Slashdot Mirror
Canadian Town Picks Uber For Public Transit (cnet.com)
Stephen Shankland reports via CNET: Innisfil, population 32,727 as of 2014, concluded in a March council meeting that subsidizing the car-hailing service was a better deal than paying for a bus line. The city plans to pay 100,000 Canadian dollars (about $75,000) for a first stage of the program and CA$125,000 for a second round about 6 to 9 months in. That compares to CA$270,000 annually for one bus and CA$610,000 for two, the town said. The town evaluated on-demand transit proposals as an alternative to buses. "Uber emerged as the only company with an app-based platform (i.e. UberPool) that would facilitate ridesharing and the matching of two or more passengers on trips across the entire town," the town said in its explanation of the move. Innisfil will subsidize Uber trips so citizens pay between CA$3 and CA$5 themselves, depending on the destination, the town said. "You can't have taxpayers pay for a transit system which they cannot use," Innisfil Mayor Gord Wauchope told The Toronto Star. "And this was a transit system that people can get from anywhere in the town of Innisfil, and use it for a reasonable price."
What telephone number do I dial to hail an "Uber" ? I do not have a so-called "smart" so-called "telephone".
"You can't have taxpayers pay for a transit system which they cannot use,"
And for those citizens without a smartphone?
Innisfil will subsidize Uber trips so citizens pay between CA$3 and CA$5 themselves, depending on the destination, the town said.
Isn't CA$3 to CA$5 per ride more expensive than bus rides?
Uber may be better for the city, but it doesn't sound like it will be better for the consumer.
Perhaps an uber-like system operating minibuses would be ideal. Finland was trying something like this. There were no set bus lines/routes. People just asked for a ride and the system would build the route on the fly.
Our local public transit union (Gatineau, QC) just ended a period of rotating strikes. Honestly, I was hoping the city would have ditched the drivers and simply proposed an uber-like solution. But, in the end, the city caved in (which probably will result in higher fares for us because). I can hardly wait for the day we can fire all of these unionised drivers and replace them with autonomous vehicles.
Here it is in Trump's own words:
Let that sink in. He's crowing about the strongest consecutive months of hiring since 2015.
That's like saying, "Today, I had the biggest bowel movement since yesterday! WINNING!"
You are welcome on my lawn.
Innisfil, population 32,727 as of 2014
Is anybody else weirdly disappointed that the town does not have 41 more people?
Great for the town budget now, but lousy for long term social stability. They're encouraging part-time under-employment.
It would have been better to launch a town-owned cab company. Probably with somewhat worse service, but with full employment for a couple of people. (Innisfil only has a population of 36K). And with city-owned, electric vehicles.
Even better would have been to escalate this to the county level, and let Simcoe build a region-wide transit system based on the taxi model. By scaling up they could have some inter-city links and a few handicap/accessible vans. Simcoe county is about 5K square kilometers and has four or five decent-sized urban centers in it.
I am no Luddite. I am all for modern technology. I started programming in 1977. Any techie with a few brain cells would never pay for the privilege of using a locked-down dumbed-down toy spy computer. Did you not read "1984" ? These so-called "smart" devices are telescreens. Or are you so hoodwinked by the groupthink you can't see that?
Innisfil is more a township than a town.
https://www.google.ca/maps/place/Innisfil,+ON/@44.2663747,-79.608043,12z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x882ab00dc176ce35:0xf7066f5ec40dbd0a!8m2!3d44.3008813!4d-79.6114973
A rather spread out township. The small downtown part being 6kmx3km (4mi x 2mi) then a number of isolated subdivisions where a farm has been turned into a subdivision further out.
Good idea, except that they will be giving 20% of that money to Uber. Have they used their own application, they could end up saving a lot.
In the U.S., a city that size likely would not have any public transit save school buses or the senior trolley. The only exception would be if it were a suburb of a larger city in which case the city's buses would extend out to the suburb. I am not sure if Innisfil is some isolated community or near a larger city, but either way this seems like a strange solution. It also seems strange that two buses are more than double the cost of one.
Seems like Innisfil tailored the contract for Uber. Does Lyft work in Canada?
Anyway, since Uber drivers bear almost all of the costs how will Uber fulfill the contract if drivers can not profit?
Who do you sue when the Uber driver is exhausted from doing 20 fares that day and has an accident and his insurance refuses to cover anything since they found out he was operating the vehicle as a taxi.
