> Uber and Lyft “are using public roads, and the profit is going to their companies,” Phil Washington, Metro’s chief executive, said at a recent meeting.
Public roads are supposed to be paid for through fuel taxes, which every Uber and Lyft driver pays. California has gasoline taxes of:
* 55.22c per gallon (second only to Pennsylvania)
* 18.4c per gallon (federal)
* 2.25% sales tax
Additionally, taxing only ridesharing companies may increase incidences of drunk driving. Is another, poorly conceived, tax really a solution?
Fuel tax revenue and other direct user fees like annual registration in California amount to less than 25% of what the state and its cities pay to maintain the roads and streets. Roads are massively subsidized from general revenues. If you are proposing a $5/gallon fuel tax then I completely agree. That would be about equivalent to what other rich countries tax motor fuel and consistent with the state's greenhouse gas emission goals.
This seems to be a recurring problem. We have all these subsidies and taxes that penalize or prioritize certain kinds of actions instead of charging everything at its true cost. This means the government is forcing a certain kind of solution to the problem rather than charging the problem makers the cost of their problem.
A better solution would be to charge all drivers the exact cost to run their cars including all road maintenance for the roads they use and the cost to the health system and environment that their cars create.
Then provide multiple options such as rail and bike lanes. People will naturally gravitate to the best solution.
I often see complaints about how this will raise the cost of products like food because they need a lot of road and fuel resources. But the thing is you already pay for this cost through other means. By charging the true cost the price of an apple may go up but the price in your tax goes down. And this way the seller of the apple is now incentivized to source the apple locally and reduce the transport costs because its no longer paid for by everyone.
Many Uber/Lyft/taxis cars are fuel sipping Toyota Priuses. Fuel taxes break down as fuel economies reach a certain point. Yes, it is not just Uber drivers using Priuses, but it is a substantial problem that has increased road usage without the same corresponding increases in fuel tax revenues.
Of course electric presents even bigger problems that many states now have a surcharge on them during registration. It is obvious that fuel taxes are going to be outdated in 10 years or so as EVs become more popular. Real-time tolling has been suggested as an alternative to this problem in Europe, but that probably wouldn't fly in the states.
> Public roads are supposed to be paid for through fuel taxes,
No, they aren't, at least in California; fuel excise taxes (and diesel, but not gasoline, sales tax) are a part of road funding, but other sources, including general revenue (largely, sales taxes and personal and corporate income tax), are used.
EDIT: Not that taxing ride-sharing is likely to reduce congestion. It plausibly could increase it, if it induces residents of mostly walkable communities (which, sure, LA has fewer of than it should) who might otherwise rely on ride-sharing for occasional car needs to instead keep a personal vehicle, which then tends to encourage additional, less-necessary driving.
NYC streets are worse because of 250,000+ (obviously, not all at the same time) Uber/Lyft/Via/etc. vehicles being on the streets. I don’t care if there is demand, they have made congestion worse, period. I think all municipalities should treat all “private”, “shared”, whatever you want to call them, car services just like taxis, and require them to be painted a special color. You know not to travel too closely behind a taxi because they could stop or swerve at any moment. Unless you look at the very fine print on the license plate (and this is only in cities that require these cars to register), you do you know it is a car for hire, and to not follow too closely, unless you want to be blocked while they pick up a fare. How is it that these upstarts can “disrupt” an entire industry, and have a significantly lower barrier to entry than the incumbent? I say, require them all to be painted pink!
Fuel is still extremely cheap in the US compared to more modern countries. It does not cover proper infrastructure, as can be witnessed in the US anywhere.
> Uber and Lyft “are using public roads, and the profit is going to their companies,”
Using this logic, they should be taxing all companies that use public roads (food delivery, package delivery, service companies), instead they are specifically cherry picking Uber and Lyft to target. These sort of anti-business policies are causing companies and people in masses to flee California and New York. Perhaps that is the goal.
Agreed. This sounds like a tax that will generate money for the govt and nothing else - it’s not like suddenly people are going to stop going places when the price goes up a tiny amount since there are no viable alternatives to driving in LA, either rideshare or private car.
> Public roads are supposed to be paid for through fuel taxes
Some States do, California does not. The underlying issue is that California roads can infamously cost an order of magnitude more to build and maintain per mile than the same road segment in other States (e.g. interstate highways). It is possible to pay for roads with fuel and use taxes, in some other States it is a constitutional requirement, but the extreme cost of roads in California make it difficult to fund the DoT that way and there is no evidence that California is going to curtail the obvious waste anytime soon.
