Uber is externalizing costs (time, money and environmental) to the rest of us. They must pay.
5
What adds to the car congestion in this city are the drivers who don't pay registration or inspection fees - people who have license plates from California, Pennsylvania (are there any drivers there because in my neighborhood alone, there are at least 12 cars from there) and shouldn't the drivers from Florida have gone back? The bike lanes on Queens Blvd. have made it even more hazardous than before! Bicyclists don't pay insurance or to have their vehicles registered or inspected. Get rid of the bike lanes and the traffic will move more smoothly, instead of every 4-8 wheeled vehicle having to share 1 lane!
Yellow cabs pay a large amount for a medalion. They have paid the freight to cruise the city. What do Lyft, Uber and Juno pay to cruise the streets? It needs to be a even playing field. Subways need to be addressed. Not just making stations more attractive. The Govenor the Mayor and the MTA need to come up with a real time table for subway riders as to when all the switches will be replaced. Once subways are running on a timely manor we can talk about Congestion Pricing plan.
1
An interesting mess. Congestion fees make sense, and they seem to have worked in London and other places. It's also a sensible prediction that Mayor De Blasio would be opposed to something that's sensible -- as would the State Assembly.
At least part of what's happening goes like this. NYC (and NY State) Governments have messed up public and private transit badly (so badly that the NY Times took notice in a series of articles). The seemingly preferred solution is to tax and regulate out of the problem (a solution that doesn't make much sense).
A better solution. Bring back Mayor Bloomberg, or some other reasonably sensible Republican to the Gracie Mansion -- plus a sensible city council.
1
Every time congestion pricing is suggested the alleged reason is to pay for the subway. Drivers already pay exorbitant bridge tolls most of which is also flushed directly down the subway. Combined with a small but vociferous group of anti-car activists we see this idea come up again and again. We are fortunate that New York City does not have home rule and that Albany casts I jaundiced I upon these attempts to charge admission to Manhattan.
1
The last time I tried to get a yellow cab to take my pregnant wife home, the driver refused service because the UN was in session and it was raining. As he told me, "this cab is going uptown" even though it was against the TLC rules for him to ask where I was going.
The car share economy is a more efficient system than yellow cabs: there is accountability built into the system for both drivers and customers instead of being anonymous. I won't be rude to the driver and they won't be rude back. It's a virtuous cycle unlike the vicious cycle of taxi's.
Also, like any functioning market, the prices adjust with supply and demand.
If I were buy myself and it's raining, I'd rather take the subway and not pay to go home. But if I have my pregnant wife, I'd rather pay and not have her walk the stairs. What's so wrong with that?
6
TRUE.
Choked streets.......crumbling subways......housing crisis......Robert Moses---where are you when we need you!
2
It's too bad the NYC and NY governments have been such poor stewards / examples / managers re the NYC subway system. Now, given their track record, the voting public RIGHTLY has little faith that additional funds will be used wisely, honestly, or effectively to fix the NYC subway system, and thus are against such congestion fees. (It's not like taxes aren't already very high in NYC).
Otherwise, the obvious solution would be to charge such fees, and make alternate pubic transportation like the NYC subway system the primary beneficiary, since run well, it could do a lot to avoid congestion.
But how many times after taxpayers are clearly bilked can you go to that well and expect to be re-elected, or even have your party remain in power?
3
So we're going to tax the Uber and Lyft riders looking for convenient and affordable transportation options to supplement the city's crumbling public transport options, but continue to allow the city and state workers, MTA officials, county clerks, cops, firefighters and everyone else with a parking placard (valid or not) to continue to drive into the city and park for free all day in lanes that could otherwise be used for moving traffic more swiftly? Way to not solve the problem, NYC.
6
Several problems with this article and the concept of applying congestion pricing. Especially since I know coworkers who take a taxi/UBER to work each day.
To relieve congestion via congestion pricing, one needs to raise the cost of transportation high enough so that the marginal rider will decide not to use the cab. A 50 cent tax is not enough to alter people's decision to take the cab. Many people have an inelastic demand schedule. Thus raising the transportation price will not cause them to change their decision, but cause them hardship. This is especially the case for workers who need to be at work at a specific time and do not have any flexibility.
The 50 cent tax is a flat tax, not based upon the distance the person rides, nor is it based upon the location of the rider. The tax should be based upon location and time. In this article it is really a disguise to raise funds for other forms of public transportation. Most of the funds will be spend on pork barrel appointees.
There is really no discussion in the article about who uses UBER versus taxis or why people decide to take a taxi versus walk/public transportation. To alter their habits, one needs to understand their decision making process. My guess is that the taxi/UBER rider has a high enough income that a $2 tax may not change their minds.
Finally, the subway pricing system is completely wrong. There is no link between the length of ride and the price of the ride.
Peter, I think the flat subway fee is better than London's system where it costs more the further away you live. Working-class people live in the outer boroughs so it would be regressive to charge them more.
As for charging a levy/tax/fee, just best to make it consistent between taxi's and car sharing.
2
It's bad in SF too. Compounded by the fact the ride-share drivers from all over the bay area descend on SF for fares, and have no idea how to drive in the city. These aren't technology companies, they're scab cabs, no matter how hard people try to legitimate their existance for their own selfish benefit.
6
Medallions are capped because the scarcity makes them valuable. Some were worth millions of dollars. The number of medallions haven't been increased in decades.
2
Uber/Lyft drivers are slaves to their direction apps. They seem to be programmed to go thru Times Square no matter the final destination. Subways are generally easier and I live on the dreaded G line.
3
It's shocking to me that this headline poses this as a question. Another example of how journalism loves to pick away at public policies that are intended to help people just to sell more papers--behavior like this is so juvenile and irritating. Make the headline straight and offer constructive criticism in regards to the plan. Leave the clickbait to fake news.
New York City needs to be more pedestrian, cyclist, and public-transit friendly. The MTA is strapped for cash, and regular taxes don't cut it, for whatever reason. Congestion pricing offers a solution. There should be an exemption for wheelchair accessible vehicles, access-a-ride, and for certain private vehicles that have accessibility plates. Possibly also HOVs like Via and privately operated commuter vans.
This city wasn't made for driving, I don't know why people are so hell-bent on living it from the point of view of a vehicle. If you love your car so much, move to California.
7
Seems the NYTimes and readers commenting have forgotten why Uber and Lyft exist in the first place. Because taxi rides are too expensive, even under regulation, and because the mob crooks own the taxis and the drivers. But mostly, they exist because they work - riders get to where they are going without waiting in the cold or rain for an in-service cab to actually stop AND the drivers make good money (yes, they make good money) for part time or flexible working hours of their choice.
The subways in NYC exist at a new low - they often don't work, are over crowded and dirty, and are filled with jokers that dance and jump and intimidate in order to get hand-outs or just a thrill at the expense of the riders. And the city does nothing but enable this bad behavior. The taxis over-charge by keeping the ticker going and choosing the worst ways to get to destinations if they even sense you are a tourist. The streets, if you choose to walk, are filled with homeless and panhandlers.
NYC has gone into the dumps. In part, because of De Blasio. No one seems to care. But the real reason for this proposal by the city government is to extract more revenue for their wasteful spending and partisan commitments.
6
Tax negative externalities... the more a business, any business, messes up the environment, the more they should be taxed.
1
Perhaps it's time to consider population control within urban areas? Across the globe? Uber isn't the issue - too many people are in NYC. NYC was a beautiful small island, not meant to hold millions.
4
A tax per ride is likely warranted within Manhattan (perhaps dynamic, depending on the current level of traffic and congestion). But to impose this without also enacting congestion pricing is a very bizarre use of selective blame-pointing. And while the Uber and Lyft rides undoubtedly generate higher economic activity (all those folks going to bars, restaurants, meetings and appointments, who might otherwise simply stay home), it's unclear the same could be said for the folks who feel entitled to drive into midtown and Lower Manhattan each and every for work, in lieu of other transit options (of which their are many) or living closer to work (in buildings with a smaller/greener footprint anyways). Cabs are for the people who live in the city to make use of the city and help the city prosper. Private vehicles are for people who live in tax havens and sprawling developments to avoid interaction with "the masses" while driving up asthma rates in outer boros.
1
NYC created congestion by reducing the space available for traffic. Uber increased the problem and all eco-types who want to ban cars but hire Uber are part of the problem. Congestion tax is just city and state mismanagement at work looking for more tax dollars (unevenly and unfairly applied) to Fund their mistakes. And residents who own cars should be exempt. Residential car use is not what clogs the city.
2
The congestion is a direct result of Sadiq-Khan's choking traffic flow by adding bike lanes and adding Select Bus lanes, and by DeBlasio's Vision Zero reducing lanes and reducing the speed limit. What were effectively 5 lane streets are now down to 2 lanes. As for Uber, they are just replacing the yellows. So if you want to tax anybody, tax the Mayor's office and NYC DOT.
6
Congestion in London was a problem long before Sadiq Khan was elected mayor and before bike lanes. Congestion charging was brought in by Mayor Ken Livingstone in 2003.
London's congestion problem is a result (among other things) of London's road layout, which is not based on a grid, but grew as London grew in all directions over hundreds of years.
The congestion charging actually works to reduce congestion and pollution.
4
Yes! Autos create smog, crowding, replace walkers, subway riders and bicyclists. Of course they should help support public transit and air quality.
Ps lived in NY for decades.
3
"Encouraging" people to take the MTA by inventing supplementary taxes for alternatives like Uber are never going to solve the corruption and dysfunctionality of the MTA. And NYC taxis are only modestly better: they are a system of servitude where wealthy medallion owners (a taxi medallion "license to operate" costs six to seven figures) license the use of their cars to mostly poor immigrants, who then must pay those owners a portion of their already modest income.
