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A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

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Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#131

Post by zjaffee »

dokein wrote: post #2

A week ago, at the stop nearest me, the E train uptown was re-routed. The C train had an 18 minute wait (the next one after that -- 19 minutes). The station was somewhere north of 100 degrees F and packed. As the trains were one floor below the turnstiles, these issues were only visible AFTER swiping $3(A) to get into the station. The escalator was broken too, which is fine for me but bad for many others. Meanwhile,…

Make sure to vote tomorrow then, whatever you believe politically doesn't matter outside of the fact that Cuomo is very much a child of that same sort of machine politics that has run New York for the last 200 if not more years.

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#132

Post by Spooky23 »

almost_usual wrote: post #96

I like the idea of ride sharing but the problem comes when it's abused to the extreme. It's not out of the ordinary for someone to order 3-4 Lyfts on the weekend in a single evening. That is a ton of unnecessary driving to hang out or fulfill the social obligations people have. I sometimes wonder what San Francisco was like before ride sharing. I imagine people would just pick a neighborhood and hang out there.

Or get drunk, maim and kill people.

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#133

Post by Spivak »

francisofascii wrote: post #22
pwned1 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ubers and Lyfts pay the $0.25 per gallon New York gas tax, plus sales tax on top of both state and federal gas taxes (tax on a tax), so they are paying for road infrastructure, just like everyone else. It's important to note that public transit agencies don't pay gas tax, and a large portion of the federal highway fund is diverted to public transit agencies.

$0.25/gallon is roughly a penny a mile. Besides road maintenance, cars also get the right of way, add to the noise/air pollution, and add grave danger to pedestrians, all for a penny a mile.

Other than the fact that it feels cheap and you think drivers deserve to pay more is there any reason that you believe $0.01/mi is too little? I mean it's about $1500 over the life of every car. Does a single passenger vehicle really cause more than $1500 worth of externalities?

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#134

Post by TallGuyShort »

rossdavidh wrote: post #95

I live in Austin, which for a period of time had basically driven out Uber and Lyft with regulation. Then, the Texas state government overruled the city, and Uber and Lyft came back. I can say from personal experience, our traffic did not get the slightest bit better when Uber and Lyft were gone. However, our drunk driving rates did apparently go up.

In my admittedly limited experience in Austin, the problem is more parking than traffic a lot of the time (at least downtown). I rented a car the last couple of times I visited but walked or changed plans to avoid moving it. Could I have used Uber at the time, I wouldn't have rented a car in the first place: I would've effectively shared one with others, kept another parking spot open the whole time, and would've been more flexible and saved a lot of time.

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#135

Post by tmcw »

cbhl wrote: post #7

There's a simple solution to this -- buses! We don't even need public tax dollars to pay for them. There were plenty of startups that wanted to run "Uber, but with a bus instead of a Car" and they all died because of regulation from the cities. Hell, Google (and other tech companies) will happily pay for its own buses to reduce VMT, but taking away street parking to add bus stops is political suicide in San Francisco…

> There were plenty of startups that wanted to run "Uber, but with a bus instead of a Car" and they all died because of regulation from the cities.

In most cases, the inverse of this statement is closer to the truth: most 'micro transit' companies have been propped up by government subsidies but have nevertheless constantly lost money on each ride. Here's some good background reading on that point: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/06/26/the-story-of-micro-tr...

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#136

Post by manigandham »

komali2 wrote: post #125
manigandham wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many places, like in California, do not have good public transportation and Uber is the only decent option. That statement in the article is definitely a heavy assumption.

The counter argument is that you no longer feel pressure to kick the issue to your congressperson to push for public transit, because a "good enough" solution has been presented (a solution that isn't as good for the environment or city than a bus).

Maybe, but perhaps the politicians should automatically look out and plan for the public good instead of needing a line-by-line spec sheet for their job.

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#137

Post by pwned1 »

vkou wrote: post #12
pwned1 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ubers and Lyfts pay the $0.25 per gallon New York gas tax, plus sales tax on top of both state and federal gas taxes (tax on a tax), so they are paying for road infrastructure, just like everyone else. It's important to note that public transit agencies don't pay gas tax, and a large portion of the federal highway fund is diverted to public transit agencies.

Gas tax does not go nearly enough of the way to paying for infrastructure. Most road maintenance is paid for by property and income taxes. $0.25/gallon is peanuts. New York (State) consumed ~135 million barrels of gas last year. That's 1.35 billion dollars of gas taxes. (Less in reality, because some commercial uses are exempt from these taxes, or can deduct them as expenses.) The NY DOT's maintenance budget, alone i…

Can you point to a budget for the NY DoT? I cant seem to find anything. The DoT web site is devoid of budgets and the state's web site doesn't help either.

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#138

Post by Spivak »

almost_usual wrote: post #96

I like the idea of ride sharing but the problem comes when it's abused to the extreme. It's not out of the ordinary for someone to order 3-4 Lyfts on the weekend in a single evening. That is a ton of unnecessary driving to hang out or fulfill the social obligations people have. I sometimes wonder what San Francisco was like before ride sharing. I imagine people would just pick a neighborhood and hang out there.

People chose a DD and then drove -- I mean it's not like we need a historian to remember back that far.

Re: A new study says services like Uber and Lyft are causing urban traffic woes

#140

Post by almost_usual »

mandelbrotwurst wrote: post #120
almost_usual wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I don't know. I'm only stating that I can see how Lyft and Uber could generate more traffic due to convenience.

Me neither =) Your hypothesis is a good one imo.

I mean, I'm definitely guilty of it. I've tried giving up ride-sharing for a bit and the social situations you get into are awkward. People usually don't understand and get frustrated.

If I ride the bus to meet someone for dinner and I get there everything will start fine. What eventually happens after dinner is that person will invite me to some other place and they'll want to get there as soon as possible. Responding with "oh, I'm trying only use public transit so I'll meet you in a bit" causes a bit of friction. It's normal to expect people to be somewhere in a certain amount of time now because of ride sharing. The convenience of it is almost like texting. "Why aren't you here yet? Can't you just Uber or Lyft?" / "Why haven't you responded to my text? Why don't you have your phone on you?"

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