In my opinion, all taxes besides a land value tax are poor solutions. rent is the final resting place of capital generated by labor and land combined. Taxing unused land higher than used land forces landowners to sell the land to someone who could use the land productively enough to afford the tax bill.
All of taxes deter productivity from increasing. It is better to tax the land date trees grow on, than to tax the output of the trees themselves.
They really said that? Your local pizza place also uses public roads, and they get the profit.
What kind of stupid.........sigh.
The point of having public roads is that it benefits the city by increasing economic output.
Did he forget that there are PEOPLE in those Uber and Lyft cars? Those same people he is supposed to serve? Or does he think the cars are driving around for no purpose making profit the whole time?
Something else to consider is that traffic was bad way before ride sharing companies started popping up. Secondly, additional taxes will ultimately end up being paid for by people who do not own a vehicle. A better way to help alleviate traffic conditions is to raise gas taxes across the board or maybe just using the tax dollars more efficiently to build public transportation like trains on top of the existing infrastructure that cars typically use. I don't know why California is wasting time on obviously bad legislation. Why do they feel the need to consider the crazy option?
Not to mention Uber and Lyft drivers are wholly responsible for vehicle fees, maintenance, registration, their cellular data plans, wear and tear. California is out of control with it’s liberal tax policies. I spent the first twenty years of my life here and every time I return back I start to remember why I left.
Uber undercuts both public transit and traditional taxi services with prices that are unsustainable and can't provide a living wage for their drivers.
This was OK initially because taxis in many places were benefiting from localized monopolies and also screwing many drivers, but in the long run it means Uber kills all the competition and then just jacks prices back up anyway.
I don't dig the drunk driving fear mongering either. If I hired the homeless $3 a trip to carry drunk people home that doesn't mean my exploitative program should suddenly be free of municipal adjustment.
Agreed. Also consider that using taxation as a punitive tool is both immoral and ignores the fact that the government doesn't deserve the resulting revenue.
Also, they plan to tax ride sharing (which people have shown demand for) and use the money to improve public transit infrastructure (which people have shown distaste for). Why, why, aren't taxes like this directed to improve the infrastructure for the services that are being taxed? Elon Musk is on the right track - build out more roads, under the city, to improve capacity and reduce congestion. Don't burn the money on a service with ridership numbers that are in freefall.
Imagine if a private company substantially raised the price of its premier product (streaming movies, for example) to build tons of infrastructure for the product that nobody wants (DVD distribution hubs, for example) and neglected to build out the infrastructure required for the product in demand. It'd be gone overnight. This is absolute insanity.
The real solution:
- Tax all road users - most easily accomplished through license/registration taxes (IE, you pay an annual fee for a sticker that gives you permission to drive your car/bus/truck in the taxed area) and fuel taxes
- By statute, require the money to be spent to improve/expand the road infrastructure
- Where pollution is a problem, (optionally) spend a portion of the tax to build out EV infrastructure, and encourage EV use by charging reduced fees to EV users
- Subsidize use of ride-sharing type services for people who would normally use public transit services
This would provide efficient, clean, point-to-point transit services for ALL users. Economically disadvantaged folks could finally stop paying the hidden 'poor people transit tax' (increased transit times).
This doesn’t fundamentally change the supply and demand problem in LA, which is a city built entirely for cars and nowhere near the road capacity for everyone to be able to make all the car trips they would like to.
For cities that want people to be able to get around AND for the roads to be relatively uncontested, the only reasonable solution is to lower demand by raising the cost of driving - ie. significant congestion pricing (tolls) across the metro - and invest the proceeds into a vast increase in more space efficient transit options. Typically this means express bus and rail service, although the number of people who can cycle efficiently on a dedicated bike way is pretty impressive, and with the scooter revolution there are a lot of other personal mobility choices for people who are less physically able.
Traffic congestion is a problem of geometry and public will - with public will being the primary impediment to progress.
The congestion caused by Uber and Lyft in SF is bad. It's not because of the number of cars on the road, although that's certainly something, it's because of how those cars behave.
Ubers and Lyfts pull over at unpredictable spots (wherever the app says to) and then just throw on their flashers. It doesn't matter if they're blocking a lane in rush hour they just stop.
