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Call me a snob, but Uber's criteria for what qualifies as an acceptable car has dramatically declined to the point where even Taxis are sometimes "nicer". Comb

Call me a snob, but Uber's criteria for what qualifies as an acceptable car has dramatically declined to the point where even Taxis are sometimes "nicer". Combine that with the fact that the drivers often don't know the neighborhood and rely exclusively on GPS (so tend to be worse drivers than a taxi). I'm left feeling like the fare - strictly from the perspective of a consumer - is actually too high.

mlindner 8y ago
That's when Uber Black is an option. Which is around what traditional taxis used to cost.
cbhl 8y ago
What are your thoughts on Uber Select / Uber Black / Lyft Lux / Lyft Lux Black?
- rubicon33 8y ago
  Definitely a fan of the Select and Black options. In fact, I've been using them more and more. The price - while higher - feels more aligned with what I would consider to be "good value". Ranked in order of importance for me are: - A competent + safe driver, preferably someone who knows the area. - A nice, clean, comfortable ride. - A driver who doesn't talk to me. All 3 of these are markedly improved in both the Select and Black options. Given I don't take Uber that often, I can justify the expense. If it was something I relied upon on a more regular basis I just don't think I could justify using Select/Black.
  - seppin 8y ago
    > Definitely a fan of the Select and Black options. In fact, I've been using them more and more. How was burning man this year?
  - caseyohara 8y ago
    > A driver who doesn't talk to me I wish "Quiet Ride, Please" was an option in the app.
    - kelnos 8y ago
      I wish drivers that pick me up from the airport (or who are taking me to the airport at an early hour) would have some sense of situational awareness and realize that someone who just got off a plane (or is waking up early to catch a flight) might not be feeling all that chatty, and just wants to sit back, close their eyes, and enjoy some peace and quiet.
      - BigJono 8y ago
        I wonder if this is a uniquely American problem. Over here (Australia) it's always a couple of short sentences ('how'zit goin'?', 'yeah good') then awkward silence the rest of the trip. Unless the cricket is on the radio, then all bets are off.
        kelnos 8y ago
        I figure probably 80% of my rides are as you describe. But I don't know what it is about airport pickups. I guess it's easy to start a conversation with "where are you flying from?" maybe, and then they don't want to stop after I give a terse answer.
      - jacksproit 8y ago
        You could always ask....
    - sib 8y ago
      I always thought this should be a "swipe left / swipe right" thing for both driver & passenger. If they both indicate they want to chat, talk away.
      - lukevdp 8y ago
        Or you can use the voice activated option with the driver. You just need to say “I’m feeling pretty tired right now and don’t feel like chatting”
- cge 8y ago
  Uber Black, at least for me, is not a good option because it usually (seemingly every time in LA) results in getting a giant SUV. These are not comfortable, and are not discreet, by comparison to good sedans.
  - speedplane 8y ago
    > Uber Black, at least for me, is not a good option because it usually (seemingly every time in LA) results in getting a giant SUV. These ... are not discreet, by comparison to good sedans. I am dubious. You live in LA and want to be discreet?
parksy 8y ago
Yeah an uber that smells of farts, vomit and piss, and the seats are sticky... that has become more commonplace for standard uber. Uberx is much nicer for an extra dollar or two (for standard trips), no more farty taxis. But using my power of recollection - taxis were a crapshoot before uber came along too. Some were okay, some were disgusting. I have not had (after a night out at a comedy lounge with my wife) an uber driver chase me into another uber, try and yank open the door yelling "I was first in line! You fuck! You Fuck! Get out!" while my taxi driver speeds away tires squealing. Since uber came along, the quality of standard taxis here in Perth has increased dramatically. The result is a net positive.
- rubicon33 8y ago
  Totally agree that in the past Taxis were MUCH more of a crapshoot, but lately they've really stepped their game up, which I think is attributable to Uber/Lyft. So all in all, I think it's been a net positive for the consumer.
cabaalis 8y ago
> drivers often don't know the neighborhood and rely exclusively on GPS I drove for Uber about 3 years ago for a couple of months when getting my consultancy off the ground, which led to my current gig. If I had a way to tell Uber "Don't give me rides that require me to leave a given geofence--we'll all have a bad time." Then I'd have been much, much happier. Everyone wanted a ride from my suburban town to the metro area that I know nothing about. Every now and then I'd get one where start point and endpoint were both my own town. I'd have happily taken less fares in order to drive more familiar streets, and the people who rode with me would have enjoyed it more.