I suppose it ought to be Innisfil for picking this evil company.
It is pretty clear to me that the point of the town paying for Uber as a "bus" service is that these drivers will be subsidized for the purpose of being diverted by Uber automatically to bus stops to pick people up that are waiting there. They're not just subsidizing the cost, that wouldn't make sense. Their is a new process that won't involve smart phones. I can't confirm that, but it's just basic reasoning. If I had to guess either they're installing a "hail a ride" button at the bus stops. Or, Uber will occasionally just automatically divert a driver to stop at these bus stops and indicate they should wait a few minutes to pick up anyone and leave with however many passengers got in if any. And, if none get in, then they just move on to the next fare if available and so on.
Are you pining for another 8 years of Obama-style "recovery"?
Because Trump's been President for ten weeks, and his two months of job growth already matches Obama's two best ever?
How about Susan Rice? Proving every damn thing liberals have said about how Republicans would abuse the pervasive surveillance state? I can't wait for President Obama to do away with all those warrantless wiretaps just like he promised.
How does Uber guarantee that a car will always be available in a town of 32,000 people?
outsourcing the town newspaper to The Onion
Look up "Stockholm Syndrome" as you seem to have it.
Access to TaxPayer funds. That is the holy grail. That is the only thing that justfies the lofty valuation of these companies.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Your worldview requires that everyone be a full-time wage slave.
Uber as I recall, requires a smart phone. The initial cost may be less but there are who other costs: Privacy (Uber gets all that public data for sale..mmm..mmm..), and it forces anyone who doesn't have money for a car to buy a cell phone. If you are in a lower income bracket, that may be impossible (and don't forget there are monthly bills as well as phone purchase prices, whether contract or from ebay). Oh, and don't forget, the city will basically be a ransom to Uber because if they pull out, all of a sudden no public transportation. This is going to be trouble. Short term gains for long term pain.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
With a population of 32,727 (2014 est.) the entire town, the Mayor and Council and Police Chief and Police Force and Fire Protection and Health Services and Sanitation Services become Uber employees!
Haha
so will any uber driver have full insurance? in that town and not ubers on / off one?
WIll the town do safety and background checks?
I live in Innisfil, what can I say.... Mayor Gord Wauchope is totally out of touch with his community. This is a horrible solution to the town needing to invest in public transit. At the end of this little experiment, our monies that are currently allocated to "public transit" will be depleted and we won't have anything to show for it.
Another reader points out that when we get up to $5 for a ride, that is expensive compared to public transportation, and they're not wrong. The distances that most residents will be traveling, nobody is ever going to see a fare as cheap as $3.
But hey, we're used to poor decisions here in Innisfil. This year (almost in opposition to our provincial leadership which announced 18% cuts to electrical rates) our local power utility has announced their intention in INCREASE our electrical rates by almost 12%.
If they're charging bus prices for Uber service they'll get more business than they can handle. A lot of people don't use the bus due to the difficulty of hauling groceries, the distance to the bus stop, and worry about dirty busses.
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
I have to say, I'm unbelievably happy to see this. The effects of a program like this are far greater reaching than the article mentions. First of all, it creates income opportunities for more people than just the couple of drivers of a bus. Second it eliminates the need for the town to cover the maintenance costs for large investments like that, but drives more opportunities for local automotive maintenance businesses (usually smaller family owned establishments). Third, they are putting money into the service, not buying an expensive "thing". What will they do with a bus in 5-6 years when it's worn out and needs to be replaced? Buying large items like that doesn't solve the need, but subsidising a service industry that does solve the need it really smart.
In the current economy where cities are constantly fighting against service based businesses like Uber, AirBnB and others that don't pay their premiums for cab medallions and hotel licenses, this is a real win, not only for the local population, but for local businesses to improve their individual opportunities. I'm not in the industry, but so far as I can tell, this is an all around win that doesn't require the local government to establish more rules and regulation, more people to enforce those rules and more time to be wasted in council meetings discussing all of the "what-if" scenarios. For those, like me, that favor smaller government that still works for the people, this is a great example that I hope to see replicated all over.
I'll use my personal "commute" as an example of how this works with, not against, other larger public transit systems.