Probably the wealthy medallion-owners and the wealthy MTA board members are a bit troubled that their respective cash cows are being threatened by Uber and are lobbying for just about any cause that makes Uber less affordable or attractive to regular New Yorkers.
5
Why are taxi medallions capped and the unregulated Uber and Lyft drivers allowed to proliferate without apparent limit? Incompetent limo drivers are bad enough without adding semi-pro Uber and Lyft drivers to the streets. There should be standards for requirements for them, and limitations on their being on the roads. Public services and delivery trucks need access to the roads to keep the city functional. Efficient mass transit should be the priority. Private cars should pay just to be out on the streets when the traffic density is high.
4
Of course the ride sharing companies should be charged the same price as a medallion. They clog up the street with all the cars they have. There are 14,000 medallion taxis in NYC and 80,000 ride sharing cars! That is why there's so much traffic in Manhattan.
3
Sorry, "entrepreneurs". We need to regulate you... out of business. Simply charge these dangerous fools the price of a taxi medallion. Regulation has its purpose. Teach the millenials from Iowa or wherever that if they want to live in the Big Apple, they need to learn how to use the subway and buses!
5
NYC DOT used to get it's congestion information, and travel time, from the GPS in NYC Medallion cabs When Uber was given permission to pick up passengers in NYC part of the agreement is that it would provide pickup and drop off information to NYC. Uber should be made to provide the same GPS information so we know what roads they are using.
3
There should be no cars allowed in certain parts of Manhattan, period.
5
Anyone who casually observes traffic patterns in NYC will note that a major source of congestion is caused by bad behavior by private car service operators. Common issues are blocking traffic traffic lanes unnecessarily to pick up passengers or to check their apps. I don't know why the journalist who wrote this article omits this fact and instead pushes a tax which will probably not help solve the problem.
Folks: If you are concerned, please download NYC's 311 app for your smartphone which allows you to submit a complaint with a photo of the bad-behavior driver's plates within seconds. If we do this enough and the city responds by revoking TL&C licenses appropriately, then we can help solve this problem eventually.
4
Did our mayor recently hand out thousands of free parking passes to teachers? He caused congestion to get votes.
5
Yes. The teachers who get paid poorly and can't get to their jobs to teach our children are the problem. How did nobody else see this?
1
Explain to me, how an extra fee per ride applied to UBER and its ilk will resolve the traffic nightmare in Manhattan ? How this fee will reduce the number of FHVs ? I don't get it !
I tell you what to do: Limit the number of UBER and its ilk vehicles to a number equal to yellow medallion taxis which is about 13,600. That's a good start !
4
NYS is the most corrupt state in the country will figure out how to steal this tax as well.
2
Soda tax Democrats are at it again. This proposed fee (tax) has nothing to do with traffic congestion and everything to do with saving the failing New York Subway. And liberals wonder why Democrats lost so badly in 2016.
4
If the NYC subway fails, congestion gets worse. It must be nice to live in a sprawling bubble with no density...
3
Charge the cabs instead.
Uber provides a superior service.
7
There was a time when unregulated vehicles like Uber were called "gypsy taxis," and were illegal. New York should follow London's lead. Uber and it's ilk represent a failed experiment. They have made things worse rather than better.
4
What? Taxis don't troll the streets and make illegal U-turns to get to a waiting fare and... and...? I agree with the reader who said this article was likely written by a medallion-owner. Here's my "little problem" with TLC drivers in NY: I was late for a meeting at 116th/B'way and had come in to the city via NJ Transit (train). Slightly disabled and unable to hoof it to the #1 train, I exited to the street and tried to hail Uber. Got an immediate reply ... from a TLC driver, who promised pickup in 12 minutes. Hobbled to the assigned corner and waited. Twenty minutes later I called him. The GPS on my ohone indicated that he was sitting...not in traffic as he said but outside a Dunkin Donuts. Canceled that ride and tried again. Another TLC picked up the UberApp request. Hobbled to a different corner. Same wait, same lie about traffic (as I talked with him, I watched traffic moving quite nicely up 8th Ave). Canceled. Tried a third time. Another TLC (the plates on the cars are identified by Uber, and all three very plainly showed the letters TLC). So TLC is hijacking Uber calls. Finally tried hailing an actual taxi. Nada. Hobbled back those 3 long blocks to the #1 subway entrance; by now I'm hurting so bad that I was tempted to turn around and head back NJ, but that would have been just as painful by then. The TLC charges a fortune--and doesn't (no pun intended) deliver reliably. I'll take UBER any time I can get it.
4
All NYC Uber drivers are required to obtain TLC license and plates, so I'm uncertain what kind of car you were waiting for.
1
I didn't know about the NYC TLC requirement. Thanks for that information. As to what kind of car I was waiting for: any one that would actually pick me up. I take what I can get. All 3 Uber drivers lied--two of them stayed put right in front of Dunkin Donuts; the 3rd complained about being stuck in traffic on 8th Ave; I explained that I was standing on 8th and traffic was moving just fine. On that occasion, I couldn't get anything--and the steady parade of taxis all had passengers (so THEY weren't losing fares that day). Needless to say, I missed my meeting. At least the subway was running.
1
I am a 76 year old woman who loves to visit New York. I used to ride the subway to get around and now I don't. Why? I have physical problems that make stairs an overwhelming challenge for me and the lack of working elevators and/or escalators at subway stations rules out the subway for me. So I use a cab or a ride-hailing service. I don't like adding to the congestion on the city streets. I'm certainly aware of the problem since I've been stuck in traffic like everybody else. The only way to reduce the congestion is to make the subway into a usable transportation system for everyone, which is certainly isn't today.
22
I live in Harlem. There isn’t a Citibike anywhere near me. The the A and C trains take anywhere from 40minutes to an hour and twenty minutes to get me to my business in FIDi. In the evening, lately the C train is always a 15 minute wait at 145 when I get off the A which has taken forever to get uptown. My commute in either direction used to be 30-35 minutes.
In the last 3 weeks, I have watched a physical altercation with no police response, a person urinate on the platform while the MTA cleaners walked away and a homeless person switch to the other side of the car because he had urinated and defecated on the first bench he first occupied.
In desperation’ when I can’t get to my business via subway I take a cab. The MTA surcharge is a poke in the eye. I paid a fare to the MTA and am now giving them more money to not get me there.
Consider:
- build mandated residential public parking, and open up two lanes of street space for transportation, not car storage.
- green cabs are empty leaving downtown Designated locations for pickups to the outer boroughs- fewer empty cars
- charge higher tolls for cars entering the City with only one person - MTA $
- based on license plates cars can only come in on certain days - car pool or transportation on off days
- new buildings must have parking built in.
- Fire the entire MTA board
- More Citibike
-replace the tone deaf transportation commissioner
Uber and Lyft thrive because when desperate we can get from here to there.
4
Virtual money vs. real money.
Virtual fact vs. real fact.
Virtual convenience vs real convenience.
Virtual sclence vs. real science.
Virtual President vs. real President.
Virtual progress vs. real progress.
3
After 6+ of driving a yellow cab overnight, I’ve seen a massive amount of change in our business and the flow of traffic around the streets with much of it has been caused by Uber and it’s peers. Unfortunately, nearly all of it has been for the worse:
-Unbridled growth in ride-hailing companies, to the point where we may soon have 100,000 of them on the streets, as opposed to a bit less than 13,000 yellow cabs.
-Ride-hailing companies double-parked everywhere, making every kind of illegal turn in the book, and having car interiors that resemble offices and airplane cockpits, with nary a ticket given out to them by the NYPD.
-Failure to comply with ADA requirements, while access-a-ride continues to be a subsidized failure.
-Non-compliance with the licensing, fees, and MTA surcharge that yellow drivers must pay, costing the city millions in transit revenue and increased payouts for their higher accident rate.
All of this because these companies claim that they don’t have to play by the rules - rules that were set up to protect the public since the passage of the Haas Act 80 years ago.
At best, this is capitalism run amok and unchecked. At worst, it’s a *massive* failure of on the part of city government, the DOT, the MTA, & the TLC to perform their jobs and put an end to this farce. Knowing that nearly all will be returning for another 4 years only adds insult to injury, since none have yet to come to their senses on this.
http://gothamchronicles.net
10
Any additional fees paid by ride share companies should go to make cabbies who invested their life savings in a medallion financially whole. The City owes them that because The City let the TNCs destroy the value of their investment by evading the cost of the medallion.
8
So five years ago, try to find a cab in Manhattan in the rain. Good luck. Now, no problem. So what if it takes a little longer to go cross town.
5
Congestion is a huge problem- for the environment, for ashtma rates, in children for emergency vehicles, etc. It's a lot more than "taking a little longer to go crosstown"
3
I think( what u think and mean about transportation?) Transportation means fast .reliable.and on time job need to done.not sitting on traffic with cab or ride share cab.last 30-40 years why yellow cab get popular.beause they are quick reliable and on time.before 2013 from midtown going to lga airport takes no matter what 1 hours doesnt matter what time it was.as well jfk took one hour and half .now these days midtown to lga needs hour and half .as well jfk needs close to 2 hours.they way city runs traffice later on people scared to ride cab as well rideshare.rideshare company makes billions of dollars.who gets benefited big joints business mens not the city .city losing money everyday.if you calculated yellow cab paying M.t.a since 2013.to now i guess almost 30% less.still our governments support rideshare company.
Why discriminate against Uber and Lyft in favor of rich private vehicle owners? Charge a daily congestion fee to all vehicles in the city.
2
To the wealthy this is just a trifle! Tax everyone for mass trans; add on taxes to all visitors to the city; then make it all free complete with rest rooms and a friendly security force.
And more pedestrian walking malls sin cars.
Wake up NYC with your ever growing population—/ you do not need cars!
1
This is all about taxing people with money to pay for the transportation of those without. It is socialism and the heart and soul of the Democratic party. Buying votes from the poor to keep the Democrats in power. Seattle has a tax that hits the people with expensive cars so the Democrats can buy votes by giving almost free bus rides to those without money. Socialism--pure and simple.
