3 ms·

I'm unsure if anyone is seriously making arguments that dropping in Uber/Lyft into a city like Phoenix, AZ would be much more efficient. Rather, it would hopefu

I'm unsure if anyone is seriously making arguments that dropping in Uber/Lyft into a city like Phoenix, AZ would be much more efficient. Rather, it would hopefully help as an intermediate transportation mode for cities that have a somewhat useful transit system. For those cities, mass transit is the highly available mode. To state the obvious, people can want all the availability in the world, but they don't often get that because of the costs associated with it. Cars are expensive[1], and so is parking[2]. The costs of congestion are also typically only paid for by drivers with time (although many cities are toying with congestion pricing). Of course, the cost calculation for residents changes for different cities; the costs in Manhattan vs in Atlanta are very different. So while you in particular may be able to afford the private cost burdens of car ownership, I believe the convenience of owning a car is a woefully inadequate metric to make policy decisions on. This is all mostly moot anyway as at least according to the original post, ridesharing does not positively impact car ownership. [1]: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/publications/64-billion-massachusetts-vehicle-economy https://www.hks.harvard.edu/publications/64-billion-massachu... [2]: The High Cost of Free Parking by Donald Shoup (ISBN: 1884829988)

Izkata 4y ago
Yep, I live in Chicago and it's a cost/convenience scale with Lyft in the middle. Trains/buses are cheapest but take the longest, Lyft costs more but is faster, and driving is even more convenient (say, for groceries) but costs the most, especially if you don't need it very often. Taxis should fit in there somewhere, but I've never used one because public transport was good enough, then when Uber/Lyft came about they hadn't yet come up with anything as convenient (or at least as well publicized).
kortilla 4y ago
> For those cities, mass transit is the highly available mode. But what cities are you talking about? In the Bay Area mass transit is absolutely not “highly available”. Nor in LA, nor in Atlanta, etc. There is, to a rough approximation, one city in the US where you can get by without a car and not feel like you are severely restricted on schedule and destinations - NYC.
- coredog64 4y ago
  Meh, even NYC has its transit deserts. Going to La Guardia, I always took an Uber/Lyft because the transit story is awful (bus to train with a bunch of transfers) and I don’t want to budget half the day for getting to the airport on time. Leaving the airport is less time sensitive so I’d only take a taxi if I had more luggage than I wanted to haul through multiple train trips.

Izkata 4y ago

Yep, I live in Chicago and it's a cost/convenience scale with Lyft in the middle. Trains/buses are cheapest but take the longest, Lyft costs more but is faster, and driving is even more convenient (say, for groceries) but costs the most, especially if you don't need it very often. Taxis should fit in there somewhere, but I've never used one because public transport was good enough, then when Uber/Lyft came about they hadn't yet come up with anything as convenient (or at least as well publicized).

kortilla 4y ago

> For those cities, mass transit is the highly available mode. But what cities are you talking about? In the Bay Area mass transit is absolutely not “highly available”. Nor in LA, nor in Atlanta, etc. There is, to a rough approximation, one city in the US where you can get by without a car and not feel like you are severely restricted on schedule and destinations - NYC.

coredog64 4y ago
Meh, even NYC has its transit deserts. Going to La Guardia, I always took an Uber/Lyft because the transit story is awful (bus to train with a bunch of transfers) and I don’t want to budget half the day for getting to the airport on time. Leaving the airport is less time sensitive so I’d only take a taxi if I had more luggage than I wanted to haul through multiple train trips.