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Austin Is Conducting Sting Operations Against Ride-Sharing Drivers (examiner.com)
Since the Uber and Lyft ride-sharing apps stopped service in Austin, drunk driving has increased, riders are hunting for alternatives, and the police are conducting undercover sting operations against unauthorized ride-sharing drivers. With Chicago also considering new restrictions on ride-sharing apps, Slashdot reader MarkWhittington shares this report from Austin:
With thousands of drivers and tens of thousands of riders who once depended on ride-sharing services in a lurch, a group called Arcade City has tried to fill the void with a person-to-person site to link up drivers and riders who then negotiate a fare. Of course, according to a story on KVUE, the Austin city government, and the police are on the case. The Austin Police Department has diverted detectives and resources to conduct sting operations on ride-sharing drivers who attempt to operate without official sanction. Undercover operatives will arrange for a ride with an Arcade City driver and then bust them, impounding their vehicle and imposing a fine.
"The first Friday and Saturday after Uber was gone, we were joking that it was like the zombie apocalypse of drunk people," one former ride-sharing driver told Vocative.com. Earlier this month the site compared this year's drunk driving arrests to last years -- and discovered that in the three weeks since Uber and Lyft left Austin, 7.5% more people have been arrested for drunk driving.
"The first Friday and Saturday after Uber was gone, we were joking that it was like the zombie apocalypse of drunk people," one former ride-sharing driver told Vocative.com. Earlier this month the site compared this year's drunk driving arrests to last years -- and discovered that in the three weeks since Uber and Lyft left Austin, 7.5% more people have been arrested for drunk driving.
"Earlier this month the site compared this year's drunk driving arrests to last years -- and discovered that in the three weeks since Uber and Lyft left Austin, 7.5% more people have been arrested for drunk driving."
Other than catering to lobbyists for cash, there's nothing that govts enjoy more than "incidental" revenue. Literal "public safety" is somewhere near the bottom of the list, somewhere after "leaving things in better shape for my successor".
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws-Plato
It's nothing to joke about. And trying to blame a lack of taxis for commiting a crime is really pathetic.
Uber and Lyft left Austin because the VOTERS decided in a referendum to demand that they do ground checks based on fingerprints. Uber and Lyft said that what they had was good enough. Lyft and Uber lost badly and they so they left. So, to be clear for you my astroturfing friend, most people VOTED AGAINST LYFT and UBER.
"Every security scheme that is based on secrets eventually fails." - Steve Jobs
That's not exactly the whole story. After the referendum was put on the ballot, Uber and Lyft went nuts with advertising, including direct phone calls of people with Uber and Lyft accounts. Basically, they made themselves so annying that even those who might have supported them were completely pissed off. Then they had to leave to save face after all the effort they made into the vote. That left a vacuum which was filled by many small ride sharing companies.
As i understand it from hearing about it on radio a few days ago, the ride sharing company in question is a complete "pay whatever you want". (While nobody said as much on the interview, it sounded like they should have called it "all tips".) It is also structured differently than the others RSCs, and the city people wanted them to have some kind of permits that can't even be acquired by that kind of company.
Uber and Lyft left Austin because the VOTERS decided in a referendum to demand that they do ground checks based on fingerprints. Uber and Lyft said that what they had was good enough. Lyft and Uber lost badly and they so they left. So, to be clear for you my astroturfing friend, most people VOTED AGAINST LYFT and UBER.
I think it's fair to say that most people (over 50%) have never taken Uber or Lyft and were just going by the horror stories they heard on the news. Also, those people voted for more regulations, from a consumer's point of view, more regulations on others can't be that bad. Nobody likes to be regulated, but everyone is willing to regulate others.
That being said, the suggested regulation went above and beyond requiring fingerprinting the ten fingers and doing an FBI background check (which is what the UberBlack drivers are already doing as a requirement for UberBlack, and not UberX). The new regulation extends to having special lanes for taxis and buses where ridesharing cars are specifically excluded. Personally, I understand why Uber and Lyft pulled out. The fingerprinting for all its drivers is one annoyance, but having lanes designated for taxis only in a city where the taxi lobby is strong, would have been a slow way to boil the frog (or in this case, a slow way to boil Uber and Lyft).
There are a couple of problems with relying on jury nullification:
1) The average person doesn't know it's an option, and most judges won't let anyone tell them during the case.
2) One of the key purposes of the modern American jury selection process is to filter out anyone who might think for themselves.
Proof that the local government doesn't care about public safety but they do care about their budgets. Can't make their bottom line without DUI convictions and seized vehicles.
The whole purpose of the referendum was to demand that these companies do background checks for "public safety" you fucking twit. No one forced them to leave, they weren't able to get their way and out of fear that it would set a precedent which would impact their bottom line they chose to leave. If you are mad, that anger should be directed squarely at them. Arcade City is violating a law that the People of Austin voted for, so I do not fault the police for enforcing the will of the people. The increase in DUIs is unfortunate, but the city can not be responsible for the irresponsible decisions that people make while under the influence of alcohol that places the safety of others at risk.