2
What you describe are called "public services". Sounds right to me.
4
No only should they pay a fee but they should be required to carry higher insurance than they do today.
4
Uber's tech should enhance our T&LC, not add to the traffic problem while creating a parallel workforce subject to lower pay and increased risk.
12
I don't think there is any added risk. I have found yellow cab drivers to be much worse than Lyft as they don't have any accountability. They don't care about their customers because it's anonymous whereas the Lyft drivers do.
I'd rather see the Taxi's removed off the streets. They've had decades to prove themselves and what to show for it? It's a bad model and should be dissolved.
2
Imposing an additional fee on ride hailing services will neither solve the congestion problem nor improve the subway system. If you begin with a flawed premise you will often arrive at a flawed conclusion or in this case, flawed solution.
First, congestion is a factor of too many vehicles on the road, period. Placing a cap on the number of ride hailing cars is a start as they have done with taxis. Secondly, the additional fee of .50 per ride is not enough to discourage people from using Uber or Lyft thus forcing them to the subway or bus. So you will tax people more under the guise of solving a problem that will not be solved. That sir is effectively called a “Con”.
Finally, the idea of assessing an additional tax on ride hailing services as a means to improve the subway system is an oxymoron at best and a cruel joke at its worst. In New York alone over 5 million people ride the subways everyday at a cost of $2.75 per ride each way. A one-way fare of $2.75 alone generates approximately $13,750,000 per day! That is over $5 billion per year! Round trip fares must generate between $5 - $10 billion a year. Where does all of the money go? Operating and maintaining a transit system is not cheap but revenues of $5-$10 billion a year should be more than enough. The MTA should be audited before it seeks any additional revenue
8
Congestion is engineered in this city. Remove all that was done to create traffic and let traffic flow instead of restricting traffic at every major turns. Remove the parking from the middle of the road and make Bicycle lanes much smaller and let bicyclists share the road with vehicles. Congestion tax is back, so now we know it has always been about the congestion tax. And please, remove those pedestrian malls. Nobody uses those except for 2 months of hot days and the rest of us suffer for the entire year. City coffers created the traffic so they are the ones to deal on their own. New Yorkers should not be paying to bail out their dreams. Also, please please cap TNC's cars on the roads. Increase taxis to 30k and remove all those mediocre taxi wannabes Uber/lyft/juno etc. No congestion tax. New Yonkers have already paid for it thru unproductive sitting down in traffic for all the engineering started with Mr. Bloomberg.
3
I just looked at how much money I spent on Lyft rides this past month -- it's ridiculous.
However, my commute via subway requires 2 different trains (one of them with notoriously bad service), and nearly EVERY single day there is some kind of problem on at least one of the lines I take, and it takes at least 40 minutes on a good day. So sometimes, I treat myself to a car ride that zips me through the Battery Tunnel in 15 minutes... my time is money, too.
Plus, with no simple bus service between my home and the next neighborhood over, where all the shops and restaurants are, and when weekend subway service regularly skips my stop, it's maddening to try to get around via the MTA.
1
"Midtown traffic... average[s] 4.7 miles per hour [down] from 6.5 ... five years ago." Projecting that, the average will be 2.9 mph by 2022.
Almost anyone can walk 3 miles per hour - faster than riding in a car. The whole city will become a walking city.
2
I am not sure how bicycle friendly NY is because I have not been there in quite awhile but in Europe the cities are providing Electric bike rentals. They go about 20 mph and there are places to pick and drop off throughout the cities.
15
Not a big help if your over 60.
1
True, but not the point. Not every form of congestion reduction has to work for all people. The net benefit of getting some of the younger population out of cars reduced congestion for those who remain.
Problem: motor-assisted bikes are not legal in NYC. (Hmmm. Wonder why.)
2
Put info tech to good use. Rather than move people around a congested city, move the people out and their work with them.
Apps, email, e-document processing has eliminated the need for office workers congregating in large congested cities.
Most workers can do their work from home or in suburban or even rural work space hubs.
It’s time for the real tech revolution.
10
The problem is everyone wants to be in the center of the city. I’m all for moving people out of nyc. But they keep moving in!!!
1
So the workers at home can be penalized by the shiny new Trump tax plan, with limited deductions? Sounds like an even less fair alternative.
I disagree. The answer is not to isolate more people in stay-at-home jobs; the answer is to improve the transportation infrastructure. Uber is causing more problems than it has solved, thats for sure, but people are still going to want to leave their homes somehow.
It always gives me the chills when techies suggest that the best way to improve some urban problem is just to get rid of the people.
1
If all modes of transport in cities were charged what it truly costs to support them, a better balance would emerge. All vehicles that use roads should be appropriately taxed to pay all that is needed in order to build and maintain them. This includes gasoline taxes that account for all costs surrounding everything from the impacts of pollution to defending sources of imported oil. All users of mass transit should also pay whatever fees are needed to use and maintain those services. Economics alone would likely result in greater mass transit use, along with improved facilities.
12
Highly doubtful. If transit riders had to pay full freight, especially suburban riders, no one would take transit.
4
Your argument is specious. Andy W. is urging that every form of transportation be charged for its full costs. For example, Uber needs to be billed for the cost of using our city streets as parking lots for the "entreprenuers" who donate their cars (free of charge) to Uber. Uber also needs to be prevented from subsidizing their service (which they currently do to the tune of about 30%.)
So yes, we must begin charging Uber and its passengers for the full costs of using our streets, as described by Andy W.
Those using public transit would face comparitively higher costs if they began driving their cars, and even higher costs for using Uber, who causes all this additional congestion, for which I am going to charge them... alot!
3
If all modes of energy use were charged a realistic price of the SOCIAL cost of the fuel they use, AGW would not be a big problem yet, and EV's would be much further along.
The ENTIRE income tax system is a giant mess, comprised mostly of favors to groups of voters. (Witness the recent "tax reform" mess).
You expect rationality from government, especially re taxation? What world do you live in? Seriously -- I say this with no disrepect.
I've been driving Lyft for about a year now and almost immediately I saw how much slower driving in Chicago has become with thousands of ride hailing cars on the street. Because I consider myself a Chicagoan before O consider myself a Lyft driver, I applaud the city's decision to raise the fee and direct the funds to the CTA.
I take many passengers on short trips that cost them $3. Bus fare costs $2. Many riders tell me they've permanently given up public transportation because the convenience of ride hailing is not that much more expensive.
I agree that these services provide a great advantage to passengers in comfort and convenience over public trans and taxi service. Why then, are passengers not charged a premium for these advantages? Many comments here suggest the market should dictate the fees, but I've only read one comment that points out, correctly, that ride sharing services are using predatory pricing to increase market share. This is not the market doing its job,unfettered.
A formerly 10 minute drive now takes 20 because of extra cars and amateur drivers on the road. These cars are stopping anywhere along major thoroughfares and are often driven by suburban drivers who are too timid for city driving but clueless enough to do it anyway.
The CTA has many well known problems but the erosion of its passengers base due to predatory pricing by ride sharing companies will only lead to declining, not improving service.
33
Those fees should first go to the cabbies who bought medallions to make them whole.
2
Other than walking... and biking!! I have found that biking is by far the fastest and most reliable- not to mention the cheapest- way to get around this city.
6
Please, NYC, come up with some way to reign in the "ride sharing" (what a laughable, bald-faced lie that name is) companies and the remarkable surge in congestion that has come with them.
I say please because once a few of the competent, adult-like civil servants in your town figure that out, the inmates that run our asylum here will have a model to follow, or at least one to discuss!
11
True ride sharing makes more sense both environmentally and economically than private rides. A service like Via lets people get places often more expeditiously than public transportation at a reasonable price. In theory there would be less congestion if more people shared and their were fewer cars waiting for single rider bookings. Shared rides should be encouraged, not taxed.
1
Basically, the term "entrepreneur" has come to describe anyone who is unqualified to get a job with a real company, and who depends on the government's looking the other way (i.e., no regulations) as a result of the lobbying of the "entrepreneurial" masters (e.g. AirB&B,Uber, etc).
This article does a good job in pointing out what anybody with half a brain would have predicted -- multiply the number of Ubers by the unoccupied time per vehicle, and you'll massively increase congestion! But similarly detrimental consequences on housing availability in desireable neighborhoods have accompanied the rapacious efforts of AirB&B to take over our city.
2
If the subways need repair, raise the fare.
6
Raising fares isn’t the answer.
Clearly, Albany isn’t concern about it, but they surely want the Billion$$$ the City makes in Taxes for their other state wide projects.
Albany Politicians need to own their neglect and lack of leadership on effectively creating a positive & proactive Capital Improvement 10yr plan.
If Yellow Taxis are capped, why not just implement across all TLC licensing caps.
More Taxes and new fees should never be the first choice. A progressive mindset that pushes outside the box thinking is a must.
Or have personal vehicles and ride share vehicles pay for the infrastructure they use so more funds can be directed to mass transit.
A country that falls for the Silicon Valley snake oil of "disruption" as inherent progress not only gets Uber disrupting traffic but a nation primed by 2016 to elect a Disrupter-In-Chief. There really is no difference between falling for the marketing hype of Apple, Facebook, Uber, Twitter, Google, AirBnb, and their ilk and falling for the hype of Trump.
A people who allow themselves to fall for the lie that these corporations are different from Goldman Sachs, ExxonMobil, Bank of America, Lockheed, Wells Fargo, and their ilk, are primed to allow themselves to fall for the lie that Trump was running to "drain the swamp."
24
Can learn a lot from Asia, especially, China. Put in bicycle lanes/fly overs. As a former New Yorker, honestly, it's amazing how much less congested the roads are here and how much more efficient the subways are here (granted they are newer)
Bicycles let commuters zoom to convenient subway station and bus stops reducing the need for cars.