I will never for my life understand why an Uber or Lyft driver thinks it's any better to double park in an active lane of traffic than to temporarily pull out and block a driveway or a red zone. Both are illegal, but at least one of those doesn't block traffic and endanger other drivers/bikers.
Almost every day I see an Uber driver double-parked within 50' of somewhere they could have pulled over safely.
If the cops would give out a few more tickets for this, the behavior would get better and so would the traffic. And then we wouldn't have to tax the road use. Taxing the road use is crap, everyone should be able to drive their vehicle on public roads as much as they want as long as they follow traffic laws.
I'm a LA resident. People in this city like to talk about congestion as though they see it as a problem, but they don't actually see it as a problem.
Only people in the valley see it as a problem because there are limited choke points into and out of LA proper which keep people from getting to work.
LA's limited transportation infrastructure prevents DTLA's homeless from getting to Beverly Hills, Long Beach's gang-related activity from getting to Brentwood, etc.
If LA wanted to fix their transportation problem then they could build trains parallel to the 405 and 110 and solve the problem, but they don't want to fix the problem because the problem allows them (us?) to keep the city segregated by income.
Is there some "law" that public transportation officials never account for the fact that increased fares or taxes will reduce demand?
Maybe most people don't care, but I find it hard to take seriously anyone who doesn't believe in price elasticity of demand. Perhaps they are ignorant of economics, or perhaps they are so well off that that $2.75 isn't worth counting. Either way…
A lot of people's thinking doesn't go beyond stage one. We should all be asking ourselves "then what will happen?" many times before advocating for economic policies, especially tax increases.
I expect this to backfire. More people will buy cars if hiring out their commute becomes more expensive. Once they have bought a car, they'll use it even for perfectly walkable errands, just like everyone else.
"Metro also is considering a fee on bicycles, electric scooters, and other devices"
NYC is doing this as well and it makes no sense to me. What is congestion? Is it “people who own cars getting stuck in traffic”? To me it seems like all this benefits is wealthy people who want to drive comfortably to/around their neighborhood.
Not only that, if you look at plates, a good portion of the cars around Manhattan besides taxis and hire cars (T-plates) have out-of-state plates. Why should residents pay hefty city/state taxes AND pay more to use the roads (through the new Uber/Lyft tax) so that there is less congestion for people who live out of state and drive in? What behavior is the city trying to incentivize?
I feel this is a completely misjudged solution. The reason so many people use Lyft & Uber is because of lack of public transport. This seems like city finding another way to tax people instead of helping its citizens.
Pretty sure Los Angeles had bad traffic way before Uber and Lyft arrived.
I distinctly remember staring out of the Hilton at Universal City in 2006, on my first visit to California, with a group of Canadians marveling that there could be a traffic jam at 10PM at night.
Comparing rideshare to public transit, this tells me there's clearly a need for easier, faster transit even with higher pricing.
Solution? Try to ruin it.
Instead, maybe we should embrace it and provide incentives for ridesharing vs driving alone? E.g. give uber a lane on the highway for 2+ passengers and tax only single rider transits. Give a few lyft ride coupons with every monthly bus pass. Provide benefits to using busses (which are a terrible experience) by occasional free lyft rides ...
It is a tax to increase revenue. LA has almost non-existent public transit, so anyone riding Uber/Lyft is likely to drive on their own.
It is disingenuous to describe this as anything that has any remote chance to even reduce traffic minimally. LA is an extended suburb, and only infill development of higher density over time can make more public transit economically viable.
What a great plan! Not improving public transportation. Not taxing people who own private cars. Taxing cars who serve dozens passengers a day! Guess what, if these people weren't using Uber, each of them would be driving their own car.
Charging for use of the road is the only way to balance supply and demand for road. More at peak times and a discount off-peak. Fixed price subscriptions for your commute.
But I see no reason to treat Uber cars differently, except that having a driver does not qualify to one to use the carpool lane (which I would eliminate anyway)!
I'd also allow subscribers and those who buy ahead to sell their prepaid trip when the price surges. Wait an hour and make $5 when there's an accident.
Hmm I often wonder why California doesn't implement a congestion tax. In Stockholm you need to pay around 4$ if you want to drive on the highway during certain hours into and out of the city.
I can't say if it works to reduce congestion but it does even the field and it certainly made me want to not drive there.
