Slashdot Mirror
Data Research Reveals When Taking a Yellow Cab Is Cheaper Than an Uber
An anonymous reader writes A team of data scientists have come up with a system to identify times when regular yellow taxis are cheaper alternatives to an Uber [in New York]. Researchers from the University of Cambridge and the University of Nanmur in Belgium have compared a broad dataset of both yellow taxi and Uber fares in New York and have discovered that for a trip costing less than $35 Uber is often the most expensive option. The data scientists were able to reach this conclusion by comparing trip and fare data for each yellow taxi ride taken in 2013 and entering it into Uber's fare query system. Prices were taken from Uber's lowest-cost service Uber X and the NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission.
They do it because of the smell.
I always thought that Uber was more expensive, the idea being you could usually get an Uber car more easily than hailing a cab.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Or a surge pricing multiplier kicks in while you are waiting your 20 minutes for the car to pitch up, only to suddenly get a cancellation notification... I guess the driver found a better fare.
I don't take Uber (or more often: Lyft) because it's cheaper. I use these services because 1) the car actually shows up, 2) when it's supposed to, and 3) I know ahead of time how much it will cost. Even if it's a couple of bucks more, that's well worth the vastly better customer service.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Just so folks know, UberX in NYC is unlike UberX in any other market, in that the cars are drivers are all licensed livery cars and drivers with TLC (Taxi and Limo Commission) commercial licenses and insurance. This is unlike the rest of the US, where UberX drivers and vehicles don't need commercial licenses and plates.
Only real difference between UberX and Uber Black in NYC is the quality of the car (usually Camrys or similar with UberX, and Town Cars or big SUVs with Uber Black).
8 miles is a very long taxi trip in NYC - average is 2.6 miles.
I was new to the Seattle area and a college student, asked to be taken on a mainstream road in Bellevue (148th Street iirc), the cabby claimed not to be able to find it. Mind you this was 17 years ago and was 10pm, I was desperate to meet my roomate while he was still up and get into my new apartment. What should have been a $35 taxi ride cost $105. Gas was $1.16 in the area and I thought it was high compared to my area.
I already knew he ripped me off bigtime and couldn't happen with smartphones today nearly as much, but there you have it. A lot of subsequent rides later, I see taxis trying to rip off a lot in certain areas. Taking longer routes or their meters just not corresponding with reality somehow, maybe an advertised rate and then setting a higher one (my experience not always in America, mind you).
Never used Uber, but if it's one destination, one final price, I'll take it thank you very much.
I only respect laws designed to represent the interests of the citizenry as a whole--not the vested interests of one tiny class who bribed some politicians with campaign contributions.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
What a complete and total pile of crap.
The average age of a NYC taxi is 3.3 years. They MUST be replaced after 6 years.
You can not call a yellow cab in NYC. Since you can't call one, your BS about one not showing up is false. You CAN call for a town car, which WILL show up, and has the same age limits as a regular cab, and WILL be a Lincoln Town Car or equivalent.
I don't know where you get your 'facts' from about Uber, but you sure as hell don't normally get a higher-end car or SUV. You usually get a Prius or Camry or something of that ilk.
Average fare in NYC is $13.40. Initial drop is $3.80-4.30, depending on time of day.
http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/do...
The fare data does include tips. See bullet point #2 on the first page.
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1503.0302...
Huh? How can Uber drivers self-select out of short trips if they don't know where the trip is going? Also, the system doesn't work that was, as I understand it. Drivers hit the on duty button on the app, then they're available, until they hit off duty. If they get an assignment, they can in theory turn it down, but do that more than a few times, and you'll be dropped off the system.
So you'd be behind laws requiring a good driving record for drivers providing car-for-hire, requiring good maintenance for vehicles used for hire, requiring honest pricing, and some sort of way to check compliance with all of these requirements?
Only if those laws weren't REALLY designed to protect monopolies and money-making rackets for local governments.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Do you actually have any idea at all what the regulations are for taxis? Here are some of the rules that 'only represent one tiny class':
Cars must be inspected 3 times a year. This includes safety and cleanliness, and accessibility.