8
Its quiet incredible to see these comments from NYT readers at some point I thought I was reading Breitbart. Uber is causing congestion? Jeez are you guys serious? You guys must be medallion holders. For years taxi supply was artificially controlled to hike up ride prices. Uber brings an innovative solution and all you can do is complain.
I bet you also like zoning laws in NYC which is unfriendly to new developments, after all only you are entitled for affordable housing.
15
Here here! Uber is not competing with mass transportation. They are competing with taxi cabs and personal cars! If we let the taxi cab industry die its self-deserved natural death and allow folks to leave their cars in the garages without a penalty, congestion can only go down.
8
Get Grammerly. You need it!
1
I don’t understand why we need to raise money to fix the subways. We pay FARES and TAXES. That is how I, and we all, contribute. Why doesn’t anyway else say this?
23
Besides Fares & Taxes, question where the Lottery money is going. Originally proposed to improve the public school systems. Decades have past and no meaningful improvements seen. Transit Infrastructure crumbling under the pressure of a growing city. We need an honest audit of the state Lottery programs.
12
They need to audit the MTA.
2
Because while what you say is true, it does not mean that those fares and taxes pay the full cost of the subways. Therein lies the rub.
1
Tax the taxicabs. They too create congestion.
11
They do. That is the point. Uber has an unfair advantage because they pay no fees to the city, and more and more , they pay less to their drivers.
4
There are already taxes and surcharges on taxis.
I apologize for sounding arrogant, however, how many times does one have to be hit in the head with a hammer before they are unable to comprehend the obvious truth about Uber and so many other companies? They are not new businesses, they do exactly what the Taxi company does, but are not regulated as such because of the "tech" part. It's a loophole, plain and simple.
29
Don’t know bout NYC, but Uber and Lyft are all over the streets in Chicago for one reason. Folks LIKE the service and clearly find it a far better value than a taxi or driving their own personal car.
Cold rainy night at O’Hare airport — I can get an Uber in 8 minutes and they text me when they drive up so I don’t have to stand in the rain. Taxi line? Half hour if I’m lucky and 20% more expensive. And prearranged taxis? Good luck with that. (Sorry. No train from the airport to the suburbs).
Want to get between downtown and the Burbs? With a taxi? Forget it — your driving. (I know... the train! But it isn’t the train. It’s the train PLUS taxis.)
Simple math is Uber and Lyft are helping folks stay outta taxis and outta of their cars and off the streets. Not to mention the reduction in drinking and driving.
Let the market do its job and I suggest the streets will clear to pre-Uber days. Not of Uber and Lyft cars, but of taxi cabs and personal cars.
Otherwise you can stick with decades of social engineering and let the government continue to pick the winners and losers in the transportation market.
Personally I’ll join the millions and pay for a quick and efficient Uber ride over a dingy and late taxi with a non functioning credit card machine and a driver who doesn’t even know the route to Soldier Field any day. And my car will stay in the garage.
13
Why is it that taxi drivers never seem to have/use GPS apps?
2
Interesting how the non-New York comments differ from the New York resident comments. The New Yorkers seem to be willing to use mass transit but know how corrupt and inept the MTA is. New Yorkers don't like getting ripped off and taken advantage of anymore than the rest of the US does. If the buses and trains were clean and timely, I'd ride them in a minute. And so would most other people. And now that the Transit police are fully a part of the NYPD, anytime Mr. DeBlasio would like to enforce the law and keep people from molesting, harrassing, and urinating on passengers please feel free.
14
"...most riders are much happier with uber lyft than the ... yellow cabs..."
A few months back, I felt guilty for using Lyft rather than yellow cabs. I'd remembered cab drivers as being rude. Lyft/Uber drivers never are. I thought maybe that cab drivers had changed because Lyft and Uber are breathing down their necks.
So I took a cab from the airport to my house. Based on that, it doesn't cab drivers appear not to have changed. Still as rude as ever. I'm not happy with the street-crowding caused by Uber and Lyft, but nothing should be done to make life easier for cab drivers.
13
There’s no real reason to treat Uber & Lyft differently. *Cars* create congestion. Personal vehicles create congestion as well, and they sit idle even more—requiring lots of parking space.
Pricing is an appropriate way to encourage efficient, judicious use of resources, but cities would be wise to avoid creating incentives that prefers single-occupant private cars over shared vehicles. Pricing per hour or per trip for *all* vehicles is preferable to a special fee that only attaches to shared vehicles.
9
I was riding the eastbound M66 a few weeks ago -- a very busy bus line due to the east-side hospitals and Hunter College -- and we were stalled for at least 5 minutes between 1st and 2nd Avenues by an Uber that had been waiting for a passenger. The Uber driver attempted to parallel park to get out of the way but didn't quite make it, and there was not enough leftover space for the bus driver to bypass the Uber. Result= a bus-ful of angry and late commuters as well as a massive traffic buildup behind us. The apps should definitely bear costs for the effects they have on the rest of the transit system.
39
Excellent example. However, might I offer an improvement, by pointing out that Uber is not an "app" but rather a swarm of lobbyists. Their so-called "app" is an extremely elementary program, with no sophistication whatsoever except for the hidden stuff they added to hide certain of their activities from regulators.
3
long-term congestion relief requires many solutions. there are many hours in the day, but too many deliveries are scheduled during the same time, ie business hours. Given that this is the "City that never sleeps" perhaps we should examine the hours that are available for deliveries, and the delivery tucks that clog our streets during daylight hours. Many deliveries are time-critical: construction projects demand timely deliveries, but bodegas do not. it is time to restrict certain deliveries to the dead of night. and of course those workers who toil such hours should be paid a premium, offset by tax breaks.
6
And who shall be at the stores and other places of business in the dead of night to receive these deliveries?
Why does the times publish the age of certain persons quoted in articles? And it doesn't publish the ages of others. I don't understand why it publishes the age of anyone when the person's age isn't relevant to the article. It would be relevant, for instance, if the person just won a marathon at age 100.
3
To be fair it looks like it is more and more relevant. Majority of the readers are against Uber for the wrong reasons.
1
NYC's traffic situation has become completely untenable. Traffic is so bad that one even gets stuck in traffic riding a bike (I would never waste my time trying to use a car - or the subway, unless I absolutely have to). It is beyond embarrassing that a city that compared with many other metropolises is essentially awash in money (or at least the ability to raise it - see congestion pricing!), cannot get it together to provide the most basic services to its citizens. Nor does there seem to be any attempt made to curb the ridiculous amount of pollution generated not only by cars driving at walking speed, but also by those idling, which contrary to what the law seems to indicate, appears to be an entirely accepted form of absent-minded and immoral selfishness.
15
Seems traffic in NYC has been at a quasi standstill during rush hour longer than Uber or Lyfts existence. Why not blame Yellow cab then?
6
Perhaps blame all vehicles, private and for hire?
The plain fact of the matter is that I would rather pay to sit in a private car that travels across the city at a snail's pace than sit in a mass transit vehicle, traveling at the same speed, with people who smell, who scream at the voices in their heads and shouldn't be on the streets to begin with. Traveling on mass transit is unsafe and it is filthy. Taxis have been ripping off the general public with lousy service for decades. Let's solve the real problems of society instead of going after the ride-hailing companies who have filled an obvious consumer need...evidenced by their instant exponential growth. If there wasn't a demand, there wouldn't be a supply.
18
Michael of San Francisco -- Your comments are just ridiculous -- and insulting. People on mass transit don't smell and feel perfectly safe. Much safer, in fact, in a vehicle driven by a properly vetted, insured, supervised driver than some guy off the street who then has my home address, name, and credit care info. I step off the curb, put up my arm, and a cab stops in seconds -- no waiting, looking, calling to see where the car is. And as for people who hear voices do you imagine we should lock them all away out of your sight and away from your delicate sensibilities? Are there no poor houses? No prisons?
Cabs have worked extremely well for decades precisely because there was demand for THEM. Now I can't get across town because of the swarms of polluting single passenger vehicles clogging the streets. PUBLIC transportation can be efficient, cheap, and environmentally friendly if we just prioritize it.
3
Maybe it NYC could improve subway service and stop the incessant delays and never ending closure of stations and tracks on weekends, we’d ride the subway more
Until then, hold off taxing us more instead try luring is back with better service
17
Should you pay? LOL as if you will have a choice i.e. only sf is better on finding ways to raise money to pay for inept government
2
Do you know why people use Uber in NYC? Because the subway experience in this town has become unpleasant since de Blasio became mayor. It seems each time I take the subway, I have to contend with homeless in the cars, aggressive panhandling, etc. When I wrote to MTA they told me to call homeless services. Apparently the MTA subway no longer wants or has the authority to ask the homeless (most of whom have terrible hygiene) to leave the subway cars. I often see aggressive panhandlers on 1/2/3 trains stop in front of young women and not leaving them alone until they give them something.
This is harassment.
I know the MTA subway answers to the state not the city, but we didn't have these problems during the Bloomberg years.
13
Was on 1 train Christmas Day at 9:30 am and crazy man was repeatedly screaming next stop names in Spanish at the top of his lungs. Very uncomfortable ride. And why are the police always clustered in groups of two and three talking to each other? They can't do something if they don't see something.
3
As far as the 'rideshare' portion of this problem, it's no secret that these companies are taking people off of buses, subways, bikes, and feet and putting them into cars by offering dirt cheap prices. Force these companies to stop with the predatory pricing model, which is illegal, and the fares will go up to where they should be, putting people back in buses, subways, bikes and on their feet. It's ridiculous that these companies are getting away with predatory pricing for so long.
7
Any first-year economics student knows that "predatory pricing" is a fallacy.
4
Regardless of terminology, Uber wouldn't have survived this long without heavy subsidies from venture capitalists. Once the legacy taxi industry is eliminated and subsidies disappear, riders will have to pay higher costs. That was always the plan.
