Fading in and out of posts about Uber and Lyft, since Uber’s beta launch in San Francisco, in 2010, Uber has now reached 70 countries. As former posts noted, by 2015, when New York City was well-served by 13,200 taxis – many owners and/or drivers whose entire families went into permanent debt to fund one vehicle’s medallion had plummeted to $805,000 from $1.05M the year before. By mid-2015, it had plummeted to $740,000. Of course, former Mayor Bill DeBlasio had, by then, allowed 15,000 Ubers into the City, none of which had to buy a medallion. As these dynamics decimated the City’s taxi system, all types and manner of despair has haunted both Uber and Lyft drivers (few who even know it) – which I have covered in two dozen posts. (I left it to the New York Times to cover, extensively, the destroyed lived of the City’s taxi drivers and their families – and whose drivers have effectively become indentured servants, since the explosion of Ubers into New York City has turned their family fortunes to dust.)
Thankfully, former NYC Mayor Eric Adams, swimming neck deep in an alleged pool of corruption, thankfully cut off the number of Ubers operating in the City by capping them at 60,000. One interesting consequence of this oversaturation has been this mode’s contribution to the agonizing death of the City’s fixed route system.
Most people don’t think of it this way, but a major difference between travel by bus versus taxi, TNC (Uber and Lyft) and automobile is that every bus passenger pays for a seat. Other modes do not incur or charge costs by the seat. They incur them by vehicle. So a family of five taking a local bus would pay roughly $15 – although if some were children, elderly or disabled, their fares would be considerably less. In contrast, if one owned an automobile, and could find a parking spot (obviously more available in many parts of the City than in others), travel costs could be less. And for short trips, travel by taxi or TNC would also be less. As a consequence, many short bus trips – from which the MTA derived the greatest financial benefits since the occupied seats to “turnover” quickly, along more new passengers to fill them (many at $3.00 a trip) – were replaced by these otherwise bus passengers “mode-splitting” from buses to other modes. This would not have happened had bus fares disappeared – although the traffic the additional buses needed to handle the increased capacity, or even the longer dwell times these vehicles need to accommodate more boardings and alightings would have made them, and every other vehicle, travel more slowly, not “faster,” as Mayor Mamdani promised.
Particularly during the peak rush hours, when many bus passengers had to ride as standees, many who could afford it “mode split” from buses to TNCs and taxis. This mode split had the effect of not only filling the streets with more vehicles (because some personal occupancy vehicles (POVs) carry more than a single driver, a bus carrying 50 people does not replace 50 POVs. Instead, it more accurately replaces about 40. But still, that is 40 additional vehicles clogging up the streets. Further, this mode split had the effect of depriving the transit system from 40 additional fares – placing the City more in debt and jeopardizing the future of transit in the City. Only this time around, transit service would not be bailed out by an increase if FTA (formerly the Urban Mass Transportation Administration) funds, as President Johnson did in 1964.
Frankly, given his appointment of a like-minded Secretary of Transportation, it would not be a surprise if the 80 percent subsidies for its operations costs that transit now receives from the FTA (an administration withing the U.S. Department of Transportation) is reduced – although elimination altogether is highly unlikely. Of course, most people would have thought the same thing about the Agency for International Development (USAID) 15 months ago. Still, most transit riders are unlikely Republicans, much less voters for President Trump or his like-minded successor in the Republican primary in 2028. So it would be prudent to not imagine this elimination of all transit funding unthinkable. Unlikely would be a more reasonable prediction.
Just the same, the decrease in transit revenue was caused, in part, by the increased number of Ubers (and a small number of Lyfts). So even apart from the treachery and illegality of the contract these TNCs hold with their drivers, and the flagrant illegality of the contract forced upon its riders, unknowingly, the impact these intruders have had on many other City functions and dynamics – largely traffic congestion and great financial deficits – should not be overlooked.
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