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London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

bbc.co.uk

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Re: London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

#71

Post by snitko »

robryan wrote: post #62
snitko wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If their knowledge is of any value to consumers, consumers are going to choose them over Uber. If not, then nobody should care. I can learn how to program stuff for MSDOS, doesn't mean it'd be worth anything these days. As for regulations and licensing, it shouldn't exist in the first place as it only raises prices and prevents legitimate competition.

To what end? Anyone with a car can start their own taxi service? I don't think it is in the public's interest to make taxi driving unprofitable which is what would likely happen without regulation and licensing.

Where I live anyone can be a cab. You raise your hand on any street any time of day and some car will stop. As a result, prices are normally 3 times lower compared to the US. You negotiate the price with drivers beforehand and you don't have to tip them because all of the money go directly into the driver's pocket. I've never heard anyone complain about this system. Now tell me how is this a bad idea?

Re: London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

#72

Post by msy »

buro9 wrote: post #57
casca wrote: post #22

The Black Cabs in London have a long-standing monopoly on picking people up on the street and providing a metered journey. This is mandated by law. To become a black cab (not always black in colour) driver, it is necessary to take an advanced test called The Knowledge where you are expected to know every London street and landmark along with best routes based on random street closures. It takes about 3 years to study…

> Any advances that Uber makes will benefit all mini-cab companies and most importantly, passengers. Except for all of the disabled ones, the wheelchair users, the ones who only wish to travel a very short distance and are unable to do so alone (the pregnant, mothers with pushchairs, the extremely inebriated, elderly, injured, etc). The monopoly and some privileges (bus lane access, pick up fares anywhere) is granted…

Black cabs have no obligation to pick up fares and will regularly refuse to take trips that they feel are inconvenient or they think will likely result in a return journey without a fare, even after you're in the cab. Want to go south and it's near the end of the driver's shift and he lives north? Back to waiting for you.

This is in comparison to the NYC system where once you're in the cab, they're obligated to take you where you want to go.

Re: London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

#74

Post by dragonwriter »

viraptor wrote: post #70
cjrp wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus a SatNav won't know that at rush hour, a longer (distance-wise) route could be quicker in a black cab due to them being allowed to use bus lanes.

Google maps already integrates with Uber. If they managed to get such connection, I'm not sure why a bigger black cab company operating in large cities couldn't get an agreement to include taxi/bus lanes on a separate app. Can't imagine Uber forced Google to cooperate with them...

Isn't Google -- through Google Ventures -- a significant investor in Uber? That kind of may give them a different set of considerations than "a bigger black cab company" would have.

Re: London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

#76

Post by pmorici »

buro9 wrote: post #57
casca wrote: post #22

The Black Cabs in London have a long-standing monopoly on picking people up on the street and providing a metered journey. This is mandated by law. To become a black cab (not always black in colour) driver, it is necessary to take an advanced test called The Knowledge where you are expected to know every London street and landmark along with best routes based on random street closures. It takes about 3 years to study…

> Any advances that Uber makes will benefit all mini-cab companies and most importantly, passengers. Except for all of the disabled ones, the wheelchair users, the ones who only wish to travel a very short distance and are unable to do so alone (the pregnant, mothers with pushchairs, the extremely inebriated, elderly, injured, etc). The monopoly and some privileges (bus lane access, pick up fares anywhere) is granted…

"without excluding anyone of any ability."

It's all well and good that it is written that way on paper but do they actually follow that in practice? Is there any reason to believe an Uber driver wouldn't make every effort to accommodate a passenger needing some extra assistance?

Re: London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

#77

Post by cjrp »

viraptor wrote: post #70
cjrp wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus a SatNav won't know that at rush hour, a longer (distance-wise) route could be quicker in a black cab due to them being allowed to use bus lanes.

Google maps already integrates with Uber. If they managed to get such connection, I'm not sure why a bigger black cab company operating in large cities couldn't get an agreement to include taxi/bus lanes on a separate app. Can't imagine Uber forced Google to cooperate with them...

Google Ventures are an Uber investor, I'm not sure if that's what sparked the integration but it probably didn't hurt!

I'm not sure if there's actually a comprehensive source for bus lane data - if there is, it would be really useful for motorbike users too (who can generally use bus lanes).

Re: London black taxis plan congestion chaos to block Uber

#79

Post by corin_ »

rwmj wrote: post #66
k-mcgrady wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> "They would, yes - but when any big company gets bad press for not paying taxes in the UK (for example Google), nobody uses the excuse "but their staff in the UK still pay UK tax", the focus is on whether the company's profits are being taxed." Because the tax paid by employees is insignificant compared to the tax the company should be paying.

Umm, citation needed. Salaries are usually at least 50% of a company's expenses, and UK tax on salaries will be 30-40% of that, so that's at least 15-20%, likely more.

Citation needed for sure, but being a big % of expenses doesn't mean anything either way - salaries could be 100% of your expenses, and tax rates could be 90%, but if the company has revenue of 100x and expenditure of 10x then 90% of that 100% is still only 9x, which is the equivilent to a 10% tax on their 90x company profits. (Equally, salaries could be a small percentage of expenditure, but if the company makes only a small amount of net profit then tax on salaries could easily dwarf tax on the company's profits.)
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