4
I don't know -- the subways and buses that I ride seem very crowded ALL the time. Have you ever been on the platform at Jay St that is 4 people deep at *4:30 pm* waiting for an F train that is packed to the gills once it finally arrives? Or squeeze yourself onto an old A train with absolutely no place to hold onto? Wouldn't be so bad if the train could brake smoothly and not fling you across the car every time it slowed. My commute via subway is awful every single day, and I travel ahead of peak rush hour!
2
Riders should pay a fee, yes, though mostly because cars are slowly killing us. Climate, yo.
But Lyft and especially Travis Kalanick's Uber are the law-avoiding megacorps that foisted their totally-not-taxi-employers-or-anything services on the city with the help of some government palms they've greased. They should be hit with tax increases (not incentives! *glares at Cuomo and Start-Up NY*) that make them, not passengers, pay the most for their adverse effect on both traffic and worker wages. City and state government shouldn't just let them have their cake and slow down the cake delivery truck too.
8
You could add another $10 billion to the city's $82 billion budget and most of the money would be squandered on an overstuffed bureaucracy, cost overruns, and outright waste. The enfeebled infrastructure would show only minimal improvement, the cost of transportation would be substantially higher, traffic conditions would be worse, the super-rich would be feasting even more splendidly at the trough, and the city would be clambering for billions more.
5
You forgot public unions. Subway conductors pulling down $250K plus bennies and pension.
5
I use Uber and Lyft and drive my own car around San Francisco and from my experience and observations the extra cars on the road significantly add to drive times. What was once a twenty minute drive across town is now thirty.
9
sure. because nothing else changed in san francisco.
1
How has the congestion affected ambulance service? Have people died because ambulances were unable to arrive? Or died enroute ? Whenever I see an ambulance stuck in traffic and parked cars taking up a potential emergency lane, I wonder why the city permits on-street parking. Forbidding on-street parking and leaving a lane open for emergency vehicles should be considered.
15
On a recent trip to NY, it was my experience that a driver's inability to communicate in English and the subsequent use of Google translate, and his lack of knowledge of the city and the subsequent use of Google maps was the source of congestion, as he was unable to pay attention to his handheld and the road at the same time. The proliferation of uber and lyft drivers who need to have nothing other than a "suitable" vehicle exacerbates this problem greatly.
21
Wouldn't congestion pricing make more sense? Why only tax one type of vehicle, when free bridges and free parking encourage driving into the city.
8
Assess a per-day fee to drive a vehicle into the city *or* to park it there. The burden on the public is in having vehicles in the city, whether they stay there all the time or not, so that's what vehicle owners should pay for. Not necessarily the entrance, but the presence.
5
"Why only tax one type of vehicle,..." because only one "type" -- Uber, Lyft, etc., -- overwhelmingly spiked Manhatan's traffic problems into their current, hyper-congested condition, according to scientifically-replicated data. (As well as the subjectivity of any alert person with unimpaired eyesight.) Moreover, this "one type of vehicle" isn't necessary; rather, it's redundant! The number of NYC-licensed taxis PLUS the abundance of NYC-licensed Neighborhood/Corporate car services within the five boroughs already meets New York City's cab hailing service needs. Perhaps the best question to ask is: "Why is the city allowing, and why are citizens enabling, a 'new type of vehicle' service that offers only a veneer of convenience, while substantively compounding traffic delay problems and hindering first responder's ability to protect & save lives?"
7
I suggest you try looking at the causes to why congestion pricing is opposed rather than the effects. There are those who live in areas where there are hardly any alternatives to driving. They don't just see it as a regressive tax to those who can barely afford it, but they will also see it as a punishment for having such little alternatives. Unfortunately, transit deserts exist even within what defines the boundaries of NYC, and those are the ones who will be hurt by that the most. Another thing is that the supporters of this idea, which you are probably one of them, don't seem to understand that boundaries are NYC aren't where the subway lines stop. Also, I feel that many of the supporters don't drive on a regular basis themselves, so they don't know what we regular motorists go through. As for the so-called free bridges and parking, much of that is already paid for via taxes for infrastructure. In other words, much of it is already paid for even if it's not right on the spot. Meanwhile, the original purpose of tolls was to pay off the bonds for whatever they were on and be removed once they were paid off. However, there are politicians that believe in using them as revenue sources that causes them to go further up while less of it is actually going to where it's supposed to yet they still claim that it should be raised even further, which is what will be feared if congestion pricing gets passed or even placing other tolls.
I will happily support even a large per-ride tax on all car services (taxis, lyfts, ubers, etc) as soon as the MTA tells us exactly what they will use that tax money for that will ACTUALLY fix the problems!
Most people here only use car services because the mass transit situation is so wretched in the first place. So before we make taking cars (often the only viable option) even harder to afford, tell us -- What is the plan here?? Where will those dollars go and how soon will we see benefits??
22
No but cap the amount that can roam the street at anytime of the day, and make the companies, like Uber or Lyft pay a fee. Stop making the client or the driver pay and make the company pay. They reap all the cash without much overhead where a driver is left with barely anything. I am not a driver but this sharing economy has to be controlled. But maybe we won't need to since the GOP tax plan will trickle so much money down and wages are going to rise tremendously...
9
Not to mention that Uber uses big SUVs in its "fleet".
Bad for the environment and absurd for individuals to be driven around in big vehicles.
8
It's not just Uber. The livery cab companies still use Lincoln town cars and big SUVs. I don't understand why we even allow pickup trucks and these oversized SUVs in NYC for the average person/family. Traffic would floe much better and parking would be easier to find if more people used smaller vehicles.
1
Another reason to bring the Hammer’s Fee out, at the rate this is going it’s just a matter of time before they figure out how to charge us for the air we inhale
1
After nearly a decade in NYC I'm packing up my family and moving to greener pastures. The city's complete inability to find viable solutions to ever increasing rent, the disastrous MTA, the staggering cost of childcare and basic amenities are shameful. Tax the last few dozen Ubers I take in your city, I've had enough.
20
A country that falls for the Silicon Valley snake oil of "disruption" as inherent progress not only gets Uber disrupting traffic but a nation primed by 2016 to elect a Disrupter-In-Chief. There really is no difference between falling for the marketing hype of Apple, Facebook, Uber, Twitter, Google, AirBnb, and their ilk and falling for the hype of Trump.
A people who allow themselves to fall for the lie that these corporations are different from Goldman Sachs, ExxonMobil, Bank of America, Lockheed, Wells Fargo, and their ilk, are primed to allow themselves to fall for the lie that Trump was running to "drain the swamp."
13
As cities populated mostly with liberals who welcome tax increases, NY and its sister cities should impose a meaningful per ride tax of, say $5.00 per ride with a provision to adjust for inflation.
2
If the question is "Should New Yorkers pay a surcharge for using ride share vehicles that will be allocated to the MTA?" The answer is "Yes".
The second question is, "Can New Yorkers please have an accounting of all of the taxes and surcharges that are specifically supposed to be directed towards Mass Transit as well as the funding that comes from NY State, the funding that comes from NY City and the funding that comes from the Federal Govt?"
New Yorkers do not mind paying for Mass Transit however, it seems very unlikely that all of the taxes and surcharges that are paid with Mass Transit in mind ever make it to their intended purpose.
12
If NYC wants to get me to stop using Uber they should fix the A train so I dont have to wait 40 minutes and then spend the express trip in the tunnel going 5 MPH .... oh and clean up the stations.
29
I know people have been suggesting this for a hundred or so years, with nothing to show for it, but isn't it about time to ticket double parked cars and trucks? Double parking obstructs traffic and seems to have become the default. Clear the traffic lanes, and see how much faster trafgic moves.
32
The "fee" is a tax; in universities it's tuition; for the airlines, it's part of the ticket price. Call it what it is.
2
So municipalities want to raise their competition’s prices to help pay for their decrepit mass transit? That seems contrary to free market principals and, quite frankly, undemocratic.
14
I'll tell you what's contrary to free market principles and undemocratic: allowing a private business to use and degrade the public infrastructure and environment without paying their fair share for it.
16
Privatize the subway! Managers are paid $300,000 per year and don't know a lick about fluid dynamics! Link pay to on-time trains and clean up the open running sewer!
I wonder how much time cars idle while sitting in deadlocked traffic? Tax the car drivers; get 'em out of their cars and into public transit or ride a bike!
8
I agree Uber and Lyft should be regulated. Just as any other business in NY pays their share in maintaining the streets they use 365 days a year. But, giving the MTA a new per-ride fee on all for-hire vehicles in Manhattan will only support the 200k salaries. That still doesn't solve the new equipment needed cars, tracks, switches etc.
14
Congestion pricing will work if it's thoughtfully proposed. Here's a thought: why not offer a free visit for commercial vehicles in and out of Manhattan between the weekday hours of midnight and 6 a.m. to do their deliveries? Much of the traffic is generated because of double-parked trucks. Any other time on the clock every vehicle pays, and at the height of the business day including rush hour, they have to pay more. Offer midtown buildings an incentive to have to pay for security and personnel to keep the loading docks open in the middle of the night. A modest tax break for compliant buildings? Hey, nothing else has worked, right?
11
Paris does this and it works!
Uber was allowed to submit a 98% redacted environmental impact study. They claimed 'trade secrets.' The report also somehow concluded that the more cars they add, the more cars are taken off the street. Meanwhile, yellow cabs are limited to 13.5k based on environmental impact studies.
The entire Uber false business model is based on a constant influx of new VC. 50% of every ride is still subsidized. This is what allows them to keep flooding cities with cars, disconnected from any form of demand.
42
Much cheaper than the (artificially supply-limited) yellow cabs, these ride services have introduced a bit more "democratic" equality to our transport system. But the streets may be near capacity, so now the rich as well as the poor are inconvenienced. This may cause change, but not more equality, or efficiency.