- kelnos 8y ago
  The problem there is twofold: 1) Many drivers from your town would likely geofence themselves to your town, reducing the supply of drivers that will drive to the metro area, increasing wait times and driving up prices, making riders unhappy. 2) Drivers would use this feature to avoid driving to "bad" parts of town, making transportation discriminatory. (In ways that are illegal for traditional taxi companies, so Uber would eventually run afoul of the same regulations.) It's a shame because there are reasonable use cases for a geofencing feature (you seem to certainly be one of them), but it can be easily abused and can hurt the rider experience depending on locale. (Not saying the rider experience is inherently more important, but certainly Uber/Lyft would see it that way.)
  - cabaalis 8y ago
    For #1, it seems the market would adjust. We already see complaints about drivers not knowing the area they're driving in. Would it reassure riders to know that their driver spends 99% of driving time in an area they're riding? For #2, sincere problem for which I am not aware of a good solution.
    - kelnos 8y ago
      Not if there aren't enough drivers there, period. I'd much rather a driver unfamiliar with my city who needs Google Maps to get me to my destination if the alternative is I have to wait 20 minutes for a car.
GordonS 8y ago
> Combine that with the fact that the drivers often don't know the neighborhood I used to travel to Houston quite a lot. Not sure if this is representative of taxis in general in the US, but the taxi drivers never knew the neighbourhood. I couldn't say "I want to go to Acme Stuff in X district", I had to give a "Cross road" (a very US thing, that) and the driver would use satnav based on that. It did seem that a lot of taxi drivers were recent immigrants (invariably chatty), so that accounts for some, but not all. At first, this was a surprise, as in my native UK I can literally give a street name within 50 miles of where I am, and the driver cocks their head for a second, gears whir, and yes! They know it!
- astrodust 8y ago
  That's probably because becoming a taxi driver in places like London is extremely hard (https://www.theknowledgetaxi.co.uk https://www.theknowledgetaxi.co.uk), while becoming a taxi driver in Houston is probably as simple as "do you have a license?"
  - wrboyce 8y ago
    Yes, London is the whole UK. EDIT: If it sets a standard then why has that standard not been adopted nationwide? Your argument is dead in the water and I can only assume you’re speaking as a person who has never visited the UK.
    - astrodust 8y ago
      It sets a standard. The US has no such equivalent.
  - maxlybbert 8y ago
    I lived in a small New Jersey town where getting a taxi medallion involved little more than paying $100 and promising to charge every customer no more than $5 (for in-town trips).
  - GordonS 8y ago
    I'm not in London, or even England. AFAIK, it's relatively straightforward to get a taxi license anywhere in the UK but London.
GordonS 8y ago
> Uber's criteria for what qualifies as an acceptable car has dramatically declined to the point where even Taxis are sometimes "nicer" In my travels to the US, which almost exclusively meant Houston, the taxis were always very basic, "boxy" cars; not sure about make/model, but they always felt "cheap". Meanwhile in Europe, a lot of taxis are Mercedes E class saloons, or high-spec saloons from other makers.
- astrodust 8y ago
  A taxi in Europe is akin to an "airport limo" in North America. The differences are astounding.
  - Bayart 8y ago
    Here in France taxi driving is pretty hard to get into. You not only need to pass an exam, but you also need a licence that can be bought or rented from its owner, which is really expensive. New licences are basically non-existent. In comparison the cost of the car itself isn't as important, so drivers put some effort into it. And they're more professional. I've never once in my life talked to a taxi driver in France besides entering and leaving the car.
    - namdnay 8y ago
      You’ve identified one of the reasons for having nice cars, which is the relative low cost of the car as compared to buying the licence. The others are that they are only paying about 50% of the cost of their cars (as the installments are deductible from gross income), they get subsidised diesel (hence the ludicrously overpowered v6 German engines when the rest of the world is running on Japanese hybrids), and most importantly they get to use the vehicle as their personal car when not working...
  - photonios 8y ago
