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Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

citylab.com

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Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#41

Post by AlexB138 »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #19
vkou wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the wealthy[1] can opt out of having to use public services, those public services tend to be crap. When the wealthy are forced to use public services, all of a sudden, they become interested and politically engaged in improving them. Uber doesn't drive improvements in transit in this sense - it starves it of political capital. The best transit services are ones which are used by a wide swathe of the public. [1]…

This, a million times. The metro in Paris is good because upper middle class people take it.

How exactly did you come up with that direction for the causal relationship?

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#42

Post by gdulli »

thisisweirdok wrote: post #22
GlickWick wrote: post #9

I know it's only an anecdote, but myself (and many other colleagues) in Boston switched to periodically using rideshares to commute due to the decline in public transit quality. The tech boom in the area completely overloaded the system, and when you combine it with the rampant corruption behind the MBTA, this was inevitable. Uber and Lyft have not been the best actors, but someone was going to step in and profit off…

Unfortunately this only exacerbates the problem as ridership declines. I know students in Boston who have literally never taken public transportation. 5 years ago this would be unheard of.

I have friends and co-workers with free access to the MBTA because it's paid for by our employer. I see them pay for ridesharing when the free public transportation is a reasonable option for the same trip. I see some people paying their own money to commute to work every day when they live inside the city and could be doing it for free.

People just want to take the path of least resistance and there's a lot of young tech workers with low expenses and high salaries who don't think about the long-term impact of the money they're spending on unnecessary conveniences instead of saving.

The real problem is that complaints about a shard public resource grow disproportionately like a meme and people codify that public transportation is terrible and unreliable, when in reality it's imperfect and that's an exaggeration.

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#43

Post by awgneo »

ummonk wrote: post #40
capkutay wrote: post #21

Sorry but this is bullshit. As others have mentioned, public transit beats uber/lyft when its actually the better, faster service (e.g. London, Tokyo). But when public transit is poorly planned, slow, dirty, crime-ridden like it often is in the US, uber/lyft wins every time. Even when cities like San Francisco choose to spend billions on improving public transit, they mess it up every single time. There's a long list…

Yup. E.g. in Manhattan you'd be crazy to not use the subway. It's just faster than everything else, and extremely liberating. In contrast, in SF, if you want to get to your destination in any reasonable amount of time and don't your start and destination are not near the BART line, you need to use car / Uber / Lyft. Or even a scooter or Go bike is faster than public transit. SF needs to significantly invest in transi…

I really wish Brooklyn had as many latitudinal lines as Manhattan. Whenever I visit Brooklyn, Uber/Lyft is always a better option.

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#44

Post by distances »

crdrost wrote: post #27

It is certainly valid to say that, to first order, Uber and Lyft do not compete with public transit. I get a Lyft from downtown KC to the KC airport about thirty minutes away; I do this because it's about as expensive as airport economy parking will be for several weeks; I do not think twice about public transit because there simply is no public transit route there. But to go to the library or Union Station I'd never…

A city of 500k inhabitants doesn't have even a bus between the airport and city center? That's quite interesting, one would think it'd one of the most sought after routes.

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#45

Post by cozzyd »

Uber and Lyft increase downtown congestion (like sometimes up to one third of cars I see are Uber/Lyft in downtown Chicago) and routinely block bus stops and in bus lanes. This further slows down buses even more and screws up schedules. I wish bus drivers could automatically ticket the drivers.

I have a CTA pass so I almost never use Uber/Lyft because it's so much more expensive.

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#46

Post by GabrielF00 »

GlickWick wrote: post #9

I know it's only an anecdote, but myself (and many other colleagues) in Boston switched to periodically using rideshares to commute due to the decline in public transit quality. The tech boom in the area completely overloaded the system, and when you combine it with the rampant corruption behind the MBTA, this was inevitable. Uber and Lyft have not been the best actors, but someone was going to step in and profit off…

I only use Uber/Lyft in Boston for routes where the T would be inconvenient or if the weather is really bad and I don't want to walk home from the T station.

I just hate Uber Pool and Lyft Line - the routes they take are often side streets with lots of congestion and turns, there's a lot of frustration when you're almost to your destination or to a major road and then the driver turns around to pick up another passenger. Drivers often play music I find annoying.

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#48

Post by [deleted] »

capkutay wrote: post #21

Sorry but this is bullshit. As others have mentioned, public transit beats uber/lyft when its actually the better, faster service (e.g. London, Tokyo). But when public transit is poorly planned, slow, dirty, crime-ridden like it often is in the US, uber/lyft wins every time. Even when cities like San Francisco choose to spend billions on improving public transit, they mess it up every single time. There's a long list…

[deleted]

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#49

Post by geebee »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #19
vkou wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the wealthy[1] can opt out of having to use public services, those public services tend to be crap. When the wealthy are forced to use public services, all of a sudden, they become interested and politically engaged in improving them. Uber doesn't drive improvements in transit in this sense - it starves it of political capital. The best transit services are ones which are used by a wide swathe of the public. [1]…

This, a million times. The metro in Paris is good because upper middle class people take it.

Just so. But they also take it because it’s good

Re: Another Study Blames Uber and Lyft for Public Transit’s Decline

#50

Post by crdrost »

distances wrote: post #44
crdrost wrote: post #27

It is certainly valid to say that, to first order, Uber and Lyft do not compete with public transit. I get a Lyft from downtown KC to the KC airport about thirty minutes away; I do this because it's about as expensive as airport economy parking will be for several weeks; I do not think twice about public transit because there simply is no public transit route there. But to go to the library or Union Station I'd never…

A city of 500k inhabitants doesn't have even a bus between the airport and city center? That's quite interesting, one would think it'd one of the most sought after routes.

I mean it does it's just hard to get to and slow. It's route 229, it takes 10-15 minutes to get (through public transit) to the center of the metro area where it goes through, in fact almost as long as just walking the 10-15 blocks or whatever it is to get there... then I think you are waiting 10 more minutes on average as they run every 20 minutes, and it takes something like 50 minutes to get from there to the airport -- whereas the straight shot with a Lyft is maybe 30 minutes, the bus can take somewhere from a half hour to an hour longer.

So it's possible with some transfers etc., it's just sufficiently inconvenient and slow that I've ruled that out.

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