As Uber Comes to New York, Its Legality Is Questioned

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/05/nyregion/as-ubers-taxi-hailing-app-comes-to-new-york-its-legality-is-questioned.html?_r=1&ref=nyregion

by olivercameron • 14 years ago

46 25 14 years ago

nytimes.com

untog4• 14 years ago

Interesting. It looks like the various taxi heavyweights of the world are due to battle it out in New York. Uber from SF, Hailo from London, GetTaxi from Israel...

A telling quote from the Betabeat[1] article:

Uber has 10 to 15 yellow cab drivers pre-registered to use its app, whereas Hailo has 2,500. A representative from Uber scoffed at that number. Reached by phone, Hailo confirmed both its planned launch and the number of registered drivers in New York City

It'll be interesting to see if just being the first into market will allow Uber to overcome odds like this, but that is a giant difference. 10-15 cab drivers is nowhere near enough to satisfy demand from New York customers.

[1] http://betabeat.com/2012/09/uber-launch-yellow-cab-taxi-app-...

nitashatiku• 14 years ago

I've since updated that number in Betabeat with the figure from tonight's NYT article, which says Uber planned to launch with 105 pre-registered cabs and plans to add 100 a week. (The initial, incorrect number was what I had when I broke the story this afternoon, and tried to confirm with Uber. Apologies for that.) Agreed though--it's going to be really interesting to watch, with each player having a corner of the market. There's also Taxi Magic.

chimeracoder• 14 years ago

> There is the high-pitched whistle, the two-handed gesticulation, the rapid snapping of fingers. Many favor the classic wave — an open palm raised high, stretching into coming traffic.

Does anybody honestly do anything but stick their hand out (Statue-of-Liberty style)?

On a more serious note:

I'm surprised they're even attempting this with medallion cabs. I honestly don't see the need here - Uber's availability in NYC is decent... could be improved, certainly, but there are well more than enough gypsy cabs/car services around to tap into, it seems.

The NYC medallion system is one of the few that I think works well. Unlike in other cities, the rules that Uber would potentially be violating are those which only affect medallion cabs, and explicitly exclude car services like Uber. (The intent is to have the medallion cabs resemble a 'public' transportation system more, in that they cannot refuse service to anywhere within the boroughs, cannot refuse passengers etc.), while the private cab companies can do whatever they damn well please, more or less.

I'm not sure what Uber has to gain by doing this - it's a hefty risk, especially since the forces they're probably up against here in New York are very powerful and very well-funded, and the laws are already rather lenient - they've been able to establish a successful business already without pushing the envelope.

elliottcarlson• 14 years ago

Oddly, I have seen some of these other gestures used to hail a cab - but luckily it's not very frequent.

I just had my first Uber ride today - it was such a breeze and my driver Julien was friendly and very easy to talk to. One of the first things I noticed (and checked for) was that he had a TLC issued license plate - so I know he is paying his dues somewhere. One of the more interesting parts of our conversation included the fact that he owns his own vehicle and pays his own TLC fees - but at this point he only takes fares via Uber. He said it's hassle free and the people seem friendlier overall (except the one lady who rated him 1 star because there was traffic - who knew Manhattan could have traffic congestion?!)

I like the idea of Uber and hope they succeed in the NYC marketplace - while just a little bit more money, the experience was far better than I have ever had in a standard medallion cab, and even some of the other car services out there.

jc4p• 14 years ago

I'll throw in another datapoint in here. I've lived in NYC for the last 2 months and have taken NYC taxis only five or six times since mostly everywhere I go is on the same subway line. I used Uber last weekend to get a ride to JFK last minute from Brooklyn and it was a fantastic experience. The price was similar to that of a taxi and I ended up paying much less because it was my first ride and I had both a $20 off first ride coupon (Add it! It's YelpSF, it worked for me in NYC) and I had $15 coupon from something else I don't remember, so I ended up paying barely $30 for a quick cab ride from Brooklyn to JFK.

The driver was extremely friendly, but he wasn't a regular taxi driver, he had a day-time job and did Uber on the weekends and nights only when he needed the money. I thought it was a bit weird since I've read articles on here about NYC's weird medallion deals, but it seemed great for both sides.