Must have a rate card with FIXED (regulated) fares (none of this surge pricing nonsense) that the fares can see
All drivers must have valid Taxicab Drivers Licenses
Must have minimum $200,000 insurance per person
Must provide workers compensation coverage for drivers
Must operate each cab a minimum of 18 hours a day (again, none of this 'I'll only drive if the rates are high enough' crap)
Drivers must be trained for wheelchair passenger assistance (owner of the cab must pay for the training)
Must have braille and raised lettering plaques with the same info as the rate card (fares, complaint line, taxi ID)
Drivers license must be displayed in a lighted frame
Must have accurate taximeter
Must have operable air conditioning
Do you actually have any idea at all what the regulations are for taxis? Here are some of the rules that 'only represent one tiny class':
Here's the deal--no matter how good taxis are, no matter how much benefit they confer, no matter how much some people prefer them, there're some people who prefer Uber, or some other service, to taxis. Some people who have a choice choose Uber instead of choosing taxis. That means, to those people, that Uber is better, to them, than traditional taxis would be, to them. Now, the taxi operators and politicians beholden to them don't like that. They want to remove that option, the option that the people prefer, in order to force them to choose taxis, which is what they don't prefer, or to choose nothing, which they also don't prefer. That being the case, it doesn't matter how good taxis are, it doesn't matter how many benefits that taxi operators and owners can tout. It doesn't matter how many benefits that politicians can tout. It doesn't matter how many benefits that shills on Slashdot can tout. It doesn't matter how many benefits that you, if I haven't already mentioned you, can tout. What matters is what people want and are willing to pay for.
I hope I've cleared that up.
~Loyal
I aim to misbehave.
The problem with that thinking is that nothing happens in a vacuum. You make it sound like Uber and the people who chose it have no impact on everyone else. When Uber comes in and gets to cherry-pick only profitable rides, and otherwise lower their price (by not doing all the things that regular cabs must do) that means the traditional cabs are not getting that business. They can't survive with their regulated rates and must-carry rules, time required on the road, etc. if they only get the unprofitable trips. That impacts not only the cab companies, but everyone who uses them, which is a whole lot more people than use Uber (236 million people per year in NYC).
If someone owns a factory they don't get to say 'yeah, everybody else has to obey EPA rules, etc, but those rules are really just to protect the existing factories, and my customers live somewhere else and don't care anyway, so we declare ourselves exempt from the law and will just dump waste into the rivers and air'. This is the same thing.
Well they are insured and they do have a license, so I am not sure your point.
They don't have a LIVERY license, and they don't have COMMERCIAL insurance.
You realize that there is a difference between standard car insurance and commercial livery insurance, right?
I'm sure you'll be happy to be sued when your Uber driver hits someone while transporting you and neither the driver's insurance nor Uber is willing to pay.
Go on, citizen, stamp the vote card. R or D, your choice.
I do not know about New York, but if you take an Uber car and get into an accident, do not count on the driver's insurance. It was invalidated the second you got in the car, having promised to pay him.
No good deed goes unpunished...
How many of those regulations really offer any value in a reservation system like Uber? Why have the license in a lighted frame when you can just display it to the user on their phone or whatever? Why does the user need to see the license anyway?
Many of those regulations herald back to the day when enforcement of the law and recordkeeping was difficult, so they had to try to keep tabs on what was going on and deputize the citizenry.
I see variable fares as a benefit. Why not have reserve drivers who are willing to step in when things get busy for a higher rate? If somebody was paying $500/hr I'd be happy to get in my car and give people a lift, but I'm not going to do it for $10/hr. That is how virtually every other area in the economy works.
Cars must be inspected 3 times a year. This includes safety and cleanliness, and accessibility.
I guess inspected does not mean fixed or repaired, based on what I've seen.
Must have a rate card with FIXED (regulated) fares (none of this surge pricing nonsense) that the fares can see
And then they tack on extra fees like tolls that they are not supposed to charge.
Must have minimum $200,000 insurance per person
Uber provides more insurance than that for drivers.
Must provide workers compensation coverage for drivers
How nice, and yet how irrelevant to me as a passenger.
Must operate each cab a minimum of 18 hours a day
Again, utterly irrelevant to me. I don't drive 18 hours a day and I can drive just fine. I only care that they are working when they pick me up. When an Uber comes to collect me they know where I am and where I wan to go, so it doesn't matter how often they drive at other times.
Drivers must be trained for wheelchair passenger assistance
But not every cab can take a wheelchair...
Must have braille and raised lettering plaques
Must they also light a fire with sticks? Using an Uber means you are using an accessible smartphone, not having some useless plaque in braille that was probably printed in the 1950s
Drivers license must be displayed in a lighted frame
With Uber you see the driver before they even get there.
Must have accurate taximeter
Which is often broken. Or is not accurate whatsoever.
Must have operable air conditioning
Uber cars do not need this and other rules like it, because they don't have cars that are such complete piles of shit you must specify rules like this. They just have working AC because WHO DOES NOT HAVE AC IN A CAR.
Uber: the car transport for people with common sense.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Besides there is nothing preventing the pro-cab drivers from participating in the Uber market place. Maybe they need to spend less time whining and more time driving.