[cpprototypes]

There is great potential for something like Lyft to fix the rail "first mile" and "last mile" problem. If they can integrate systems with government so that the Lyft cost is part of the rail fare, then it's possible it could be covered by the commuter tax benefit. That would be a big win for everyone, lower cost for commuters, steady income for Lyft, increased ridership for rail.

EDIT: The more I think about it, this is such a good idea I hope Lyft is seriously working on this. With something like Lyft Line, the optimization potential is immense. Assuming each Lyft Line car can have 3 passengers and most workplaces would be within 2-3 miles of a rail station, rides could be very cheap and fast. For example, most coworkers going home would probably share the same Lyft back to the station. The short distance (assuming a 2-3 mile radius) combined with Lyft Line would allow very high throughput during rush hours. If the Lyft cost can benefit from the commuter tax deduction, that's just icing on the cake since the car sharing alone should drop costs by a lot. And there's also networking effect. Coworkers will want to encourage coworkers to do this so they can lower costs for everyone.

[honkhonkpants]

Glancing at the map of Centennial, Colorado, tells me that this is way beyond a first/last mile problem. The problem is this exurb is so sparse that there's nothing within a mile of this station. This appears to be the walking path from the nearest residence to the Dry Creek station, and it's a full mile if you make a suicidal dash across a five-lane with a 40MPH speed limit, or 1.2 miles if you follow legally-prescribed sidewalks and crosswalks.

https://www.google.com/maps/dir/39.5800626,-104.8864011/Dry+...

This isn't a "last mile" problem it is a problem with this urban form, which cannot be effectively served by transit. It's hard to believe anyone put a rail station here in the first place. It must have cost a fortune, especially with that multi-story parking structure.

Probably the best thing that could be done with this site is take the rail station as a blessing and level all of those office parks within a mile of the place, building up a walkable transit village instead. You could easily put several thousand residences in that area instead of what appears to be a shitload of surface parking.

[randyrand]

>It's hard to believe anyone put a rail station here in the first place.

It's not. Perhaps you've never lived in a suburb with a train. They're incredibly useful in getting to the city.

You don't need to be able to walk to the station for it to be useful. Its surprising you think that's how public transit needs to work.

This is a commuter train. You live in the suburbs, drive to the station or get dropped off, and take the train 95% of the way to work. It saves you having to drive in traffic, and parking in downtown where space is limited and expensive. It's incredibly useful.

Without that train living in the suburbs and working downtown would be shit.

[mandeepj]

> Without that train living in the suburbs and working downtown would be shit.

I second that. I live in the suburbs of Chicago. When I moved here - I thought I would drive to downtown (my work location). Everyday, my one way drive was taking about 2 hours. It was pathetic. I switched my commute to train. It was about 30 mins ride along with the benefit of either taking a nap or doing my work.

[jbuzbee]

Strangely enough, I live in the Willow Creek neighborhood you selected. For me, living on the opposite side, it would be just over a two mile walk. And for the most part, it's a very pleasant walk through a park-like development of mature trees, creeks, playgrounds, a school, etc. The last section is not too bad either with cross-walks, lights, etc. And the Google map is a bit out of date. There's a new condo development just a block or so away from the station. But for me, it's a moot-point as my commute is in the opposite direction...

[nerfhammer]

The taxi station near my commuter train station did this. When a train arrived the dispatcher would come out and ask everyone who meandered near the taxis where they were going and then pool people into shared cabs. They didn't even ask if you wanted to share or not, they assumed everyone did.

[nathancahill]

The old is new again. Lyft invents the commute carpool.

[pavel_lishin]

Except Lyft is on demand; I don't have to be waiting in my driveway exactly at 7:45 every morning, lest a coworker have to wait for me and hold up everyone else as well - and I'll never be held up waiting for them either.

[nathancahill]

Have you ever taken Uber pool? It's like that, but worse, because you're riding with strangers that you can't yell at for dilly-dallying.

[vegashacker]

It's a fair point about the dilly-dallying (although I believe there are rules like you can't be more than 3 min late, tho I don't know how strict they are.) I've definitely had rough lyft lines where I seem like I'm really being taken out of my way. But most of the time it's awesome, and kind of fun.

But the important difference that pavel was identifying was that you don't have to decide ahead of time that you are heading to the bus station. That's huge! You decide to head downtown or whereever, pull out the app, bam someone's coming to pick you up. To me this feels very different than, e.g., "casual carpool" in the Bay Area.

[ringwalt]

I think Uber Pool only gives you 1 minute from the time the driver arrives, but I've never had a driver leave without the second passenger when they took 5 or 10 minutes to show up. Plus people never like to admit that they're at fault; if they driver leaves after 5 minutes because a passenger wasn't at their pickup point, the passenger can probably leave nasty feedback and risk the driver being banned if it happens a few times.

[findjashua]

I've had a pretty good experience with Lyft Line tbh.

The fare is based on the destination, so I don't get charged extra if the driver takes a longer route, or if the ride takes longer due to traffic, or if there aren't other passengers available to carpool.

The fare is also pretty reasonable - lyft line for 2 people comes out about the same as the Muni, so it's pretty much replaced Muni for me.

They also recently added the option of entering more than 1 destination, which is pretty handy when you're dropping someone off on the way home.

PS: I'm not affiliated with Lyft, just a satisfied customer.

[vm]

I wish! "On demand" here means waiting 2 minutes to match with a ride that is says it will arrive 5 minutes later, but really arrives 15 minutes later.

Commuting with Lyft/Uber requires planning because of the awful arrival forecasts. It's just easier to pull of because no one has to be the lackey that drives the full group (and spends the most time personally).

[pavel_lishin]

I've never used one, but I'd much rather call a car and wait 15 minutes when I'm ready to, rather than rush to be out the door by 7:45.

[what_ever]

I haven't had the same experience in Boston or South Bay. There have been a few instances it has been late by 3-5 minutes but not too often to actually bother me.

[jdminhbg]

In the same way that blogging invented the zine, I guess. The difference between an analog carpool and one with always-connected GPS devices seems pretty significant.

[r00fus]

Technology (smartphones + software) has made this so much more seamless as to be be new again.

[wehadfun]

How much would these train + Lyft tickets cost? If you charge a flat rate you risk the someone paying $5 for a $25 commute. What if a taco bell executive gets kicked off the Lyft platform for abusing a driver then buys a trainLyft ticket?

[onion2k]

If you charge a flat rate you risk the someone paying $5 for a $25 commute.

Then you make a loss on that ride. Making a $20 loss occasionally is fine if you're making $1.50 profit on the next 500,000 rides, especially if you'd only get 5,000 rides without the flat fee. This is why you model your market structure properly and use as much data as you can lay your hands on to find a workable price point.

It's trivially easy to dream up reasons why, completely hypothetically without any research at all, something might not work. It's not very helpful though.

For what it's worth, where a friend of mine lives in a city in the North West of the UK, getting an Uber is cheaper than taking the bus.

[aeorgnoieang]

"... a taco bell executive ..."

That's an oddly specific example.

[SilasX]

I think the parent is referring to case last year where a drunk Taco Bell executive was caught on tape assaulting an Uber driver:

http://www.businessinsider.com/taco-bell-fires-executive-acc...

[aeorgnoieang]

Thanks. I was guessing it was something like that.