The shared ride model of the VIA service puts more people through a given road capacity, more like the mass transit model. Perhaps it should be mandated, or exempted from a proposed fee, similar to the high-capacity lanes on some highways.
Or we may have to tell people to stay home--if slow traffic does not adequately convey that message.
2
Uber,lyft and others should never have been let in. Period.
16
Can’t agree more! Let’s only allow the yellow cab monopoly. They do a great job talking on the phone the whole time, racing down the streets, and keeping their cars sufficiently dirty. It doesn’t make sense to allow an efficient model.
5
only if you don't believe in competition and giving consumers better choices any study would prove most riders are much happier with uber lyft than the lousy and expensive service provided by yellow cabs
11
A country that falls for the Silicon Valley snake oil of "disruption" as inherent progress not only gets Uber disrupting traffic but a nation primed by 2016 to elect a Disrupter-In-Chief. There really is no difference between falling for the marketing hype of Apple, Facebook, Uber, Twitter, Google, AirBnb, and their ilk and falling for the hype of Trump.
A people who allow themselves to fall for the lie that these corporations are different from Goldman Sachs, ExxonMobil, Bank of America, Lockheed, Wells Fargo, and their ilk, are primed to allow themselves to fall for the lie that Trump was running to "drain the swamp."
9
Let's harness the zeitgeist. Anyone benefiting from the Trump tax giveaway by using the passthrough dodge must kickback 25% of their savings to mass transit. Otherwise they must only commute via subway like the rest of us.
6
Hey Winnie,
I like Jonathan Swift's idea: we should charge the real slowdown culprits to pay for the subway and they are ....wait for it—pedestrians.
If we can charge pedestrians, we can pay for the subways, potholes, scaffoldings...the list is endless. There will be an app to make it happen and disrupt multiple industries. It would be like 'Uber for ..pedestrians'
An untapped revenue source that will last as long as the City does.
2
Bloomberg pitched congestion pricing years ago, well before app culture came along. It failed.
Tax the car, not the person. Those who want to avoid the charges will dump their cars, relieving the problem. Uber will pass the cost on to passengers anyway.
Targeting the pedestrian, who may have been drinking, burdened with packages, stuck in bad weather, or is otherwise just seeking a quick and safe ride home--or to work--is a bad idea.
11
I hope gas hits $5 again - Uber and extra cars in NYC wouldn't exist if not for cheap gas.
And when it goes up again, guess what, there are no more gas stations left in Manhattan - all gone! Doesn't look good, so enjoy the cheap congestion now.
7
London does it...why not New York?
Simples.
4
Ah, how about cab stands for Uber and yellow cabs? You know, the way every other congested city in the USA and Europe works?
How about truck deliveries only in non-peak hours, if the trucks have no loading bay to pull into and must park on the street? You know, the way every other congested city in the USA and Europe works?
How about actually enforcing traffic laws for vehicles, pedestrians, and bicyclists? You know, the way....
8
Come to San Francisco. Uber drivers sleep in their cars. Surge pricing and totally congested downtown. I only take Yellow Cab when I need to, otherwise walk or take the bus.
7
You're looking through the wrong end of the binoculars...
Even with all of this congestion, people are booking more rides than ever...
First - If NYC really wanted to fix traffic, rather than just getting money, they'd start charging a dollar-per-minute-per-axle double-park fee for trucks loading and unloading...
Second - allow a first five seconds for cars-only on green lights, for right turns at congested intersections, before signalling pedestrians to cross...
4
These unregistered taxis should be banned from the streets until they pay back the fine for every single unregistered taxi they have put on the roads. Europe and London have the right idea when it comes to dealing with these illegal taxi services.
7
There should not be a limit on the number of taxis, and medallion fees need to have price limits. Secondly, whether it's passengers in a taxi, or a Lyft, either way these are passengers who are not so selfish as to purchase or own their own car. Each person that owns a private car (and not using it as a Lyft/Uber driver) is often riding solo in that car, clogging our streets, adding pollution, expecting the city to provide 'sufficient parking' for them
wherever they drive throughout the city, etc. These same people often use their cars to simply drive to Dunkin Donuts three blocks away from their homes, and then they double-park. Etc.
We who do not own cars should not be penalized for using the occasional Lyft or Uber. Also, if we are noticing increased demand for Lyft/Uber rides, it is because of the deplorable condition of the subways in NYC. We need fewer private cars, better public transportation and more bike lanes. We also need to penalize cars that double-park (in Astoria, Queens, cars double-park with complete abandon), and we need to penalize bicyclists and food delivery people that do not follow traffic laws.
4
Clearly you don’t know many car owners - who is going to give up their parking spot for a cup of coffee?!
3
If traffic is slow, people and the City are losing money.
Now we have a so-called Progressive Mayor who cannot see his own backyard, because he's looking at Iowa.
How could Congestion Pricing hurt?
Any real New Yorker can see and feel the slowdown created by Uber - there are thousands of extra cars on the roads each day. It used to be a problem only created by Nassau, Westchester and Jersey residents wanting to drive in by themselves to their jobs in NYC that they don't pay NYC RE taxes for - now it's a massive roadblock.
Congestion Pricing is a No-Brainer.
3
Some of us need to drive into the city sometimes for our work. Otherwise walking and the subway will do if you allow twice the amount of time that should be necessary. Don't encourage all these cabs.
Maybe the mayor should use pubic transit instead of being the worst, wasteful non example possible. Maybe he would get some productive ideas for commuters by hanging with the little people. More ferries and Stops!
3
I know a 825 Billion dollar annual CASH COW can be tapped to help our failing infrastructure.
1
So many ride share drivers are terrible drivers. Dangerous drivers. Rather than tax the people, why not require a driving test for anyone, yellow can included, who wants to drive people for pay. New Yorkers deserve safer drivers. The city needs 1/3 less cars at minimum. Why not set higher driving standards for “professionals” and make our roads safer while solving congestion. Provide a service to the people, rather than a bill.
5
Why test the professional drivers and not the non-professionals? I have ridden in Uber, Lyft and yellow cabs and believe the former two are generally safer drivers than the latter. They have accountability unlike yellow cabs.
3
Not gonna happen
Uber is taking people off public transportation and filling the streets with cars. This has been obvious for anyone with an unbiased eye. Every politician rolled over an played dead. Chicago has the right idea, if I read correctly, tax the ride shares and use it for enhancing public transportation. Seventy cents is not sufficient, it should be two dollars per ride.
6
Uber is not competing with public transportation. It’s competing with taxis and personal car use. Taxing Uber is penalizing those who are keeping their cars off the streets. Why is that good policy? Would you rather one personal car transport one or two passengers over 4 hours in the city or an Uber car transport some 20 or more? Plus Uber cars drive during high demand hours and stay home in low demand.
Uber use absolutely keeps cars off the street compared to the alternatives of taxi cabs and personal cars. Beyond a personal bias, why dissuade that via taxation?
3
KJ, I live in Chicago and drive Lyft. I totally disagree. Many of the rides I give downtown could be accomplished cheaper and just as fast by CTA but professionals who ride are happy to pay the extra buck or two not to mix with the hoi polloi.
I had a few passengers tell me they do not take bus or train because of Uber/Lyft. Worse, I see people who probably shouldn't be spending the few extra bucks a week do it anyway because it's cheap enough and convenient.
I'll drive so long as it fills my financial need for a side hustle, but as a 23 year resident of this beautiful city, I will not willingly support the downfall of our public transportation system for a crummy net rate of less than $15/hr.
2
In my neighborhood the Uber drivers circle endlessly waiting for a call. As much as I blame the ride hailing apps the city has failed on two other fronts. Firstly public transportation which many have noted and secondly with redesigning roads by reducing the traffic flow. They want to reduce cars and increase bicycle use, but they have not created more incentives to do so. The increase in 40,000 car services on the street has made these changes short sighted. Lastly, when was the last time you saw a traffic agent controlling traffic. People block the box with impunity. Sometimes I feel this city runs itself.
6
I commute at higher speed and with more piece of mind on my commuter bike. My bike is durable and inexpensive to maintain. Maybe $500 for s good commuter bike. My commute is 5 miles and it takes me 30 minutes. I get some exercise, too.
For an extra $100 invested you can buy rain pants and jacket, and lights fire and aft.
Most of my ride is on the Hudson River Greenway. Traveling on this protected greenway adds about a mile and a half to my trip, but there is no traffic, ever.
I highly recommend biking as a means of getting around. The city is becoming more and more accommodating to cyclists, with bike lanes on most avenues in Manhattan.
See you out there!
11
This is idealistic but not realistic.Consider this morning. 15°.
Amazing the unfair playing field that city officials think is fair -- let's give Uber / Lyft / etc a free ride while we charge taxi hundreds of thousands of dollars to operate and place safeguards on one side (taxis) and leave the other side (Uber) essentially unregulated. Uber and other ride sharing services need to operate under the same regulations that are in place for taxis, period. Another thought - taxis should be allowed to operate free of congestion charges if congestion pricing is implemented.
10
I've found that Uber vehicles are clogging up the pick up areas at airports.
In particular the points where one gets on other regional, public transportation (Buses), and where you get your shuttle to a hotel or car rental. I wish airports would crack down on them for picking up their passengers in areas that were not meant for them to do so. That's what the taxi stands and areas are for.
13
the reason they are there is that people are using them they provide a better service
3
amen
1
To the detriment and inconvenience of many other people's transportation services and needs?
Not good. And selfish.
5
Improve our public transportation system? No, that's too easy. It's better to make NYC a harder place to live and work in than to improve the subways, the buses, and the roads. And you wonder why people no longer want to work in NYC? I don't.
7
For years, our elected officials fumbled public transportation. Now that we finally have an alternative, they want to tax it. Got that?