How do you guys think the trend from public transit to rideshare will look once self-driving cars begin ramping up?
I imagine that without the cost of labor from the driver, rideshares should become dirt cheap. Will anybody use public transit in 10 years? If not, the congestion problem will get many times worse.
It's the classic induced demand phenomenon - when roads are expanded, people drive a lot more, and congestion remains the same. Same thing with transit - people ride it up to the point where it's miserably crowded.
Both are signs that our infrastructure in either form is unable to service the maximal demand society places on it, so people ultimately decide not to go places because of the cost of doing so (in terms not just of cash, but also comfort and time).
I think people will use rideshares only to the point that congestion is precisely miserable enough those who choose to rideshare to tolerate it.
So what might happen is that mass transit remains equally as congested, just more people are taking trips than they were before because the capacity of the whole system has increased.
It's also the case that, unlike self-driving car infrastructure, trains are far more scalable - in places that actually invest in their mass transit infrastructure, I think mass transit can compete pretty well the more the municipality invests in train lines and stuff.
But to assume that self-driving cars will save cities that don't have transit infrastructure—that might be true for very sparsely populated, small cities, but for all the American cities that lack public transit infrastructure, I think the situation will only change marginally.
It's really frustrating that in so many cities, car owners are perceived to have more of a right to the road than non-car owners (aka those who take only rideshare). Roads are payed for by public subsidy and there shouldn't be special handouts for car owners.
Seems like there could be a lot of unintended commercial consequences — people that would be customers deciding not to bother. I don’t know the situation in other places, but in Colorado the RTD smartphones apps are just awful. Twice in the last month I ended up taking an uber home because the ticketing app for the buses was down and I couldn’t access tickets I bought. Not to mention it frequently feels unsafe. I’m fortunate to be a 6’4” male, but if I was say a 5’2” woman I would totally want to avoid the harassment.
Maybe the focus should be in providing better public transportation instead of encouraging people to stay home.
> Ridership is now at its lowest level in more than a decade, driven by a shift to driving instead of using Metro’s sprawling bus network.
Maybe if they realised that the reason nobody takes public transit is because LA's is one of the worst of developed countries, they'd be a bit more incentivised into building a better system instead of trying to blame external things and create more taxes.
I barely use Uber/Lyft when I'm travelling in Amsterdam, Paris, London or NYC, but find myself having no choice but be in a car when I'm in SF or LA.
This has to be just a money grab right? How can they possibly contend that people using ride sharing services exacerbates road congestion? Neither of their arguments makes any sense.
[+] [-] nickles|7 years ago|reply
Public roads are supposed to be paid for through fuel taxes, which every Uber and Lyft driver pays. California has gasoline taxes of:
* 55.22c per gallon (second only to Pennsylvania)
* 18.4c per gallon (federal)
* 2.25% sales tax
Additionally, taxing only ridesharing companies may increase incidences of drunk driving. Is another, poorly conceived, tax really a solution?
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_taxes_in_the_United_State...
[+] [-] shereadsthenews|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baroffoos|7 years ago|reply
A better solution would be to charge all drivers the exact cost to run their cars including all road maintenance for the roads they use and the cost to the health system and environment that their cars create.
Then provide multiple options such as rail and bike lanes. People will naturally gravitate to the best solution.
I often see complaints about how this will raise the cost of products like food because they need a lot of road and fuel resources. But the thing is you already pay for this cost through other means. By charging the true cost the price of an apple may go up but the price in your tax goes down. And this way the seller of the apple is now incentivized to source the apple locally and reduce the transport costs because its no longer paid for by everyone.
[+] [-] seanmcdirmid|7 years ago|reply
Of course electric presents even bigger problems that many states now have a surcharge on them during registration. It is obvious that fuel taxes are going to be outdated in 10 years or so as EVs become more popular. Real-time tolling has been suggested as an alternative to this problem in Europe, but that probably wouldn't fly in the states.
[+] [-] dragonwriter|7 years ago|reply
No, they aren't, at least in California; fuel excise taxes (and diesel, but not gasoline, sales tax) are a part of road funding, but other sources, including general revenue (largely, sales taxes and personal and corporate income tax), are used.
EDIT: Not that taxing ride-sharing is likely to reduce congestion. It plausibly could increase it, if it induces residents of mostly walkable communities (which, sure, LA has fewer of than it should) who might otherwise rely on ride-sharing for occasional car needs to instead keep a personal vehicle, which then tends to encourage additional, less-necessary driving.