Are they diverting precious resources away to enforce the anti-Uber law or are they making tons of money imposing fees for enforcement. You can't have both...
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I live in Austin and many smaller TNCs have moved into the city to fill the market need, and these TNCs are willing to comply with the city ordinances.
Build and fund a proper public transportation system.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
At voir dire you must never admit to being an advocate of jury nullification, even though it's a power you have as a juror. If you exercise it in a given trial, always have some interpretation of the evidence and testimony, however strained, to use as an excuse. You have the right to be as tricky as the prosecutor is at interpreting the case.
First, I am violently against the idiotic regulations passed by our city council that pushed Uber and Lyft our. But that does not justify bullshit statistics. This 7.5% increase stat is repeated by everyone and its total
It compares number of absolute arrests to same period last year. It does not account for increased population in a rapidly growing area. It does not consider APD force size. It does not consider APD enforcement priorities. It does not consider APD coverage densities downtown vs elsewhere. I could go on.
Enough already. There are plenty of actual facts and actual logic to show how stupid the TNC licensure measures are. We don't need to make shit up and rely on the fact that 90% of Americans failed stats101.
true story: I was in Austin last summer. I was having a bad allergic reaction cuz where I was staying was an old house and there was so much dust. Out for drinks with my buddies, and my top lip starts swelling up cuz allergies. long story short, we drink, we drink, and my lip gets so huge it makes me look like a platypus!
head on home, go to bed, then next AM it is still swollen up! I thought it would subside during the night. so I look up on my phone where the nearest urgent care clinic is, so I could get a shot of steroids in the butt to put everything back in order. But first I needed to find a way to get there. Cuz I didn't have a car.
SO I TOOK A LYFT.
Only like a 10 minute drive, got my shot, and everything went back to normal.
I wish people would pay attention to success stories like this, before making rash decisions at the polls!
It's nothing to joke about. And trying to blame a lack of taxis for committing a crime is really pathetic.
No one is blaming a lack of taxis or saying that the scumbags that drive drunk are not ethically reprehensible. What we are saying is that people are marginally shitty and if you make it marginally-harder for them to do the right thing then marginally fewer will do the right thing. That's not a moral statement, it's an empirical one.
That's not an argument anyone accused of drunk driving should be able to raise a defense, but it is certainly an argument to present to a legislative authority debating whether or not fingerprinting or background checking will make things more or less safe.
The whole purpose of the referendum was to demand that these companies do background checks for "public safety" you fucking twit. No one forced them to leave, they weren't able to get their way and out of fear that it would set a precedent which would impact their bottom line they chose to leave. If you are mad, that anger should be directed squarely at them
They are not obligated to serve the city if they don't want to. And you certainly cannot blame them for the fact that the same people that voted to restrict their operations chose to be shitheads and risk others' lives by driving drunk.
As to the public safety argument, I think one has to be aware that measures that were intended to increase public safety do not always work in the way intended. I'm sure the voters believed at the time (and perhaps justly so) that the background checks would increase safety. As an empirical matter, that may or may not turn out to be true -- the measures might have that effect, no effect or may have the opposite effect than what was intended.
Ever think that's because advocates of nullification are generally assholes that want to make trials to be about _them_ for egocentric reasons instead of the actual court case? Really, ranting about jury nullification is commonly associated with such far-out crap like sovereign citizens, tax denialism and other idiotic shit.
Preaching for something that exists for _extremely_ unusual circumstances for, like, every court case one doesn't like the result of is a good way to destroy this tool for the truly exceptional cases where it would be useful.
(expecting to be moderated as troll - let's see...)
"Hey Ez, where you headed?" my neighbor asks.
"Up to the store to get a few things" I yell back.
"Mind if I ride along? I need some stuff too."
"Sure, hop on in" I tell her.
"Thanks! Here's a five for gas." she says as she climbs into my car.
Uber, Lyft, and the like don't "share" rides, they are taxi services.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Since Colorado legalized marijuana there has been a 300% increase in hospital visits related to marijuana usage.
You don't suppose that might be because people avoided actually seeking medical care before, because they were afraid of getting into legal trouble?
From that point of view, the 300% increase would be a positive outcome.
Taxis are artificially expensive, and generally as slow as they want to be. Particularly when legislation has driven competition out and they have no reason to be timely or reasonably priced.