My typical work day is as follows:
1. Drive to my local train station (about 4 miles from home so let's say $2 in gas and averaged maintenance costs).
2. Pay $1.50 to park at the train station (large lot with about 300 spaces for commuters).
3. Take a train to the city $200 monthly (I'm in the suburbs).
4. Take the train back to my local station.
5. Drive home (another $2 in gas/maintenance).
The public transportation in the large municipal area where I live is very good, but locally in my town, there are no bus options for getting to the train.
IF we implemented something like this in our town, I would pay my $4 a day to an Uber driver that would drive me too and from the train station. Now, maybe that doesn't save me any money, but it doesn't cost anything more. The local town, on the other hand, can take that huge space for parking, where the cost of maintaining the lot is barely covered by the parking fees, and create a great new "downtown" business space where a coffee shop and other commuter conveniences would be right at the train station.
Here are the big wins in my mind:
New local businesses generate more local tax revenues for an overall increase in local government revenues.
Environmental improvements with fewer greenhouse emissions from cars.
Less traffic in the downtown suburb.
Local folks that are looking for a "side hustle" to make ends meet have another opportunity!
Here's the really interesting thing. My wife and I probably only need one car! That's at least $5,000 a year back in my pocket.
Honestly, I don't see the downside in suburban areas like this. Would it work in a larger metropolitan city? Probably not since busses and subways really do a good job to alleviate the traffic that would be caused by a bunch of extra cars that only hold 3-4 people at a time, but I really think that more smaller towns, like mine, can benefit from this in a big way.
Dissenter
"There is no knowledge that is not power."
privacy concerns aside, they need two vendors or else Uber will jack their prices. If the subsidy is "make it cost $3 - $5," they will quickly eat up the whole subsidy and the town will be stuck, "but mah budget." If the subsidy is "xx%," they will raise prices so the consumer sees the same price they would have otherwise, and take the subsidy as free money. It is basic microecon; how can this be prevented without two vendors? The standard move is to negotiate prices for the subsidy period, then threaten to revoke the subsidy and go back to busses at the end of the period unless you get another period of proper prices negotiated, but you cannot easily sign a price contract with Uber because the prices are opaque and algorithmic.
on all those rides. That's why this works. So long as they can leverage Uber's loses to their gains this is going to be a good deal. The real question is will Uber burrow in like a tick when the prices start rising and screw everyone over.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Putting in the infrastructure early is always easier than retrofitting.... uber is just a "cheap" way out of our current situation that is going to cost us the future of our public transportation system. By the time the town outgrows this stop-gap solution, it is going to cost us multiple times as much to put in the infrastructure that we should be investing in today.
You could also maybe recognize that computers are computers. They compute. Size isn't really the issue.
You're right. The issue is whether it's truly a personal computer, in that the person who owns it controls what computing is done. A home microwave oven has a computer in it, but it's not a personal computer in this sense. Neither is an iPhone or iPad in most cases, particularly when the device for loading user-written programs into an iPhone or iPad costs more than the iPhone or iPad itself.
Slashdot should reach out to the mayor for a Q&A session.
-=-Ze End-=-
So how well does Uber handle wheelchairs?
A lot of municipalities also have (somewhat) on-demand or scheduled service available for seniors and the disabled and I'd expect this same kind of thing to start happening for some of those. I'm pretty sure my town (Chicago suburbs) maintains at least two small buses for this purpose along with maintenance, drivers, staffing for scheduling, etc. and I think for most things you have to schedule a day in advance and the hours are limited.
Subsidizing Uber or Lyft to provide those services instead might save the village money depending on details I don't know, but it could also provide much better service by being easier to utilize and better able to respond to demand changes.
fencepost
just a little off
I actually love Uber, but this is a *terrible* move. Two of the greatest advantages of public transit: traffic reduction and reduced carbon emissions, will not be realised with this scheme. Car sharing is a much better idea, so that hundreds of Uber vehicles aren't just randomly driving around all the time pumping CO2 into the air. It would also be more convenient and far less expensive not having to pay drivers.
Once automated vehicles are a reality, this would be a great solution, but we're a long way away from that. Even in that case, people should be expected to share their ride as much as possible.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Does uber gaurentee that a certain percentage of their fleet will be handicapped or disabled accessible? I know that this is always a consideration when designing "public" transportation systems, what promises of accessibility could uber possibly make about cars that they don't own?
I'm not clear on whether this solution will utilize taking advantage of drivers that don't realize how much their vehicle costs will take out of their cut from Uber, or if they will be paid a salary as anyone performing a public service should be.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Just because it has a Spanish name doesn't mean that it's bad.