[roldie]

I've had U/L drivers in Austin who had trouble with English or were clearly not from Austin. One time, I used Uber Pool or Lyft Line and the drive asked me to call the next passenger because he couldn't communicate with them. I also had to direct him to where the pickup location was.

The rest of your points are true. Austin has done a good job of trying resist growth by not investing in infrastructure or transit. Then people come here anyway and getting around is a mess. Ridesharing is essential in Austin. The new ridesharing apps that have cropped up have not filled the void.

[pm90]

> The rest of your points are true. Austin has done a good job of trying resist growth by not investing in infrastructure or transit. Then people come here anyway and getting around is a mess. Ridesharing is essential in Austin. The new ridesharing apps that have cropped up have not filled the void.

This isn't deliberate. Austin has experimented with a number of public transportation options. But whenever any plans are put up for a vote, it gets shot down as too expensive.

Also, the city isn't that dense (yet) for most common forms of effective public transportation, like subways. This might change in the future, but currently growth is not focused on Austin city proper (Travis County) but also many of the suburbs around it.

[chiph]

To be fair - the $1 billion bond that was up for a vote the other year was filled with pork. Only about 2/3 of it was transportation-related, and a fair amount of that was for studies, not actual construction (if they don't know where the congestion is, they should monitor Waze to find out)