[naravara]

>The thing is, the user experience of Uber, Lyft et al is strictly better than public transport. Some would even say it is 10x better (in the From Zero to One sense).

A bus can transport about 60 people in footprint of 2-3 cars (which would transport about 15). There is no way a transportation system that revolves around everyone getting into cabs is going to match that sort of efficiency. The "user experience' of such a service that ignores externalities like forcing people to sit in traffic (raising travel times and prices) is not a good analysis.

Also, many people don't think that having to walk a few blocks as part of a journey is some kind of crazy physical burden.

[surrealize]

> There is no way a transportation system that revolves around everyone getting into cabs is going to match that sort of efficiency.

If _everyone_ used lyft line/uber pool, the vehicles could be larger and more efficient. Uber/Lyft know where people are going; at scale ("everyone") they can aggregate rides more extensively.

[naravara]

>If _everyone_ used lyft line/uber pool, the vehicles could be larger and more efficient.

That's called a bus. If I have to ride in an efficiently routed, high capacity vehicle I'm essentially just riding a bus service with an app that tells me when the next bus is coming. What you're describing is just an upgrade to a public transportation system. There is no reason a well administered city government couldn't do all of this.

Hell, a city could develop an app for getting around in it that serves multi-modal transit. You could have an app or a card that works as a single interface for riding buses and trains, renting out a car-share or bike-share, and hailing cabs. There is no concrete benefit to tying their city transit to the whims of a private corporation when they don’t have to.

>Uber/Lyft know where people are going; at scale ("everyone") they can aggregate rides more extensively.

Not "everyone." Just people with smartphones at the moments when they happen to have smartphones with them. It’s also dubious to claim we would realize that many benefits from eking out microefficiencies in aggregating rides. What's the real upside there? Well maintained bus lines in walkable city plans do just fine enough on their own.

[surrealize]

The bus doesn't necessarily go where I want to go, when I want to go there. Uber/Lyft do. At scale, they can do both demand-dispatching and ride-aggregation.

> There is no reason a well administered city government couldn't do all of this.

It would be great if they did, but I'm surely not holding my breath for everyone to get a well administered city government. In the hypothetical that we're discussing (uber/lyft usage that's high enough for most rides to be aggregated) the cost of using uber/lyft would be much lower per-rider. In that world, cities would be better off giving residents subsidies for private ride-hailing use.

As long as there's a competitive market with multiple entrants, the cities wouldn't be at the mercy of the private corps. The concrete benefit of the private companies is much more competent technology development, and the option to switch if they're not giving you what you want.

> Not "everyone." Just people with smartphones at the moments when they happen to have smartphones with them.

"Everyone" was the premise of the comment I was replying to. But seriously, smartphone penetration is quite high. And how many smartphone users don't carry their phone with them when they go out?

Buses aren't a good choice for "everyone" either--they only help people whose trips align with bus lines and schedules.

[naravara]

>The bus doesn't necessarily go where I want to go, when I want to go there. Uber/Lyft do. At scale, they can do both demand-dispatching and ride-aggregation.

Hail a cab? You can even use a cab-hailing app? There is nothing magic about Uber/Lyft's service that a municipal taxi service couldn't use.

And an aggregated bus service through Uber isn't going to be any better. Once the VC funding subsidy runs dry and the dream of cheap, point-to-point ride hailing is going to die. You're going to have to learn to walk a few blocks every now and then.

>As long as there's a competitive market with multiple entrants, the cities wouldn't be at the mercy of the private corps.

If you're talking subsidization then it will have to be. Administering tax subsidies or credits for using ride-hailing in lieu of actual public transit would be a nightmare to implement if the market is truly open to any entrant to the market. And there is no reason a city government should want to allow a private corp to skim off the top either.

>But seriously, smartphone penetration is quite high. And how many smartphone users don't carry their phone with them when they go out?

More than you would think. Young people, old people, poor people, mentally handicapped people, people who have been away from power outlets for a while. Foreigners who don't have domestic SIM cards yet.

>Buses aren't a good choice for "everyone" either--they only help people whose trips align with bus lines and schedules.

Bus lines and schedules aren't exogenous. They're put together based on estimations of where the demand for the bus line is. You think people aren't at the mercy of Uber and Lyft's schedules? You call a car and it says you're waiting 15 minutes for the next ride, that's no different than going to the bus stop and seeing that you'll be waiting 15 minutes for the next bus.

[surrealize]

> Hail a cab? You can even use a cab-hailing app? There is nothing magic about Uber/Lyft's service that a municipal taxi service couldn't use.

Are you arguing for or against ride-hailing apps, here? The original comment you replied to was that ride-hailing (as exemplified by uber/lyft) is a much better experience than existing public transit.