    Depends on where you are in Europe. Here in Romania, taxis are consistently horrible. The cars are usually old and not well maintained. It's not uncommon to see duck taped airbags. The drivers are far from friendly. But! They are consistently horrible in my experience. Not once has one ripped me off and they always use the meter. They know every address you throw at them and get you there safely. No matter the hour. They're also dirt cheap. 2.25 RON/km. So that's about $0.55/km. For the Romanians reading this; Bucharest is an exception and I've had nothing but bad experiences with cabs there. My experiences are based on using cabs weekly in major Transylvanian cities.
duxup 8y ago
A while back in Chicago I was picked up for Uber, in a Taxi... that also drove for the other services and was tied to a local taxi company. Not a bad ride that one, but that guy had all his bases covered...
clhodapp 8y ago
I'm with you right until the line break. The thing is: even for the quality-declined cars, we are not paying enough to cover the costs. Those are simply the economics of using a phone app to hire a person to come and pick you up in their car and then drive you somewhere. The truth is that if you want to pay less for transport then you need to not be taking human-driven taxis.
- fwip 8y ago
  Yep. Uber is subsidising the fares and even then the drivers are barely making minimum wage, after accounting for their expenses.
dsfyu404ed 8y ago
>Call me a snob You're a snob. I wish they'd relax their policy on vehicles. I would have no problem riding in 90s shitboxes. I would find it novel. As long as it's been vacuumed that week I don't care what condition it's in.
- tomjakubowski 8y ago
  I'd rather pass on 90s-era safety tech
  - kortilla 8y ago
    Such as?
    - macintux 8y ago
      Well, in the 90s pretty much the entire car was the crumple zone. (That may be a slight exaggeration.) ABS wasn’t as common. https://www.wired.com/2017/02/watch-terrifyingly-bad-car-safety-just-20-years-ago/ https://www.wired.com/2017/02/watch-terrifyingly-bad-car-saf...
- outside1234 8y ago
  They should add a tier of service so that you can choose as a rider.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
cyphar 8y ago
> I'm left feeling like the fare - strictly from the perspective of a consumer - is actually too high. Not to mention personal risk if you consider how dangerous some Uber drivers are. However if you consider the cost of car maintenance, annual depreciation on a taxi-like vehicle, and petrol the fares are actually very low. I would be willing to bet that a lot of Uber drivers are wavering around breaking even on the long run. Maybe that's why a lot of drivers' cars aren't as well-groomed as they used to be. Now, I get that "from a consumer perspective" this is irrelevant, but it does mean that a cheaper service is simply not possible without sacrificing something.
- lugg 8y ago
  The beauty of the uber model is that drivers don't even need to break even. Very few I speak to are doing it full time to make money. Most are doing it as a side hustle for a little extra cash before or after work. Or they're using the money to justify spending more on their dream car. They don't need to break even, they needed the car anyway, it would depreciate roughly the same amount anyway. Or at least the extra uber usage is going to be negligible compared to the time based depreciation.
  - cyphar 8y ago
    > Very few I speak to are doing it full time to make money. Interesting. Anecdotally, in Sydney it seems almost all Uber drivers I meet are doing it full-time now. A few years ago, it was just a side-gig for most but I think the demographics have shifted quite a lot. > They don't need to break even, they needed the car anyway, it would depreciate roughly the same amount anyway. Not if you're driving it 10x more than you normally would. Mileage affects the resale value and increases the likelihood of additional maintenance work (especially if you're doing city driving which is substantially more stressful on cars).
    - JBlue42 8y ago
      In LA, Uber drivers seem to be more like former shitty taxi drivers. Lyft drivers are for more likely to be part-time hoi polloi.
rblatz 8y ago
I feel like it depends on the city. In Phoenix I typically get a relatively nice car with a fairly normal guy or girl that drives a relatively newer car as a side gig, or to keep busy during retirement. Conversely in Columbus Ohio all the drivers I’ve had recently are clearly former taxi drivers that migrated to Uber. The cars are old and beat up, the insides are dirty, and the drivers disregard the app’s directions usually taking us to the wrong spot.
deanCommie 8y ago
Where are you finding these magical cabbies that know the city better than GPS? My p99 experience is the opposite (Except in London where they have The Knowledge I agree that when it comes to finding the most efficient routes across town, cab drivers are better (especially during rush hour), but once they get to the right street the experience is so much better with Uber/Lyft/GPS. "It's the red building in the middle of the next block. No, the next block. No, a bit further. The...it's fine, I'll just get out here." vs. "Perfect, thanks!"

