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Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

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Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#51

Post by themagician »

aianus wrote: post #30
themagician wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It competes by doing things like not complying with existing regulation, laws, or unions. It's an "app" and thus except from all regulation. So they don't pay a driver $70,000/yr and give him or her a pension. They can pick stops based on profitability, not access. They carry the bare minimum of liability insurance because if anything happens they can just close up shop. They don't have to comply with the Americans w…

Ok, I'll bite, why on earth does a bus driver deserve $70,000 a year and a pension? There are billions of people in the world who would kill to do that job for $35,000 and no benefits.

Because we've decided as a society that paying people a decent wage is a good idea.

The same can be said for a lot of jobs, including so-called "software engineers." You can pay people in Romania $300/day instead of paying someone in SF $1,800 a day.

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#52

Post by anishkothari »

asimjalis wrote: post #34
JimboOmega wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't shake the feeling that it's an answer to the problem "I like the idea of commuting in a shared vehicle, but the bus is dirty and sometimes homeless people ride it."

I have used buses in SF. They are unreliable. Sometimes a bus just never shows up, regardless of what the schedule says. Then two buses show up at the same time. This has happened to me several times.

> Then two buses show up at the same time. This has happened to me several times.

This is called bus bunching, here's an explanation. http://www.wbez.org/series/curious-city/why-buses-arrive-bun...

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#53

Post by Apocryphon »

pjlegato wrote: post #13
themagician wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It competes by doing things like not complying with existing regulation, laws, or unions. It's an "app" and thus except from all regulation. So they don't pay a driver $70,000/yr and give him or her a pension. They can pick stops based on profitability, not access. They carry the bare minimum of liability insurance because if anything happens they can just close up shop. They don't have to comply with the Americans w…

If the regulated, unionized public transportation service actually answered to the residents, services such as Leap could not exist. They'd be unnecessary and unused.

It's certainly possible to simultaneously believe that the regulated, unionized public transportation contains service deficiencies, while at the same time advocating that a private transportation that provides better service should also be regulated and unionized.

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#54

Post by timdaub »

As a person who regularly rides the bus on my way to work I can assure you that you will most certainly not be able to work on a sideways positioned table in a CITY-bus.

Busses turn left, right with speed and in some cases break strongly. Speaking of motion sickness, most people I know are not even able to work riding a train (ICE for example, which is perfectly comfortable IMO), so why should/would/could they on a city bus.

However, the interior looks nice and if you're promised a seat then this might still be a nice alternative to public transportation.

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#55

Post by jsprogrammer »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #49
andy318 wrote: post #17

Anyone know Leap's arragement with their drivers? Their TOS makes it seem like the Uber for buses. From Terms of service - "LEAP DOES NOT PROVIDE TRANSPORTATION SERVICES, AND LEAP IS NOT A TRANSPORTATION CARRIER. IT IS UP TO THE DRIVER OR VEHICLE OPERATOR TO OFFER TRANSPORTATION SERVICES WHICH MAY BE ARRANGED THROUGH USE OF THE SERVICES"

You missed the best part: >[Leap Transit, Inc] OFFERS INFORMATION AND A METHOD TO OBTAIN THIRD PARTY TRANSPORTATION SERVICES, ^^BUT DOES NOT AND DOES NOT INTEND TO PROVIDE TRANSPORTATION SERVICES^^ OR ACT IN ANY WAY AS A TRANSPORTATION CARRIER , AND HAS NO RESPONSIBILITY OR LIABILITY FOR ANY TRANSPORTATION SERVICES PROVIDED TO YOU BY SUCH THIRD PARTIES.

Some more goodies:

>We do not guarantee and do not promise any specific results from use of Leap and/or the Services.

>We, our subsidiaries, officers, directors, employees and our suppliers specifically disclaim any implied warranties of title, merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement.

They also don't offer any refunds:

>Any fees that Leap Transit may charge You for the Licensed Application or Services are due immediately and are non-refundable. This no refund policy shall apply at all times regardless of your decision to terminate your usage, our decision to terminate your usage, disruption caused to our Licensed Application or Services either planned, accidental or intentional, or any reason whatsoever.