> And an aggregated bus service through Uber isn't going to be any better.

Compared to existing public transit (on a set schedule/route), uber/lyft are better because they're demand-dispatched based on where people want to go and when.

> Young people, old people, poor people, mentally handicapped people, people who have been away from power outlets for a while. Foreigners who don't have domestic SIM cards yet.

Many of those people will also have a hard time figuring out which buses (with which combination of transfers) will get them where they want to go. Assuming that public transit even goes where they want to go in the first place.

You're concerned about excluding people, but you're ignoring all the people who are excluded by transit routes/schedules.

> Bus lines and schedules aren't exogenous. They're put together based on estimations of where the demand for the bus line is.

Those estimates are exactly that, estimates, and the resulting routes are subject to lobbying. Plus, the bus lines don't change very often--if they did, it would be very confusing.

But demand-dispatched transportation like uber/lyft know exactly where people are starting from, exactly where they're going, and exactly when. If there's a popular show at a music club, the bus lines aren't going to adapt to that in real time.

> You call a car and it says you're waiting 15 minutes for the next ride, that's no different than going to the bus stop and seeing that you'll be waiting 15 minutes for the next bus.

The difference is that I'm waiting at home rather than waiting at the bus stop. And that the car is going where I want to go, without transfers.

[naravara]

>Are you arguing for or against ride-hailing apps, here? The original comment you replied to was that ride-hailing (as exemplified by uber/lyft) is a much better experience than existing public transit.

I never said to ban hailing apps. I said they’re not useful as cornerstones of a transit system. You’re bringing up edge cases to argue against transit when, in fact, the edge cases are where the alternative options make sense. But they’re edge cases. You don’t build general infrastructure around edge cases.

And once the subsidization schemes end, those services will wind up being prince according to the real cost, illustrating just how much of an edge it is.

>Compared to existing public transit (on a set schedule/route), uber/lyft are better because they're demand-dispatched based on where people want to go and when.

You’re comparing existing public transit to a hypothetical future ridehailing service. Of course it doesn’t have problems, not existing has that advantage. If you wanted apples to apples, you should compare it to an idealized future public transit system, which winds up looking very similar, except without some Silicon Valley VCs skimming significant amounts of money off the top.

>Many of those people will also have a hard time figuring out which buses (with which combination of transfers) will get them where they want to go. Assuming that public transit even goes where they want to go in the first place.

And yet they do. Have you ever lived in or near a transit-oriented city before? It sounds like you haven’t.

>You're concerned about excluding people, but you're ignoring all the people who are excluded by transit routes/schedules.

This is some weird pretzel logic here. I'm talking about building out transit to include more people.

>Those estimates are exactly that, estimates, and the resulting routes are subject to lobbying. Plus, the bus lines don't change very often--if they did, it would be very confusing.

People make their decisions about where to live based on transit access. This is why people like fixed-rail streetcars over buses where routes can be changed. The permanence is a feature, not a bug. It raises housing values for the people near it since they can plan their lives around it being available to them.

>But demand-dispatched transportation like uber/lyft know exactly where people are starting from, exactly where they're going, and exactly when. If there's a popular show at a music club, the bus lines aren't going to adapt to that in real time.

It’s becoming extremely clear that you have no experience of a transit oriented city. In most cities, the baseline capacity is generally enough outside of rush-hour to accommodate moderate increases in traffic from local events. For larger ones that fill up a part or stadium the transit systems generally know when large events are happening and increase capacity accordingly. They can do this because those things require organizers to book reservations and file for permits weeks or months in advance to alert them.

I don’t know why you think having 2 minutes of warning when people start booking rides are going to enable ride hailing apps to be more dynamic than the actual municipal government’s permitting data. No system is dynamic enough to respond that quickly except with hand-fisted nonsense like surge pricing.

>The difference is that I'm waiting at home rather than waiting at the bus stop. And that the car is going where I want to go, without transfers.

As long as you’re okay with spending $11 instead of $4 there is no reason both options can’t exist. But for most people’s everyday travel, they’ll settle for the $4 instead of expecting technology to solve all the issues by magic.

[manigandham]

> More than you would think. Young people, old people, poor people, mentally handicapped people, people who have been away from power outlets for a while. Foreigners who don't have domestic SIM cards yet.

Ride-sharing apps are much simpler and standardized compared to the incredibly complexity of public transit options and schedules when traveling. I've seen first-hand all those people (except those without working phones) have an easier time with uber/lyft.

Poor/affordability is a different issue.

[naravara]

Until you start expecting them to pay the prices those premium services would require.

And that's not getting into how the drivers might tank their ratings over time for inconveniencing them by being disabled.