mlindner 8y ago

That's when Uber Black is an option. Which is around what traditional taxis used to cost.

cbhl 8y ago

What are your thoughts on Uber Select / Uber Black / Lyft Lux / Lyft Lux Black?

rubicon33 8y ago
Definitely a fan of the Select and Black options. In fact, I've been using them more and more. The price - while higher - feels more aligned with what I would consider to be "good value". Ranked in order of importance for me are: - A competent + safe driver, preferably someone who knows the area. - A nice, clean, comfortable ride. - A driver who doesn't talk to me. All 3 of these are markedly improved in both the Select and Black options. Given I don't take Uber that often, I can justify the expense. If it was something I relied upon on a more regular basis I just don't think I could justify using Select/Black.
- seppin 8y ago
  > Definitely a fan of the Select and Black options. In fact, I've been using them more and more. How was burning man this year?
- caseyohara 8y ago
  > A driver who doesn't talk to me I wish "Quiet Ride, Please" was an option in the app.
  - kelnos 8y ago
    I wish drivers that pick me up from the airport (or who are taking me to the airport at an early hour) would have some sense of situational awareness and realize that someone who just got off a plane (or is waking up early to catch a flight) might not be feeling all that chatty, and just wants to sit back, close their eyes, and enjoy some peace and quiet.
    - BigJono 8y ago
      I wonder if this is a uniquely American problem. Over here (Australia) it's always a couple of short sentences ('how'zit goin'?', 'yeah good') then awkward silence the rest of the trip. Unless the cricket is on the radio, then all bets are off.
      - kelnos 8y ago
        I figure probably 80% of my rides are as you describe. But I don't know what it is about airport pickups. I guess it's easy to start a conversation with "where are you flying from?" maybe, and then they don't want to stop after I give a terse answer.
    - jacksproit 8y ago
      You could always ask....
  - sib 8y ago
    I always thought this should be a "swipe left / swipe right" thing for both driver & passenger. If they both indicate they want to chat, talk away.
    - lukevdp 8y ago
      Or you can use the voice activated option with the driver. You just need to say “I’m feeling pretty tired right now and don’t feel like chatting”
cge 8y ago
Uber Black, at least for me, is not a good option because it usually (seemingly every time in LA) results in getting a giant SUV. These are not comfortable, and are not discreet, by comparison to good sedans.
- speedplane 8y ago
  > Uber Black, at least for me, is not a good option because it usually (seemingly every time in LA) results in getting a giant SUV. These ... are not discreet, by comparison to good sedans. I am dubious. You live in LA and want to be discreet?

parksy 8y ago

Yeah an uber that smells of farts, vomit and piss, and the seats are sticky... that has become more commonplace for standard uber. Uberx is much nicer for an extra dollar or two (for standard trips), no more farty taxis. But using my power of recollection - taxis were a crapshoot before uber came along too. Some were okay, some were disgusting. I have not had (after a night out at a comedy lounge with my wife) an uber driver chase me into another uber, try and yank open the door yelling "I was first in line! You fuck! You Fuck! Get out!" while my taxi driver speeds away tires squealing. Since uber came along, the quality of standard taxis here in Perth has increased dramatically. The result is a net positive.

rubicon33 8y ago
Totally agree that in the past Taxis were MUCH more of a crapshoot, but lately they've really stepped their game up, which I think is attributable to Uber/Lyft. So all in all, I think it's been a net positive for the consumer.

cabaalis 8y ago

> drivers often don't know the neighborhood and rely exclusively on GPS I drove for Uber about 3 years ago for a couple of months when getting my consultancy off the ground, which led to my current gig. If I had a way to tell Uber "Don't give me rides that require me to leave a given geofence--we'll all have a bad time." Then I'd have been much, much happier. Everyone wanted a ride from my suburban town to the metro area that I know nothing about. Every now and then I'd get one where start point and endpoint were both my own town. I'd have happily taken less fares in order to drive more familiar streets, and the people who rode with me would have enjoyed it more.

