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Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

abc13.com

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Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#31

Post by [deleted] »

_delirium wrote: post #15
nilkn wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suburban commuters of course won't use taxis or Uber. But Houston is experiencing an urban revitalization. Almost everybody I know either lives in the loop or wants to. For folks in the loop, having easy transportation to/from bars, for instance, makes Uber pretty attractive.

Interesting; I haven't seen an in-town movement in my social circles. If anything the opposite: big movement outwards, to areas that used to be considered way out but are now becoming part of the city in a huge exurban development boom. People who used to live inside Beltway 8 are moving to areas that I used to think of as farmland but are now apparently big growth areas, along the I-10 corridor towards Katy in the w…

[deleted]

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#32

Post by justizin »

smkelly wrote: post #21
cwyers wrote: post #14

I am down in Houston about once a month for work, and I am thrilled by this. My experience with Uber has been much more pleasant (and less expensive) than with a cab. Coincidentally, the smartphone app you can use to hail a cab in Houston (and other markets, I think) has renamed itself from TaxiMagic to Curb, and the branding and UI seem a lot more modern and frankly Uber-like.

There is also Yellow Cab's Hail A Cab app, but it is terrible. Well, it is great once you manage to register and login, but the actual registration part is nearly impossible last I had to.

Why bother when you can just call 415-333-3333 and let it ring for 45 minutes while you walk in the general direction of home? ;)

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#33

Post by doseofreality »

diafygi wrote: post #13
shliachtx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard about this before but never seen it in writing, thanks. It is pretty neat. Do other cities not have the same?

Austin does. Also, feeder roads along highways are a great Texas feature, too.

Feeder roads are one of the worst features of Texas.

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#34

Post by seanmcdirmid »

superuser2 wrote: post #27
hellbanner wrote: post #8

Houston has their downtown lights turn green sequentially if you travel the speed limit. Nifty: http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/a...

There are places in Milwaukee where it seems that all the lights turn green as you approach them, but unfortunately this is of no use. The cars who have been waiting at the red light take ~30 seconds to get moving again (texting/delayed reaction time/conservative acceleration * 5-6 cars) so you still have to stop, it's just that you're stopping at green lights. Incredibly frustrating.

Hence I'm waiting for self driving electric cars, which can start going almost immediately at a green.

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#35

Post by seanmcdirmid »

diafygi wrote: post #13
shliachtx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard about this before but never seen it in writing, thanks. It is pretty neat. Do other cities not have the same?

Austin does. Also, feeder roads along highways are a great Texas feature, too.

I thought these were called frontage roads? I mean, in Mississippi, they are just called that.

I prefer living in the north where they do not have such monstrosities. But I currently live in Beijing, so I have to deal with the "fulu" all the time.

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#36

Post by seanmcdirmid »

jonknee wrote: post #23
shliachtx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard about this before but never seen it in writing, thanks. It is pretty neat. Do other cities not have the same?

Tampa, FL does. I have seen it in several other places, I didn't think it was a novelty.

Its mostly a southern thing. I've never seen it in the north, but it is common in...China around the ring roads.

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#37

Post by Dartanion7 »

_delirium wrote: post #3
baddox wrote: post #2

I don't know anything about Houston, but compared to the issues faced by car-sharing companies in some other large cities, Houston's government seems remarkably sane.

I used to live there for some years in the '90s and still visit semi-regularly because family live there, and in my own experience (which may not to apply to all neighborhoods), nobody cares about this market in Houston, because everyone drives their private cars. So it's kind of a meh, do what you want. There is a very small public-transit system, and a smallish number of taxi drivers who mainly serve business trave…

I agree with this for the most part; another problem is the vast distances (30+ minutes) many people travel to and from the entertainment districts. Very few people live within a 10-minute drive of, say, Washington Street, so taking a cab is prohibitively expensive (and cabs don't like taking people on 30+ minute rides to suburbia as the ride back is not monetizable). I'm not sure if Uber can create a new market here, because Uber drivers would face the same issues (long, non-monetizable trips to pick up / drop off riders).

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#38

Post by mseebach »

_delirium wrote: post #3
baddox wrote: post #2

I don't know anything about Houston, but compared to the issues faced by car-sharing companies in some other large cities, Houston's government seems remarkably sane.

I used to live there for some years in the '90s and still visit semi-regularly because family live there, and in my own experience (which may not to apply to all neighborhoods), nobody cares about this market in Houston, because everyone drives their private cars. So it's kind of a meh, do what you want. There is a very small public-transit system, and a smallish number of taxi drivers who mainly serve business trave…

Generally, the opposition to Uber/Lyft is driven by the taxi firms, not consumers. It's an interesting observation that Houstonians might care less about taxis, Uber and Lyft than the average city-dweller, but regular political analysis would suggest that this would give taxi firms (who cares a lot) more, not less, clout in the decision.

My guess would be that the reason for this decision not being controversial is that the supply of taxis in Houston isn't strongly limited the way it is in NYC and SF (some Googling didn't turn up much evidence either for or against this hypothesis). Which of course, again, would mean that Uber/Lyft would be competing on a level playing field and not just be scooping up heaps of customers who hate the entrenched taxi firms with a vengeance.

Re: Houston City Council gives green light to Uber, Lyft

#39

Post by Doches »

diafygi wrote: post #13
shliachtx wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard about this before but never seen it in writing, thanks. It is pretty neat. Do other cities not have the same?

Austin does. Also, feeder roads along highways are a great Texas feature, too.

Wow, I didn't realise that feeder roads were a Texas-specific thing. How do other parts of the country handle commercial properties that face highways?
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