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SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

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Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#101

Post by toomuchtodo »

saryant wrote: post #95
toomuchtodo wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> oil companies Yes. They've known about their products causing climate change for decades. They should be liquidated. > agriculture companies Some, not all. > and all the large banks Only the ones that are "too big to fail" or those engaged in illegal activities.

So... who provides the energy that makes our lifestyle possible is this magical world of yours?

Oh come on. Enough sunlight hits the earth in an hour to power worldwide consumption for a year.

It takes an infinitesimal amount of land if you were going to use solar alone [1]. There is enough wind power potential in the US midwest, from North Dakota to Texas, to power the entire US 4x over [2]. There's enough generation capacity to move 77% of light vehicles in the US over to electric immediately. There's plenty of energy to go around.

Fun fact: The latest budget bill that passed at the end of 2015 had one of the largest subsidies (ITC production tax credit) for solar and wind generation installation ever.

[1] http://cleantechnica.com/files/2015/05/Land-art-AreaRequired...

[2] http://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2015/05/f22/Enabling-... (page 6)

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#102

Post by mywittyname »

bobby_9x wrote: post #78
function_seven wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your use of "unions" causes the reader to assume you mean "labor unions", which is why your original comment is gray.

My original comment is gray because most people don't want to admit that unions cause inefficiency and bloat. I think people on HN are smarter than that.

Your comments are grey because your statements are completely ignorant.

Major cities instituted a medallion system for taxi, restricting who could operate a taxi service. The owners of the cab companies in major cities bribed the local governments into limiting the number of medallions in circulation, then bought all of the medallions. Meaning that cab companies have government-sanctioned monopolies on taxi service in many major metro areas of the US.

As others stated, this is an example of a cartel, not a labor union. And the entire purpose of cartels is to maintain artificially high prices.

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#103

Post by bstanfield »

rhino369 wrote: post #60
mayank wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Who cares about knowledge of city streets? Funny story: for a while in SF, the taxi union (?) was running ads that were thinly veiled attacks on Uber/Lyft. One of them showed a smiling taxi driver with the caption "would you rather have a driver who knows the city by heart or by GPS?" I found it particularly hilarious because the answer, for me at least, is GPS with live traffic information. Just another example of…

GPS still doesn't beat a good driver 9 out of 10 times for city driving. Uber drives consistently miss exits, head down clearly mistaken paths created by GPS errors, sit there staring at the GPS rather than the road I uber to work everyday and 90% of the time the uber driver blindly follows GPS through an alley that isn't really meant for traffic, ignoring the much simpler and faster route that whatever GPS uber uses…

You Uber to work every day? Isn't that terribly expensive?

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#104

Post by saurik »

Grishnakh wrote: post #4

Too bad, so sad... If they hadn't allowed their service to get so horrible, with nasty old cars, drivers that don't speak English and drive around in circles to increase fares, drivers claiming their card readers are "broken" so you have to pay cash, taking an hour to show up when called, passing by black people, etc., then this wouldn't be happening. From the article: "Cab drivers, on the other hand, maintain that t…

> Who cares about knowledge of city streets? Haven't they heard of Google Maps and Waze and GPS?

If I get into a cab, the driver asks where I am going, and I stump them by naming a major hotel, I personally feel like that was a frustrating failure, as now we are stuck in an intersection while I try to teach them the layout of a city I know less about than they do: the reason I am hiring a cab driver in the first place is because I want to outsource transportation, and the power that comes from being able to a street hail a cab to anywhere I want to go is tremendously useful.

The way I would describe the benefit is that "if I am using a cab it is generally because I don't know where I am or where I need to be". Imagine if you went to a restaurant, ordered a sandwich, and the waiter was like "ok, I can make that, but can you tell me what goes in it?" or hire a consultant to build some software for you and they say "ok, I can type that, but how do I build this?".

The real problem in San Francisco is that it was impossible to street hail. Your best strategy was typically to go to a nearby hotel and tip the valet to flag you a cab. Even then you were effectively screwed. And the dispatch at every cab company I have ever dealt with (except for Radio Cab in Portland) is a mess, and often they just lose track of fares.