kelnos 8y ago
The problem there is twofold: 1) Many drivers from your town would likely geofence themselves to your town, reducing the supply of drivers that will drive to the metro area, increasing wait times and driving up prices, making riders unhappy. 2) Drivers would use this feature to avoid driving to "bad" parts of town, making transportation discriminatory. (In ways that are illegal for traditional taxi companies, so Uber would eventually run afoul of the same regulations.) It's a shame because there are reasonable use cases for a geofencing feature (you seem to certainly be one of them), but it can be easily abused and can hurt the rider experience depending on locale. (Not saying the rider experience is inherently more important, but certainly Uber/Lyft would see it that way.)
- cabaalis 8y ago
  For #1, it seems the market would adjust. We already see complaints about drivers not knowing the area they're driving in. Would it reassure riders to know that their driver spends 99% of driving time in an area they're riding? For #2, sincere problem for which I am not aware of a good solution.
  - kelnos 8y ago
    Not if there aren't enough drivers there, period. I'd much rather a driver unfamiliar with my city who needs Google Maps to get me to my destination if the alternative is I have to wait 20 minutes for a car.

GordonS 8y ago

> Combine that with the fact that the drivers often don't know the neighborhood I used to travel to Houston quite a lot. Not sure if this is representative of taxis in general in the US, but the taxi drivers never knew the neighbourhood. I couldn't say "I want to go to Acme Stuff in X district", I had to give a "Cross road" (a very US thing, that) and the driver would use satnav based on that. It did seem that a lot of taxi drivers were recent immigrants (invariably chatty), so that accounts for some, but not all. At first, this was a surprise, as in my native UK I can literally give a street name within 50 miles of where I am, and the driver cocks their head for a second, gears whir, and yes! They know it!

astrodust 8y ago
That's probably because becoming a taxi driver in places like London is extremely hard (https://www.theknowledgetaxi.co.uk https://www.theknowledgetaxi.co.uk), while becoming a taxi driver in Houston is probably as simple as "do you have a license?"
- wrboyce 8y ago
  Yes, London is the whole UK. EDIT: If it sets a standard then why has that standard not been adopted nationwide? Your argument is dead in the water and I can only assume you’re speaking as a person who has never visited the UK.
  - astrodust 8y ago
    It sets a standard. The US has no such equivalent.
- maxlybbert 8y ago
  I lived in a small New Jersey town where getting a taxi medallion involved little more than paying $100 and promising to charge every customer no more than $5 (for in-town trips).
- GordonS 8y ago
  I'm not in London, or even England. AFAIK, it's relatively straightforward to get a taxi license anywhere in the UK but London.

GordonS 8y ago

> Uber's criteria for what qualifies as an acceptable car has dramatically declined to the point where even Taxis are sometimes "nicer" In my travels to the US, which almost exclusively meant Houston, the taxis were always very basic, "boxy" cars; not sure about make/model, but they always felt "cheap". Meanwhile in Europe, a lot of taxis are Mercedes E class saloons, or high-spec saloons from other makers.

astrodust 8y ago
A taxi in Europe is akin to an "airport limo" in North America. The differences are astounding.
- Bayart 8y ago
  Here in France taxi driving is pretty hard to get into. You not only need to pass an exam, but you also need a licence that can be bought or rented from its owner, which is really expensive. New licences are basically non-existent. In comparison the cost of the car itself isn't as important, so drivers put some effort into it. And they're more professional. I've never once in my life talked to a taxi driver in France besides entering and leaving the car.
  - namdnay 8y ago
    You’ve identified one of the reasons for having nice cars, which is the relative low cost of the car as compared to buying the licence. The others are that they are only paying about 50% of the cost of their cars (as the installments are deductible from gross income), they get subsidised diesel (hence the ludicrously overpowered v6 German engines when the rest of the world is running on Japanese hybrids), and most importantly they get to use the vehicle as their personal car when not working...
- photonios 8y ago
  Depends on where you are in Europe. Here in Romania, taxis are consistently horrible. The cars are usually old and not well maintained. It's not uncommon to see duck taped airbags. The drivers are far from friendly. But! They are consistently horrible in my experience. Not once has one ripped me off and they always use the meter. They know every address you throw at them and get you there safely. No matter the hour. They're also dirt cheap. 2.25 RON/km. So that's about $0.55/km. For the Romanians reading this; Bucharest is an exception and I've had nothing but bad experiences with cabs there. My experiences are based on using cabs weekly in major Transylvanian cities.

