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Another group caught in the collateral damage is people in wheelchairs. Paratransit sucks in most places and where wheelchair accessible Uber/Lyft is available

• wmichelin 6y ago
  What did people in wheelchairs do before these rideshare apps were around?
  • hnthrowaway353 6y ago
    Waste a lot of time waiting for paratransit to show up.
    • fotta 6y ago
      Yup basically.
  • meroes 6y ago
    Not sure the right word, but a lot of towns and cities have a heavily subsidized busing system for very local routes. Things like DATA Bus or Meals on Wheels. Also my grandparents in a city always used a cab service that only serves wheelchair and has trained drivers to load and unload.
  • vertbhrtn 6y ago
    I guess they hired a personal driver or spent hours a day in the public transit system.
  • Ensorceled 6y ago
    Endured. Worse, the financially better off using the paid services allowed the public services to become more responsive to the poorer members of this demographic. So now everybody will suffer.
  • tpl 6y ago
    Wait hours for a van to maybe show up.
  • xrd 6y ago
    There are plenty of cabs that are wheelchair accessible. My wife works in surgery centers and they often call a cab for someone that needs a ride home and is in a wheelchair. Edit: This was one of the main reasons against using Uber. Cabs were, I believe, legally required to provide this service, and Uber wasn't. That may have changed, but cabs were subject to that regulation, at least in Oregon, and Uber wasn't. Uber may have filled that gap, but I'm sure it was for financial benefit to them and not because it was the right thing to do.
    • Ensorceled 6y ago
      This was the complaint from the cab companies here in Toronto; they were required to have a certain percentage of their fleet as accessibility vehicles where as the ride “share” companies were not. Unfortunately, the cab companies had accumulated years of bad will from tolerating bad and abusive drivers and then ran strikes in the city where drivers attacked people and deliberately blocked an ambulance. I don’t like any of the sides in this battle.
  • woodrowbarlow 6y ago
    public transit agencies are obligated to provide this service, most municipalities contract it out. in recent years, it has been increasingly common for transit agencies to work directly with uber and lyft for paratransit services.
  • reincarnate0x14 6y ago
    In most cases, they waited additional hours, per trip, for limited spots on paratransit or depended on friends and family. The ones affluent enough to afford it used private drivers. A few years ago I was in a freak accident and ended up in a wheel chair for about 3 months. It's really hard to put into words how much more effort and hassle it is to get around that way, even when most of the people around you are willing to help. And I was relatively lucky, still having full use of my arms and no other health issues. But a decent rule of thumb is to take however long you think some activity should require and multiply that by three, at minimum. A disabled friend of mine has often spent quite literally all day dealing with disabled transit issues to get across town for a single appointment someplace. We help him out when we can, but like most people he hates feeling beholden to the charity of friends.
• runarberg 6y ago
  This is a true and an important concern. Municipalities and counties in California really need to step up their game and provide a viable and cheap to use alternative. Everybody deserves to be able to go where they want within their community when they want to. And we should provide these without relying on private companies with questionable labor practices.
  • jdoliner 6y ago
    Why step up and provide a viable and cheap alternative when you can just step down and not kill the existing cheap alternative?
    • runarberg 6y ago
      Because these cheap alternatives rely on questionable labor practices. People with limited mobility deserve the same freedom of movement as fully abled people, however that cannot come at the cost of the workers who provide it. We should be asking for both adequate transportation and fully compensated and decently paid workers.
  • benrbray 6y ago
    Americans spent $1 TRILLION on personal transport (cars + car insurance, mainly) in 2017 [1]. Imagine if just half that went to building local subway networks / high-speed rail across the country / expanding bus options. [1]: https://www.itdp.org/2019/05/23/high-cost-transportation-united-states/ https://www.itdp.org/2019/05/23/high-cost-transportation-uni...
    • core-questions 6y ago
      Yeah, that'd be great when they shut it all down for the next pandemic
      • benrbray 6y ago
        This is a dishonest argument. Compared to the United States, countries like Japan, Germany, and others in Europe have been much more successful at containing the pandemic, even with their extensive public transport systems. Our transportation system is entirely based on individual travel, and yet we cannot keep cases under control. Besides, this situation is not permanent. We should not live in complete isolation out of fear for the next pandemic. Instead, we should learn from our mistakes this time around, and agree on an appropriate course of action to protect against future contagions.
• dbancajas 6y ago
  Is there enough market size for this so that a commercial company can come in and swoop the customers?