[+] [-] lr|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stefan_|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rb666|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nodesocket|7 years ago|reply
Using this logic, they should be taxing all companies that use public roads (food delivery, package delivery, service companies), instead they are specifically cherry picking Uber and Lyft to target. These sort of anti-business policies are causing companies and people in masses to flee California and New York. Perhaps that is the goal.
[+] [-] vkou|7 years ago|reply
Even in California, collected gas taxes do not remotely approach the cost of construction and repair of roadways.
[+] [-] updateYourMind|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] clay_the_ripper|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jandrewrogers|7 years ago|reply
Some States do, California does not. The underlying issue is that California roads can infamously cost an order of magnitude more to build and maintain per mile than the same road segment in other States (e.g. interstate highways). It is possible to pay for roads with fuel and use taxes, in some other States it is a constitutional requirement, but the extreme cost of roads in California make it difficult to fund the DoT that way and there is no evidence that California is going to curtail the obvious waste anytime soon.
[+] [-] ozzyman700|7 years ago|reply
All of taxes deter productivity from increasing. It is better to tax the land date trees grow on, than to tax the output of the trees themselves.
[+] [-] ars|7 years ago|reply
What kind of stupid.........sigh.
The point of having public roads is that it benefits the city by increasing economic output.
Did he forget that there are PEOPLE in those Uber and Lyft cars? Those same people he is supposed to serve? Or does he think the cars are driving around for no purpose making profit the whole time?
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] thegayngler|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] omouse|7 years ago|reply
Do Uber and Lyft pay those drivers' fuel costs?
[+] [-] whalesalad|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xkcd-sucks|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] conanbatt|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thisisweirdok|7 years ago|reply
Uber undercuts both public transit and traditional taxi services with prices that are unsustainable and can't provide a living wage for their drivers.
This was OK initially because taxis in many places were benefiting from localized monopolies and also screwing many drivers, but in the long run it means Uber kills all the competition and then just jacks prices back up anyway.
I don't dig the drunk driving fear mongering either. If I hired the homeless $3 a trip to carry drunk people home that doesn't mean my exploitative program should suddenly be free of municipal adjustment.
[+] [-] RegicidalManiac|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mlindner|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dfilppi|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danjayh|7 years ago|reply
Imagine if a private company substantially raised the price of its premier product (streaming movies, for example) to build tons of infrastructure for the product that nobody wants (DVD distribution hubs, for example) and neglected to build out the infrastructure required for the product in demand. It'd be gone overnight. This is absolute insanity.
The real solution:
- Tax all road users - most easily accomplished through license/registration taxes (IE, you pay an annual fee for a sticker that gives you permission to drive your car/bus/truck in the taxed area) and fuel taxes - By statute, require the money to be spent to improve/expand the road infrastructure - Where pollution is a problem, (optionally) spend a portion of the tax to build out EV infrastructure, and encourage EV use by charging reduced fees to EV users - Subsidize use of ride-sharing type services for people who would normally use public transit services
This would provide efficient, clean, point-to-point transit services for ALL users. Economically disadvantaged folks could finally stop paying the hidden 'poor people transit tax' (increased transit times).
[+] [-] burlesona|7 years ago|reply
For cities that want people to be able to get around AND for the roads to be relatively uncontested, the only reasonable solution is to lower demand by raising the cost of driving - ie. significant congestion pricing (tolls) across the metro - and invest the proceeds into a vast increase in more space efficient transit options. Typically this means express bus and rail service, although the number of people who can cycle efficiently on a dedicated bike way is pretty impressive, and with the scooter revolution there are a lot of other personal mobility choices for people who are less physically able.
Traffic congestion is a problem of geometry and public will - with public will being the primary impediment to progress.
[+] [-] habosa|7 years ago|reply
Ubers and Lyfts pull over at unpredictable spots (wherever the app says to) and then just throw on their flashers. It doesn't matter if they're blocking a lane in rush hour they just stop.
I will never for my life understand why an Uber or Lyft driver thinks it's any better to double park in an active lane of traffic than to temporarily pull out and block a driveway or a red zone. Both are illegal, but at least one of those doesn't block traffic and endanger other drivers/bikers.
Almost every day I see an Uber driver double-parked within 50' of somewhere they could have pulled over safely.