duxup 8y ago

A while back in Chicago I was picked up for Uber, in a Taxi... that also drove for the other services and was tied to a local taxi company. Not a bad ride that one, but that guy had all his bases covered...

clhodapp 8y ago

I'm with you right until the line break. The thing is: even for the quality-declined cars, we are not paying enough to cover the costs. Those are simply the economics of using a phone app to hire a person to come and pick you up in their car and then drive you somewhere. The truth is that if you want to pay less for transport then you need to not be taking human-driven taxis.

fwip 8y ago
Yep. Uber is subsidising the fares and even then the drivers are barely making minimum wage, after accounting for their expenses.

dsfyu404ed 8y ago

>Call me a snob You're a snob. I wish they'd relax their policy on vehicles. I would have no problem riding in 90s shitboxes. I would find it novel. As long as it's been vacuumed that week I don't care what condition it's in.

tomjakubowski 8y ago
I'd rather pass on 90s-era safety tech
- kortilla 8y ago
  Such as?
  - macintux 8y ago
    Well, in the 90s pretty much the entire car was the crumple zone. (That may be a slight exaggeration.) ABS wasn’t as common. https://www.wired.com/2017/02/watch-terrifyingly-bad-car-safety-just-20-years-ago/ https://www.wired.com/2017/02/watch-terrifyingly-bad-car-saf...
outside1234 8y ago
They should add a tier of service so that you can choose as a rider.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

cyphar 8y ago

> I'm left feeling like the fare - strictly from the perspective of a consumer - is actually too high. Not to mention personal risk if you consider how dangerous some Uber drivers are. However if you consider the cost of car maintenance, annual depreciation on a taxi-like vehicle, and petrol the fares are actually very low. I would be willing to bet that a lot of Uber drivers are wavering around breaking even on the long run. Maybe that's why a lot of drivers' cars aren't as well-groomed as they used to be. Now, I get that "from a consumer perspective" this is irrelevant, but it does mean that a cheaper service is simply not possible without sacrificing something.

lugg 8y ago
The beauty of the uber model is that drivers don't even need to break even. Very few I speak to are doing it full time to make money. Most are doing it as a side hustle for a little extra cash before or after work. Or they're using the money to justify spending more on their dream car. They don't need to break even, they needed the car anyway, it would depreciate roughly the same amount anyway. Or at least the extra uber usage is going to be negligible compared to the time based depreciation.
- cyphar 8y ago
  > Very few I speak to are doing it full time to make money. Interesting. Anecdotally, in Sydney it seems almost all Uber drivers I meet are doing it full-time now. A few years ago, it was just a side-gig for most but I think the demographics have shifted quite a lot. > They don't need to break even, they needed the car anyway, it would depreciate roughly the same amount anyway. Not if you're driving it 10x more than you normally would. Mileage affects the resale value and increases the likelihood of additional maintenance work (especially if you're doing city driving which is substantially more stressful on cars).
  - JBlue42 8y ago
    In LA, Uber drivers seem to be more like former shitty taxi drivers. Lyft drivers are for more likely to be part-time hoi polloi.

rblatz 8y ago

I feel like it depends on the city. In Phoenix I typically get a relatively nice car with a fairly normal guy or girl that drives a relatively newer car as a side gig, or to keep busy during retirement. Conversely in Columbus Ohio all the drivers I’ve had recently are clearly former taxi drivers that migrated to Uber. The cars are old and beat up, the insides are dirty, and the drivers disregard the app’s directions usually taking us to the wrong spot.

deanCommie 8y ago

Where are you finding these magical cabbies that know the city better than GPS? My p99 experience is the opposite (Except in London where they have The Knowledge I agree that when it comes to finding the most efficient routes across town, cab drivers are better (especially during rush hour), but once they get to the right street the experience is so much better with Uber/Lyft/GPS. "It's the red building in the middle of the next block. No, the next block. No, a bit further. The...it's fine, I'll just get out here." vs. "Perfect, thanks!"