at venues instead of where fans would park.  Host cities invested in coordinated networks of rail, buses, park-and-ride facilities, pedestrian corridors, rideshare operations, and digital wayfinding to create a seamless journey from hotel to stadium and back again. Parking remained an important component of the system, but it was intentionally designed as one part of a well-communicated, broader mobility strategy rather than the center of it.

In many cities, organizers deliberately discouraged spectators from driving directly to stadiums. New York and New Jersey limited general customer parking at MetLife Stadium and encouraged arrival by commuter rail, shuttle bus, or remote park-and-ride facilities. Philadelphia implemented similar transportation plans that emphasized transit and advance parking reservations.  

Los Angeles, a city often defined by its automobile culture, used the World Cup to showcase what coordinated multimodal transportation could accomplish. According to Reuters, more than 20,000 fans used dedicated shuttle buses during some matches, while other transit customers exceeded 52,000. Union Station became more than a transfer point. It became part of the event by serving as a gathering place where fans could celebrate before continuing to the stadium or stay and celebrate a game if they didn’t have tickets.

Customer experience received as much attention as transportation infrastructure. Metro stations featured multilingual ambassadors, enhanced wayfinding, hydration stations, accessibility assistance, sensory-friendly spaces, and expanded customer service teams. These improvements recognize that successful transportation is measured by more than moving people efficiently. It is also measured by how confident, comfortable, and welcome those travelers feel throughout their journey.

That philosophy was captured well by Los Angeles Metro in a statement released during the tournament: "Instead of paying for some of the most expensive stadium parking or sitting in traffic, people can focus on what matters most – celebrating the love of soccer with fellow fans from around the world while going to and from the games." Whether a customer arrived by train, shuttle, rideshare, bicycle, or personal vehicle, the objective remained the same: help people spend less time worrying about transportation and more time enjoying the event they came to experience.

Success is: Decide, Get There, and Get Home

A consistent theme across host cities was communication. Today’s customers are informed, or at least they want to be informed. They want to know where to park, which train to catch, how long the trip will take, what it will cost, and what to expect upon arrival. Good transportation planning gives customers the information they need to make good decisions for their journey. At the host cities, mobile applications, digital signage, advance travel guidance, and coordinated messaging allowed visitors to make informed transportation decisions before leaving their hotels. By distributing travel demand across multiple transportation modes, organizers reduced congestion while improving the overall experience.

Accessibility planning also became a defining feature of the tournament. Host cities expanded accessible transit options, improved pedestrian routes, added mobility assistance personnel, and designed clearer wayfinding for visitors from around the world. These efforts acknowledged that transportation systems serve people with varying physical abilities, languages, and familiarity with each city. Successful mobility planning considered all those customers.

The World Cup also demonstrated the value of interagency coordination. Transit agencies, transportation departments, public safety officials, venue operators, rideshare providers, and parking managers worked together as a single transportation system. The event became less about managing individual facilities and more about managing an entire regional network.

As transportation professionals turn their attention toward the Los Angeles Olympic Games in 2028, many of these strategies appear well-positioned for continued success. Los Angeles has already stated that the World Cup served as an important operational rehearsal for the Olympics; it provided a successful framework that can be refined over the next two years. Moving forward, success will be measured by how effectively customers know their travel options and itinerary, reach their destinations, and get home comfortably.

The Weakest Link

Big events like the World Cup and upcoming Olympics are important to our industry because they concentrate and test every component and procedure we have in place. Mega-events stress our systems and expose our weak points, making them valuable opportunities to evaluate what worked, identify where the customer experience broke down, and improve before the next event. Creating a successful customer journey requires every piece of the engineered transportation system to work together. Historically, transportation responsibilities are divided into separate disciplines: parking operators manage parking, transit agencies manage trains and buses, venue staff manage security, ticketing companies manage admissions, police manage traffic, etc. From an organizational chart, those responsibilities make perfect sense.

Customers, however, don't experience an organizational chart. They experience one continuous journey from when they decide to travel until they arrive safely at home. If any link in that chain breaks down, the entire experience suffers.

That lesson surfaced repeatedly throughout FIFA 2026. While many large-scale transportation systems performed well, many of the most widely reported frustrations occurred at the points where one system handed customers to another. In Kansas City, traffic approaching the venue became secondary to delays entering the stadium. At the World Cup Final in East Rutherford, New Jersey, long security lines and ticket-scanning problems, not transportation itself, left some spectators concerned they might miss kickoff. These were not failures of parking or transit alone; they were failures in the overall customer journey. Transportation is a system that succeeds only when its individual components work together.

Success Moving Forward to LA28

That perspective also changes how we should measure success. A parking garage can operate efficiently while guests leave frustrated because shuttle service is confusing. A train can arrive exactly on schedule while poor wayfinding leaves visitors uncertain where to go next. Security can be thorough and effective, but if screening takes so long that guests miss the opening ceremony, the entire transportation experience is remembered as a disappointment. For the customer, there is no distinction; there is only the journey.

As our industry studies the lessons from FIFA 2026 and looks ahead to LA28, there is an opportunity to continue improving how we think about mobility. The most successful transportation systems may not be those that move the most passengers, but instead the ones that help the most people arrive with confidence, comfort, and the freedom to enjoy the destination waiting for them. Transportation isn’t the destination; it’s the journey.

References

Associated Press. (July 9, 2026). LA uses World Cup to show off upgraded public transit and test plans to hold car-free Olympics. Associated Press article

Reuters. (June 27, 2026). Fans in car-centric LA embracing buses and trains for World Cup. Reuters article

FIFA World Cup 2026™ New York/New Jersey Host Committee & NJ TRANSIT. (April 17, 2026). Regional Stadium Mobility Plan. Regional Stadium Mobility Plan

Los Angeles Metro / Los Angeles World Cup Host Committee. Metro Announces Hat Trick for FIFA World Cup 2026 by Offering Enhanced Service, Affordable Parking and Customer Experience.

City of Philadelphia. (June 2026). Transportation Plan for FIFA World Cup Matches.

National Operations Center of Excellence (NOCoE). (2025). Preparing for the FIFA World Cup 2026: Lessons from Atlanta and Host Cities Peer Exchange.

Reuters. (June 3, 2026). World Cup gives North American transit a chance to shine—or be booed. Reuters background article