  • seankimdesign 6y ago
    You mean the same taxi-service market that Uber has been notably unprofitable and bleeding investor cash for years in? But smaller and more niche? With more legal hurdles regarding accessibility and mobility requirements? Operating with only non-gig, full-benefit workers? Yeah, sounds like a market ripe for picking.
    • core-questions 6y ago
      Hahah, you nailed it. People think that they can have their cake and eat it too, but the result will either be rides that are too expensive to bother with, or workers that are paid too little. The actual financials of this don't make sense unless we were to find some way of removing all the overhead caused by having gigantic companies as middlemen.
• claudeganon 6y ago
  Not just wheelchair users. People with epilepsy and other chronic conditions unfortunately have to rely on these services for gaps in public transit. I wish Uber and Lyft had focused on sustainability vs monopoly and not foisted so much of their costs off onto their drivers, but here we are.
  • sickygnar 6y ago
    I'm not able to drive because of epilepsy and have to rely on ride share apps when family members can't drive me. It's expensive but public transportation doesn't exist here. Around 1/100 people are epileptic and the chance of a seizure during one's life is double digits, so it's not an insignificant amount of people. Mine is "well controlled" but the consequences of accidents can be extreme. Plenty of other conditions exist which also prevent people from driving. Unfortunately it's difficult to participate in a lot of our society unless you can drive.
    • runarberg 6y ago
      Honest question: Has there been a mass action lawsuit against this lack of options for you and other people in your situation? It would seem to me that your county or municipality is in violation of some ADA regulations. If not, and lawyers agree there is no case (yet), then there is an obvious gap in the ADA regulation, and it should be fixed. Everyone has equal rights to get around their community, and it is massively unfair if a significant number of people are left behind because of their disabilities.
      • claudeganon 6y ago
        Not the OP, but the ADA only requires that existing businesses/services accommodate disabilities, not provide them where they don’t exist. There’s no mandate to provide transportation for the disabled in the US. Unsurprisingly, Uber and Lyft have also been violating the ADA for pretty much their entire existence, arguing that they don’t have to comply and settling with states and cities when they lose cases: https://www.fastcompany.com/90343921/lyft-claims-its-not-a-transportation-company-to-avoid-ada-compliance https://www.fastcompany.com/90343921/lyft-claims-its-not-a-t...
• silviogutierrez 6y ago
  A while ago — and I have no citations for this — I read it was easier to just pay for private rides for every accessible person than to make NYC and SF's public transportation accessible. Yes, in perpetuity. Considerably cheaper, too. Why then, go through the effort? Because they should be integrated into society like all others. I firmly believe public transportation has benefits beyond efficiency. Something about a billionaire on the 6 train next to a restaurant worker and a wheelchair-bound piano tuner[1] strikes me as poetic and noble. Whatever the costs. [1] Headed to my place.
  • ffggvv 6y ago
    yes let’s make all public policy based on your sense of poetic justice. and not numbers. i know cost is just a number to you but that’s other people’s money you’re spending
    • silviogutierrez 6y ago
      Believe me, I'm very fiscally skeptical with government spending. Moreover, public transportation costs in the US are outrageous. Each elevator in the tens of millions for an NYC subway station. It's a racket and unacceptably corrupt. But we can tackle both problems, and should. Even with hyper efficient spending, there's an external benefit that is hard to measure and value beyond the cold, hard cash needed for the infrastructure vs government-paid private rides. I've been laterally involved in frivolous ADA lawsuits for websites before, so I also understand how even noble goals can become corrupted.
    • crondung 6y ago
      To him, that money comes from 'government' not your payckeck. This is the kind of person who like many doesn't care -he pays almost no taxes, and votes for other people's hard-earned salary to be given to him. It's one if the issues with democracy - 2 wolves and a sheep voting what's for dinner. These are also the kind of people who think people have a right to free housing, so anyone who worked, saved for 20 years, and bought a house, now owes them free lodging. This is why people vote for gop eggheads. Because while those corrupt men steal their money, it's a lot less than the entitled masses try to steal.
• calyth2018 6y ago
  In BC, Canada, Handydart is part of the public transit system. Paratranspo is part of OCTranspo under the Ottawa Transit system. Cost would be basically the same as normal bus ride. The municipalities could, you know, fund transit? In the Valley, I was talking to some interns. It was a 50 minute walk, 40 minute bus ride, and 15 minute bike ride. Basically the only reason why you'd take the bus is you can't afford a bike?!?
• trevor-e 6y ago
  I was in an Uber rideshare once with a blind person. Had no idea they were blind until the driver pulled over and got out (which initially confused me) to help them to their house.