What Uber and Lyft provided is just software that they could have sold to the cab companies to replace their dispatch, which would have solved these problems and worked in the existing ecosystem, but they wanted to take over the world and vertically integrate. I can see why, even if it frustrates me that we live in a world where that is even possible, as I do not see them as net forces for good :/.

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#105

Post by rayiner »

karmacondon wrote: post #92
Grishnakh wrote: post #4

Too bad, so sad... If they hadn't allowed their service to get so horrible, with nasty old cars, drivers that don't speak English and drive around in circles to increase fares, drivers claiming their card readers are "broken" so you have to pay cash, taking an hour to show up when called, passing by black people, etc., then this wouldn't be happening. From the article: "Cab drivers, on the other hand, maintain that t…

I've never had any of these experiences when riding in cabs. The cars were always ok, the drivers were polite and well spoken, they took direct routes and never demanded cash. I use Uber for one simple reason: It's 30% cheaper than a cab. It isn't the quality of the cars, the personality of the drivers or the nature of the service. All of those things vary from case to case for every transportation service. Uber's on…

Uber is sometimes more convenient and sometimes not. Downtown Chicago, NYC, or DC, it's more convenient hail the cab already driving by you. In the burbs Uber is more convenient.

From Union Station in DC I take Uber, even though the cab line is way more convenient. It's about 40% cheaper accounting for no tip. Silicom Valley subsidizes my morning commute!

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#107

Post by stickfigure »

saurik wrote: post #104
Grishnakh wrote: post #4

Too bad, so sad... If they hadn't allowed their service to get so horrible, with nasty old cars, drivers that don't speak English and drive around in circles to increase fares, drivers claiming their card readers are "broken" so you have to pay cash, taking an hour to show up when called, passing by black people, etc., then this wouldn't be happening. From the article: "Cab drivers, on the other hand, maintain that t…

> Who cares about knowledge of city streets? Haven't they heard of Google Maps and Waze and GPS? If I get into a cab, the driver asks where I am going, and I stump them by naming a major hotel, I personally feel like that was a frustrating failure, as now we are stuck in an intersection while I try to teach them the layout of a city I know less about than they do: the reason I am hiring a cab driver in the first plac…

but they wanted to take over the world and vertically integrate

You make this sound like there was a choice. Taxi companies are monopolistic entrenched bureaucracies. "Pay us money, run our software, and totally change the way your business operates" is just not going to happen.

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#108

Post by xxpor »

randomdrake wrote: post #94

This is not surprising at all. Traveling around the world, cab drivers are often times some of my favorite people. I like the profession, generally finding cab drivers to be interesting and knowledgeable of local areas. In San Francisco, I try to take regular cabs when I can just to meet people and support the old profession and working class folks. Bay Area, about a week ago. It was dark, cold, and raining around 5:…

Why do you let them tell you they don't take cards? From a quick googling, it seems like taxis in SF must take cards. If they drive me somewhere and the machine's broken, that's not my problem.

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#109

Post by blklane »

bstanfield wrote: post #103
rhino369 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GPS still doesn't beat a good driver 9 out of 10 times for city driving. Uber drives consistently miss exits, head down clearly mistaken paths created by GPS errors, sit there staring at the GPS rather than the road I uber to work everyday and 90% of the time the uber driver blindly follows GPS through an alley that isn't really meant for traffic, ignoring the much simpler and faster route that whatever GPS uber uses…

You Uber to work every day? Isn't that terribly expensive?

Not really, I lyft to work often and its $5 each way door to door.

Re: SF Yellow Cab to file for bankruptcy

#110

Post by mikeash »

"In reality, we have the best color scheme there is in the world, we’ve got a lot of loyal customers, we still get a high volume of calls to our color scheme on a daily basis"

Does "color scheme" have a special meaning in the taxi business, or is this guy actually bragging about how their cars are painted?

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