17
I never fail to be amazed at the clueless narcissism of Uber riders. No sense of the tragedy of the commons. No sense of a municipal good that exceeds their desire for immediate gratification which they pursue heedless of the expense of the community. Same for the company.
42
“Tradgey of the commons” is an economic term worth googling
1
The city's consumers have spoken loud and clear. Ridership for Uber and the other ride hailing apps has gone through the roof, while yellow cab ridership has fallen off a cliff. It's no mystery why: BECAUSE UBER PROVIDES A SERVICE THAT IS A THOUSAND TIMES BETTER THEN YELLOW CABS'.
Nevertheless, all I read about in this article, its comments, and from government officials is that we have to place more taxes and regulations on Uber. Huh?
What's next. Are we going to outlaw e-mail to force people to go back to mailing letters? Outlaw smart phones to force people to go back to using pay phones?
33
thank you for common sense these are the same people who were happy for deblasio to replace the city's greatest mayor
2
Through decades there has been a search to make some smaller group pay to finance the commonweal in NYC. Well it is here, at last, sort of. Put the same technology operating now at the Midtown Tunnel at every other tunnel and bridge connecting Manhattan to other places in 2018.
2
It’s fun to imagine how this argument will change in the coming years when the question will inevitably become, “how much do we charge human drivers for ‘driving while human’ which has been proven to be dangerous and a threat to the public welfare?
7
Didn't this happen before? Remember the gypsy cabs that the City turned a blind eye to in the 1980s? Only service you could get in the outer boroughs.
5
Please tell me how much the NYC taxi cabs pay to subsidize the NYC subway system.
6
50 cents every time the meter is turned on.
2
Uber and Lyft should be treated like taxis, because that is exactly what they are. And, yes, they should be charged an extra fee that will then go to pay for mass transit infrastructure.
21
Best thing would just be to make ride-hailing services illegal within Manhattan. Let's face it, traffic is worst in Manhattan itself, not too terrible in the other boroughs. And, people who use Uber, Lyft, and such, are people who have disposable income. They can take taxis instead, it used to work fairly well before these ride-hailing things.
These Uber drivers are also the ones driving uncouthly, accelerating toward pedestrians to get them out of the way, swerving across lanes, and so on. They're hungry for money and they seem to think driving aggressively will get them more money.
It'd be best to take them off the streets entirely, but first, make them illegal in Manhattan and see how much that eases traffic flow.
17
The service really exists in the app. Making them illegal would mean putting all that technology back in the tube, and that cannot be done.
1
Dear DZ,
Ah but the cars exist in real life. Making them illegal within Manhattan would enable ticketing and possibly arrests, and would clear out the problem.
3
As an experienced NYC driver (yes, mostly in Manhattan and a substantial amount in the other boroughs) of too many years and miles that I'd rather not say, the scourge of Uber drivers having befallen Manhattan is extraordinary.
They are almost universally incompetent NYC drivers, with arrogant attitudes as they plow near pedestrians and cars, and stop in the middle of anywhere (cartoon-like).
I don't think Moses himself (not the holy) could have ever caused or tolerated this.
22
How about taxing the multimillion dollar condos and their developers to update the infrastructure they are making billions of dollars exploiting rather than extracting more money from the rank and file trying to get from place to place?
18
"no reliable way other than walking.” Right. Manhattan is small. I always walked from near Penn Station to NYU in some 35 minutes. Uber takes you similar time, takes from you more than $10 and most importantly your good chance of exercise.
14
If you ever spent a half hour in a NYC winter, you would understand why many would pay 10 dollars to avoid it.
1
It is not difficult for any able-bodied adult to walk a half mile, a mile, even two miles - each way - in the dead of winter. Every day. All it takes is long johns, a parka, boots, hat, gloves. That is all. Same goes for biking longer distances.
2
Here's a thought. Ban electric bicycles and instead force people to use personal cars, taxi's and Uber.
I'm shocked, shocked, the most liberal Democratic city on the East Coast is having problems with mass transit.
1
A easy fix for all the private vehicle traffic in Manhattan would be to eliminate all on street parking. Just think of all the space that would free up. Turn Queens and New Jersey into a parking lot and get on a train. Don't like it? Don't come to the city.
7
NYC needs to ban ride sharing app cars wherever there is traffic congestion. Go back to only Medallion Taxi’s in those congested areas.
Fascinating how this is playing out.
8
When will NYC stop adding taxes to the most taxed place in America. NYC pols answer to every problem is a tax. Sad.
4
The answer is yes.
1
Buses, cars and delivery trucks share the same road space. They all get caught in the same congestion and gridlock. Obviously, buses can carry far more people than cars and should therefore be given priority. Bus Rapid Transit makes sense. The problem is that the external costs of Uber and Lyft are not taken into account. There should be an extra cost for creating this unbalanced priority on the individual at the expense of public transportation. Buses are simply a better utilization of road space than vehicles carrying one or two passengers. We need to rebalance priorities and the best way to do that is to have passengers in for hire vehicles pay more in areas that are congested.
6
I agree that we need to dedicate more resources to improving public bus transportation. I've lived in various outer borough nabes and typically have to ride a bus to get to the nearest subway. A trend I've noticed is that often these 'main thoroughfares' where the buses travel are narrow two-way streets with parking for Privately-Owned cars on Both Sides of the street. Why on earth is so much parking space allowed for Private Car owners?? Buses which carry many more passengers should get first priority. Only ONE side of the street should have parking for private cars. All bus stops need to be redesigned to allow for Pre-Payment, so that at all bus stops, All doors can open and passengers can swiftly get on and off, and continue on their ride. Such main thoroughfares also need to allow for UPS, Fedex, and store deliveries, which often must double-park in order to unload their boxes. We simply cannot have so many private cars on these streets. People have become so self-centered and lazy with their big fat SUVs, clogging our streets, often Double-Parking(!) all along these narrow streets (can you say Steinway Street in Astoria?) And in all of this, the DoT is nowhere to be found. Top priority should be given to MTA buses, taxis, and delivery trucks. We need to limit private vehiicles.
1
The city has fast fallen behind on this issue in several ways:
• chronic underfunding subway maintenance
• keeping cab medallions scarce - the rise of Uber shows that the actual demand for rides is much higher than the 13,000 cabs could tend to, and much more distributed (everyone knows that cabs bunch together in certain places, scarce in others)
• no toll system for entering city - ideas have been proposed, but nothing enacted
7
many of the ride-hail app cars are shared rides, like pool, line, or via (ie. car pooling), which reduces congestion when compared to standard yellow taxis. these shared rides also have very little unoccupied time. demand is moving in the direction of the shared rides, which should help.
3
Ride pools. I think these were called jitneys in sf. Sf basically banned them as being a threat to the Muni, the public transit. As for the increased traffic it seems that the ride hailing apps Have to be regulated much like the runaway numbers of private vehicles had to be in the Twenties and thirties. What were they called after the regs went into effect?- taxis.
2
Ride pools are popular coming into the City from the East Bay like Oakland. I'd like to see S.F. ban Uber and Lyft but of course that won't happen. These companies are skirting regs that Yellow and Metro have to follow, like if a call comes in from the housing projects or near the projects, it can be ignored by Uber and Lyft. That's discrimination. I refuse to use either of these companies and just use Yellow and Metro as much as possible.
I used to do a lot of walking in Manhattan, even in bad weather. Apparently getting around is harder now than it was a decade ago. The NYC Subway was the fallback of choice, I guess not anymore! In California, I have to carefully plan my excursions around the tidal ebbs and flows of rush hour traffic, including whether to drive or take some form of public transportation. Rideshares are nice because I don't have to park.
Sometimes I just want to stay home instead. Now that everyone's working remotely from Idaho, that's quite possible, although not necessarily desirable for society at large.
1
As a former long time resident of NYC, I have long thought that Manhattan could greatly relieve its congestion problems by changing the way it operates its street lights. Instead of setting them so one can travel at 30 mph from say 14th street to 121st street without stopping provided one travels when one would rather be sleeping, it should during the day at least reverse the sequence so that cars ahead go first and get out of the way for those behind. Then when a light changes one should be able to go maybe 10 to 15 blocks without stopping and maybe the whole length of Manhattan on ten or so light changes. Or maybe even better to have all the lights on the avenues (and therefore on the streets as well) change to red or green at the same time so one can travel maybe 10 or 15 blocks uptown downtown or across town without stopping. Perhaps there is some technical reason that would prohibit such a solution, but if not, I would bet my house in MV that such a change would greatly reduce gridlock.
I would suggest as well that NYC try congestion pricing on the subways. That should discourage the retired and unemployed from traveling at peak hours and maybe encourage some employers to schedule their work somewhat differently.
8
The suggestion above, of “timing” lights—and pushing retired/elders out of the way to make Uber/Lyft taxis shove there way around faster/better, from California, strikes one as an obvious suggestion that Uber/Lyft employees might make. Bizarre.
Truth is Lyft drivers are a clear danger to both pedestrians and fellow drivers. Many, many times, Lyft drivers are taking their eyes off the road to check their routes/next rides, while driving. I honk. The driver wakes to holding traffic at a green light, then driving through with eyes on their phone. Please set limits on sheer numbers. They are taxis, without medallions. Why are numerical limits of a reasonable sort not set? Political contributions? The City and State could hold auctions of Uber licenses—that would be the payment for the stress and accidents and danger to pedestrians too many drivers for hire present now.
7
Congestion Pricing for subway riders? We are Congestion Pricing.