Myself, I don't trust taxis, because the last time I did, I waited an hour for one at 2 AM, and when the one assigned to me showed up on tracking in the parking lot, it passed me by to pick up a bigger fare. The app then said that I had been picked up. When I tried to get another cab, the dispatcher called me, cursed me out, said it wasn't my cab and to keep waiting. After a SECOND hour of waiting, I had no alternative but to walk 2.5 miles home at 4 AM in shoes not suitable for walking in. I am now permanently disabled due to this walk aggravating a tissue disorder in my foot where the connective tissue holding my bones in place was not formed right. I wish I had documented this and sued the fuck out of the taxi company, but it was another 18 months before I really understood the extent or nature of my injury (I didn't know about the tissue disorder).
I've never waited more than 7 minutes for an uber or lyft, and that's only if they got delayed by a train or drawbridge.
Guess who I trust and who I don't?
"Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
It's a sickening sign that liberalism is entrenching itself in Austin.
Austin is a college town and has always been liberal (at least by Texas standards). College students tend to favor authoritarian solutions to economic issues. There is nothing new about that.
Unless you specifically WANT to get out of jury duty, then I suggest you saying something like "I believe in jury nullification and look forward to educating my fellow jury members if chosen for a case."
Zorg: Look at all these little things! So busy now! Notice how each one is useful. A lovely ballet ensues, so full of form and color. Now, think about all those people that created them. Technicians, engineers, hundreds of people, who will be able to feed their children tonight, so those children can grow up big and strong and have little teeny children of their own, and so on and so forth. Thus, adding to the great chain of life. You see, father, by causing a little destruction, I am in fact encouraging life. In reality, you and I are in the same business.
Fact: accident and injuries caused by driver impairment happen at levels around .15 and that number has not changed no matter what they've done with the laws. The people you need to be worried about are habitual drunks who have no regard for anything, and that's another thing that laws and checkpoints and other modern bullshit does not change.
Uh, NO.
There's no "magic switch" that happens after your blood alcohol level goes above 0.15. It's a gradual ramp upward of increased risk of accident, beginning somewhere around 0.05, based on a number of studies.
By the time you reach 0.08 (the threshold of many municipalities), you're at somewhere between twice the risk and 7 times the risk of a sober person of causing an accident. (Different studies come up with different figures, but there's a clear and significant relationship.) By the time you get up to your proposed limit of 0.15, you're up to about 25 times greater chance of causing an accident than a sober person.
It *is* true that the *majority* of drunk-driving accidents are caused by people who are significantly impaired, something like 75% of them by people with 0.15 and up. But that still leaves a significant number of people below your threshold who cause accidents.
So I at least won't joke about actual DUI but I will joke about the laws, and I will insult at every opportunity the profiteering and ruining of countless lives for no reason by our 'justice' system.
There are obviously screwed up aspects of drunk-driving laws, as there are with most things. But your assumptions ("FACT") are NOT true. Even a couple of drinks is often enough to begin to impact your driving abilities, and if you're driving over the limit (whether 0.08 or 0.1 or whatever), you ARE at significantly greater risk of causing an accident than a sober person.
Be responsible. Stop kidding yourself and saying, "Yeah I'm okay to drive" when you've had 5 or 6 beers (which is what it takes for a typical adult male of average weight to get to around 0.15). I can't believe any mods have modded this up as "informative."
Virtually everyone is now choosing not to call a cab where as before they were choosing to call a cab, because cabs were a necessary evil prior to Uber/Lyft. You might not be that bright (or maybe you're just a dishonest shill for Yellow Cab) but I bet you can subtract well enough to spot the implication here. ;)
Everything new is the infestation of California Residents. We watched the change over 5 years. It we got out just before they banned BBQ's in town.
~ People that think they are better than anyone else for any reason are the cause of all the strife in the world.
When the city forces breweries to provide parking for their customers, then I think the city is at least partially responsible for the predictable drunk driving crashes that result, don't you?
And how is it not entrapment when the city encourages a behavior and then prosecutes people for doing it?
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
Harlan F. Stone, Chief Justice
Believe me, Uber & Lyft made a statement by leaving months before the deadline for compliance. They were well aware that they would disrupt many of their employees (one of whom I know) and, as pointed out in the article, left drunks without a plan.
Uber & Lyft have been roundly criticized for this "I taking my marbles and going home!" tactic.
That was Zen, this is Tao
Public transit systems require massive subsidies even for their service during high traffic hours. The idea that they could break even after midnight is utterly disconnected from reality.
I didn't know liberals were the only ones interested in following laws. Thanks for the information.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Just because you don't understand the reason why they are so expensive doesn't mean they are artificially expensive.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
If you don't understand the reasons why the taxi industry is regulated then just say so. You'll still look like an idiot, just a smaller one.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Sounds like a reason to complain to the local government, not to usher in a totally unregulated company.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
If ride sharing services are doing the same thing as a taxi (ie. taxiing a passenger from point A to point B for profit) then they should qualify as a taxi and follow all taxi laws. Otherwise all taxi companies need to have their medallions bought out at market value by corresponding governments and we abandon all the regulation so that everyone can be on even ground again.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.