Oh, and I forgot: The driver was so god damn friendly it was a weird experience, we had a conversation the entire time to the airport versus being in regular taxis where the driver is on his cellphone talking to someone the entire time.

wickedchicken2• 14 years ago

> Does anybody honestly do anything but stick their hand out

The patrons outside my poorly sound-isolated SF apartment prefer to whistle all through the night, unaware that I have a better chance of hearing them than the cabs do.

bradleyjg• 14 years ago

They are probably running into two opposing trends:

1) The areas that most resemble thier other markets and have a big unmet need for convenient cabs are in upper Manhattan / and the outer boros (minus Williamsburg and Brooklyn Heights) and are served - when served at all - by black cars.

2) The people most likely to have heard of their app and have it on their phone are mostly in core Manhattan and the aforementioned parts of Brooklyn, and are pretty well served by the yellow cabs.

patmcguire• 14 years ago

The rules and the reality are somewhat different. Most cabs will straight up refuse to take you someplace they're unlikely to quickly find fares.

Yeah, you can get their number and complain, but it's not going to get you to Brooklyn that night.

rajat• 14 years ago

Remember when you used to ask people for directions and comedians told jokes about how as soon as they heard the directions, they forgot them?

In a few years we'll think about hailing cabs by whistling or flagging them down in the same way. Plus, the taxi drivers won't be able to bypass particular minorities with quite as much immunity from being caught anymore. "You accepted the hail, we have the record for that, but then decided not to pick the passenger up. Why?"

joshu2• 14 years ago

It is like the floppy disk icon for saving.

Someday hailing a cab will be a button that says "hail a cab" and no more.

There should be a word for this.

Simucal• 14 years ago

Anachronism maybe?

wickedchicken2• 14 years ago

> There should be a word for this.

Roughly, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skeuomorph

Evbn• 14 years ago

Skeuomorphic

dmix2• 14 years ago

Accepting is still optional and you can choose to avoid certain neighborhoods.

jmspring2• 14 years ago

I can't speak to the politics of the taxi commission and laws in NYC regarding Uber. I just got back from NYC, on arrival I took a yellow cab from JFK to Battery Park (far south end of Manhattan).

Our cab ride was during the morning rush hour and since I had the time, I was checking out google maps and other traffic info. Looking at the route the cabby was taking, I asked him why he was going all the way up to the Williamsburg Bridge in order to get back down to Battery Park (basically hitting Midtown to have to go back downtown). He was rather indignant and said he had been driving for 20 years.

He asked what direction I would take, I mentioned a few streets and one of the more southern tunnels or bridges. After sitting in a bunch of traffic, he mentioned that I was probably right, but that going surface streets in Brooklyn isn't always popular.

Experience certainly means a lot, but realtime data can trump that. I think choice is a good thing and Uber will help with that. However, with highly concentrated markets like NYC, leveraging technology could provide even more benefit.

joshu2• 14 years ago

Well, data-oriented experience will certainly get trumped by actual data.

I can't believe most cabs don't have real time traffic data.

jmspring2• 14 years ago

It is surprising. My last two trips to NYC have involved probably about two dozen cab rides plus two town car rides back to JFK. Not one of the vehicles had any visible device capable of real time traffic data (mounted smartphone, gps, etc).

Maybe there is something in the laws governing cabs?

kunle2• 14 years ago

2 things:

1. It says something about the quality of what you're doing when the competition has to selectively enforce laws (or change them as the DC City Council tried) in order to compete effectively.

2. Probably a good move for Uber - basically adding a ton more data about pickups/dropoffs in the city across NYC's taxi fleet (which would be insanely useful if they ever launch a p2p service like Lyft has done) and, even more crucially, gets them to a more mass-market price point.

untog4• 14 years ago

adding a ton more data about pickups/dropoffs in the city across NYC's taxi fleet (which would be insanely useful if they ever launch a p2p service like Lyft has done)

New York City's TLC actually already offers this data for the entire yellow cab fleet. An interesting data set, for sure.

carterschonwald• 14 years ago

wheres that data located? I tried to dig around for it a while ago, but no avail.

kunle2• 14 years ago

Good point. I wonder if by plugging this into it's routing/dispatch engine in real time, Uber can actually generate more revenue? I have to imagine that aggregating this demand will help increase the capacity utilization of the cab fleet (if cabs were maxed out on the number of trips they could take in total, the cab drivers would have no demand for a tool like this, and if the article's numbers are to be believed, between Uber and Hallo, 20% of NYC cabbies are signed up and the service hasnt even started yet!)

timfrietas• 14 years ago

Where do you get it? I couldn't find it on the site...do you have to file a FOIL request with them?

As Uber Comes to New York, Its Legality Is Questioned

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