If the cops would give out a few more tickets for this, the behavior would get better and so would the traffic. And then we wouldn't have to tax the road use. Taxing the road use is crap, everyone should be able to drive their vehicle on public roads as much as they want as long as they follow traffic laws.
[+] [-] integrate-this|7 years ago|reply
Only people in the valley see it as a problem because there are limited choke points into and out of LA proper which keep people from getting to work.
LA's limited transportation infrastructure prevents DTLA's homeless from getting to Beverly Hills, Long Beach's gang-related activity from getting to Brentwood, etc.
If LA wanted to fix their transportation problem then they could build trains parallel to the 405 and 110 and solve the problem, but they don't want to fix the problem because the problem allows them (us?) to keep the city segregated by income.
[+] [-] greeneggs|7 years ago|reply
Hmm, $401 million / 20 cents * $2.75 = $5.51 billion.
Is there some "law" that public transportation officials never account for the fact that increased fares or taxes will reduce demand?
Maybe most people don't care, but I find it hard to take seriously anyone who doesn't believe in price elasticity of demand. Perhaps they are ignorant of economics, or perhaps they are so well off that that $2.75 isn't worth counting. Either way…
[+] [-] gamblor956|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] NeonVice|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] emiliobumachar|7 years ago|reply
"Metro also is considering a fee on bicycles, electric scooters, and other devices"
Ditto.
[+] [-] objektif|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paulgb|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rajeshp1986|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blobbers|7 years ago|reply
I distinctly remember staring out of the Hilton at Universal City in 2006, on my first visit to California, with a group of Canadians marveling that there could be a traffic jam at 10PM at night.
[+] [-] jvanderbot|7 years ago|reply
Solution? Try to ruin it.
Instead, maybe we should embrace it and provide incentives for ridesharing vs driving alone? E.g. give uber a lane on the highway for 2+ passengers and tax only single rider transits. Give a few lyft ride coupons with every monthly bus pass. Provide benefits to using busses (which are a terrible experience) by occasional free lyft rides ...
[+] [-] asabjorn|7 years ago|reply
It is disingenuous to describe this as anything that has any remote chance to even reduce traffic minimally. LA is an extended suburb, and only infill development of higher density over time can make more public transit economically viable.
[+] [-] orasis|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Grue3|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stretchwithme|7 years ago|reply
But I see no reason to treat Uber cars differently, except that having a driver does not qualify to one to use the carpool lane (which I would eliminate anyway)!
I'd also allow subscribers and those who buy ahead to sell their prepaid trip when the price surges. Wait an hour and make $5 when there's an accident.
[+] [-] CorvusCrypto|7 years ago|reply
I can't say if it works to reduce congestion but it does even the field and it certainly made me want to not drive there.
[+] [-] smallgovt|7 years ago|reply
I imagine that without the cost of labor from the driver, rideshares should become dirt cheap. Will anybody use public transit in 10 years? If not, the congestion problem will get many times worse.
[+] [-] osdiab|7 years ago|reply
Both are signs that our infrastructure in either form is unable to service the maximal demand society places on it, so people ultimately decide not to go places because of the cost of doing so (in terms not just of cash, but also comfort and time).
I think people will use rideshares only to the point that congestion is precisely miserable enough those who choose to rideshare to tolerate it.
So what might happen is that mass transit remains equally as congested, just more people are taking trips than they were before because the capacity of the whole system has increased.
It's also the case that, unlike self-driving car infrastructure, trains are far more scalable - in places that actually invest in their mass transit infrastructure, I think mass transit can compete pretty well the more the municipality invests in train lines and stuff.
But to assume that self-driving cars will save cities that don't have transit infrastructure—that might be true for very sparsely populated, small cities, but for all the American cities that lack public transit infrastructure, I think the situation will only change marginally.
[+] [-] nserrino|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] overgard|7 years ago|reply
Maybe the focus should be in providing better public transportation instead of encouraging people to stay home.
[+] [-] jypepin|7 years ago|reply
Maybe if they realised that the reason nobody takes public transit is because LA's is one of the worst of developed countries, they'd be a bit more incentivised into building a better system instead of trying to blame external things and create more taxes.
I barely use Uber/Lyft when I'm travelling in Amsterdam, Paris, London or NYC, but find myself having no choice but be in a car when I'm in SF or LA.
[+] [-] markbnj|7 years ago|reply