So, they are basically saying they won't transport you, they don't make any claims to transport you [despite what their landing/marketing page appears to say], they will take your money if you think they will transport you, and they won't give it back to you when they don't transport you [which they never claimed to (except on their homepage)].

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#56

Post by eloisant »

gmarx wrote: post #11

I used to wonder, years ago when I lived in SF, why does a supposedly green city have such lousy public transportation? If this is successful, expect MUNI to use legal means to get rid of it.

SF was puzzling to me when I live in the Bay Area.

In Paris, using your car is hell but you have a good transportation network.

In smaller French cities, the transportation network is less developed but you can take your car everywhere and park easily.

But San Francisco... Both parking and mass transit is bad! The only viable solution is the bike, but that only works if you're living in the city.

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#57

Post by joshrotenberg »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #55
jsprogrammer wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You missed the best part: >[Leap Transit, Inc] OFFERS INFORMATION AND A METHOD TO OBTAIN THIRD PARTY TRANSPORTATION SERVICES, ^^BUT DOES NOT AND DOES NOT INTEND TO PROVIDE TRANSPORTATION SERVICES^^ OR ACT IN ANY WAY AS A TRANSPORTATION CARRIER , AND HAS NO RESPONSIBILITY OR LIABILITY FOR ANY TRANSPORTATION SERVICES PROVIDED TO YOU BY SUCH THIRD PARTIES.

Some more goodies: >We do not guarantee and do not promise any specific results from use of Leap and/or the Services. >We, our subsidiaries, officers, directors, employees and our suppliers specifically disclaim any implied warranties of title, merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. They also don't offer any refunds: >Any fees that Leap Transit may charge You for the Licensed Applicat…

This might have been a decent gig for Lloyd Dobler:

"I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that."

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#58

Post by remarkEon »

California Vehicle Code, §22500: No person shall stop, park, or leave standing any vehicle whether attended or unattended, except when necessary to avoid conflict with other traffic or in compliance with the directions of a peace officer or official traffic control device, in any of the following places: [...] (i) Except as provided under Section 22500.5, alongside curb space authorized for the loading and unloading of passengers of a bus engaged as a common carrier in local transportation when indicated by a sign or red paint on the curb erected or painted by local authorities pursuant to an ordinance.

So I guess they aren't using SFMTA bus stops. At least, they aren't supposed to. § 22500.5 is the exemption for school buses. I don't live in SF, but is this rule usually followed? In Seattle it seems a lot of the city bus stops are quickly becoming inaccessible to non Seattle Transit vehicles by design (lots of new construction for bike lanes and separate lanes for public trans). So beyond the legal issues, I think something like this would start to run into real world physical limitations of which cities could actually support something like this - at least in the urban core. The sort of satellite commutes you see in cities like Minneapolis would be a different story.

http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displayText.xh...

Edit: first link pointed to an older .gov site

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#59

Post by schintan »

deegles wrote: post #36
schintan wrote: post #5

the seats look sparse ..how are they going to get by with so few seats and still be competitive on price ?

Assuming a bus costs 100k@4% financing, that's about 2,200 a month. Salary for a driver could be another 100k (including benefits, taxes, etc). That's 8.3 k per month. CNG buses get about 3mpg at about $2/gallon equivalent cost to diesel ( http://www.catf.us/resources/publications/files/20120227-Die... ) Assuming 150 miles driven per day, that's $3,000 per month in fuel costs. Total costs per bus: $13,500/month or $4…

this does not include the many kind of fees, fleet maintenance expenses, other staffing costs, etc

Re: Leap: Your daily commute redesigned

#60

Post by marquis »

asimjalis wrote: post #34
JimboOmega wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't shake the feeling that it's an answer to the problem "I like the idea of commuting in a shared vehicle, but the bus is dirty and sometimes homeless people ride it."

I have used buses in SF. They are unreliable. Sometimes a bus just never shows up, regardless of what the schedule says. Then two buses show up at the same time. This has happened to me several times.

>Then two buses show up at the same time

Just two? You've never caught a bus in Chicago then..

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