If Uber and Lyft operate like a taxi or car service, then they should be treated like one even if they don't have a fleet of their own. This is unfair to those that actually have to pay so many taxes and fees to keep their businesses afloat while others don't have to. Also, the taxis are subject to limitations and how many of their vehicles can be on the streets while there is practically no limit for Uber. Anyone who thinks Uber and Lyft don't play a role in making traffic worse are being paid by them to say that or are possibly smoking something that I wouldn't want myself. Just recently the EU decided to treat Uber just like a taxi service in their claim that they operate like one to start with, and I feel that the same should be all over the US and probably the rest of the world as well as for Lyft. I hope the same will happen for Air BnB in treating them like hotels if they choose to operate like one. In reality, the EU isn't trying to get rid of Uber, they are just having them follow the same rules all other taxi services must follow, which I find to be nothing more than leveling the playing field. If Uber can't follow those said rules, then that's their problem, not someone else's. On a related note, there have been times when even Uber and Lyft have charged passengers more and even refused to pick up some, so you can't just blame this all on the taxis especially when they have their own kind doing that as well.
27
Why do you want everyone to play by the same costly rules? Why not advocate less regulation of both Uber and traditional cabs?
Why have car insurance, driver licenses or emissions standards while we’re at it.
3
Because the behavior of companies like Uber and Airbnb and its effects on the communities they operate in show that they need to be regulated.
3
Let me see if I understand the short term situation and ramifications of charging Uber passengers a fee. If there is a legitimate supply and demand curve, some people will not want to pay the extra cost of the Uber fee and will opt to go back to using the subway. The subway is already an overcrowded mess. This sounds like a poor excuse for the government to raise money. Maybe if our Governor hadn't starved the MTA, we wouldn't be in this pickle.
11
How about creating another layer of avenues above the existing lanes? Second story taxi and bus lanes with stores on that level as well.
No? Well then how about Auto Free New York? Where's your permit, buddy?
This problem exists in SF too. Whenever I use my Lyft app (it's nearly socially unacceptable to use Uber here; though I and many others do, it's not something one admits to in polite company), there are 6-8 Lyft drivers within 1/2 mile, which means 6-8 cars are cruising around empty, using gas and clogging the streets.
That's the bad part. Here's the good part: Most of those "Lyft" drivers are also Uber drivers (and Caviar and possibly other) drivers too. They're not allowed to be more than one simultaneously (though some do, as my son used to tell me when he worked for Caviar monitoring drivers in Manhattan -- but that's another story), but they're free to represent themselves as "available" for multiple ride-hailing services UNTIL they accept an order from one particular service. They're "independent contractors," after all, and Uber (or Lyft) has no control over them unless and until they agree to take an order from that company.
Every day, I see dozens of late-model cars plying the streets of SF, bearing an Uber or a Lyft logo. Far more often, though, the car I see bears BOTH logos. Presumably the driver puts only one of them on his dashboard after he accepts an order from one company, but until then, he's both. So if you see 6-8 nearby Lyft rides when you hail a ride from the Lyft app, chances are pretty good that you'd see 6-8 nearby Uber rides if you were using the Uber app instead.
Even so, SF streets are getting awfully crowded with these ride-hailing cars.
12
I consider it unacceptable to use either, and I don't. All of the drivers seem to do both Über an Lyft, and none of them seem to know their way around the city OR the rules of the road.
3
I would be happy to pay a surcharge on car service fees (including yellow and green cabs) to go towards capital improvements to mass transportation within the 5 boroughs of NYC but only if I could trust that the city managers would actually use it for its stated purposes and use it wisely. Unfortunately experience tells us that this would be a pipe dream.
21
They added a 50 cent surcharge to yellow cabs for the MTA already. Agree...just move taxes with no accountability.
2
How about legalizing and taxing pipe dreams? This would also reduce traffic congestion.
A couple of points. Congestion pricing works in London but their Underground may be farther-reaching than ours. De Blasio has hampered vehicular traffic with bike lanes and Citibikes; Citibikes should be on wide sidewalks. For as many bike riders and delivery guys using the bike lanes there are as many that do not; that causes additional traffic delays.
My real question is, where is/was the outrage about traffic delays caused by yellow cabs that do not pull to the curb to pick up or discharge passengers? All but a few cab drivers seem to think that people will not take a few steps to their cabs so when they stop to pickup a fare, they frequently come to a screeching halt practically sideways taking up 2 lanes of traffic. Additionally, on side streets most drivers stop in the middle of the street to discharge riders not caring about the cars behind them (it also does not help that people wait till they arrive at their destination to get cash or a credit/debit card out making the delay worse). Many times I've missed 2 lights waiting for taxis to move.
5
All the "traffic" agents allegedly directing traffic in midtown should be equipped with body-cams to capture all the illegalities of T-licensed vehicles and yellow cabs. After my experiences this season around midtown, congestion pricing (including on T-licensed vehicles cruising around, as well as to all vehicles entering Manhattan, seems like a very good idea. New York is past its prime, infrastructure wise, but we can get under the demand curves and extract some $ for improvements.
4
Also bring back the commuter tax. It’s not Uber who should be funding mass transit, it’s the suburbanites who use city services without paying for them.
8
Already exists... Metropolitan Commuter Transportation Mobility Tax.
5
Why do liberals think the answer to every problem is a new tax in what is already the most heavily taxed city?
Overdue. They jam 42 Street from 1st to 11th, and need to have higher fees for mass transit. . We only drive when leaving the city, otherwise I am with you on the subway. Leaving NYC should be 13 minutes (Xmas morning it was that), but is closer to 30 usually.
If 18% is the garage tax, then maybe it should be the same for Uber etal.
8
Require all cars that are for hire to have a taxi medallion issued by the TLS. If Uber and services like them were required to pay additions cost there wound be far fewer of them on the street. Add to this an additional toll fee to all cars entering the city and you are sure to improve conditions. Lastly, require all commercial trucks to make deliveries between the hours 12am and 6am. Monday thru Friday and 10am to 6am on weekends.
5
they do.
1
Equating ride-sharing with yellow taxis is a false equivalency. Where Many ride-shares drivers are part of the gig economy who work between other gigs, cab drivers run cabs full time to pay their expenses. And for the same reasons, comparing the number of ride-shares on a given street and empty minutes also is a false equivalency.
1
How sad.
The U.S. continues to pay a high price for its failure to invest in public transportation. That price will continue to get higher with every passing year.
24
While I agree that more should be invested in public transit, I’m not sure that really has much to do with the problem described here. We actually do have good public transit options. But people are always going to opt for a more convenient alternative. Public transit runs on routes and schedules. As such, it is inherently inefficient. Ride sharing actually creates a more efficient system.
1
As you said, ride sharing is more convenient, but it isn’t more efficient by any conceivable metric. Public transit is able to transport a greater number people at much greater energy efficiency. Even fully electric vehicles will never be able to complete because they us batteries and light
3
Rail draws directly from the grid.
Maybe they'd have a case if the subways worked right and were fit for human occupancy. But they're not. Be happy that this relieves some of the congestion down below. In fact, maybe we should subsidize those who do not use the subway and compound its ills.
6
Your data on the number of Ubers (65,000) vs. yellow cabs (13,000) on the street is disingenuous. Yellow cabs are being driven 24/7, as the medallion owners seek to maximize profits. Uber drivers, however, either own or lease their cars, and according to my many conversations with them have them in service 40 to 60 hours a week. In addition, as you point out - and as anyone in Bensonhurst, Jamaica or Throgs Neck will tell you - there are for more Ubers in the outer boroughs then yellow cabs.
So PLEASE don't give Mayor DeBlasio any false ammunition as he decides whether to take another run at Uber to soothe his wounded pride after the shellacking he took last time. That said, I'd be perfectly willing to pay a fair tax - $1 per Uber ride? - to go to improving the city's mass transit.
4
So, it's better to 65,000 extra cars out there, because they lease or own them, because they got connived into a deal with Uber and now make minimum wage and really have to because they are under contract to make payment on their cars?
There are so many more Uber Cars than TLC out there, and they clog up NYC streets - and when cars idle they create even higher amounts of pollution.
1
Manhattan needs a congestion fee, period. This isn't a Cuomo v DiBlasio thing, it's just reality.
And even more desperately NYC needs aggressive enforcement against double-parking, but particularly in Manhattan.
Ordinances to force business deliveries to be 11 PM to 5 PM are fairly common in major cities outside the USA, sure would help here.
And folks, we need a ban on diesels in the city. Sorry about that, but the numbers don't lie. NOx is a serious health issue (so are fine particles), and the dominant source of both now in NYC is diesel vehicles.
16
Brick and mortar retailers have the same problem that taxi medallion owners have - a playing field stacked in favor of the tech companies. The people of NYC are bearing the costs that provide billions in mispriced valuations for many tech companies.
The ride sharing apps need to pay taxes that can be used to improve public transit; it is a win for they city as well as for medallion owners. This is no different than asking all internet retailers to charge and remit sales tax for every state they do business in. There is no reason that a competitive environment cannot solve the problem of what is best for city dwellers as well as which form of transportation they wish to use.
6
This might be the greatest circular firing squad conversation I've seen in a while. "It's bike lanes!" "What about police cars!" "I've been forced off more trains than I can recall!" "Taxis won't take me to Bushwick!" "Bring back Mayor Wagner!" "East River Tolls!"
Holy Cow Batman!
(FYI - If it's under 15 blocks I just walk. Commence firing!)
14
Calling all lobbyists, calling all lobbyists. Head to Albany with your attache cases filled with banded drug money to buy off the unindicted politicians.
When I go to the center of western civilization on a weekend vacation, I travel by train, and get around in a limo town car. In the words of Alfred E. Neuman, "What, me worry"?
2
Congestion pricing regulating them as the cabs they are is a no brainer. Maybe leave an exemption for the carpool versions, such as UberPool and VIA.
While we’re at it, please bring back the “no honking” signs and quintuple the fine for that and other bad behaviors for anybody with a “T” license plate.
7
This is utterly ridiculous! It’s Yellow cabs that cause the traffic. How about this, ALL vehicles entering NYC pays a fee or needs permit. All those ppl in NJ and Long Island can fork over extra $$$ or take mass transit.
2
NJ Transit reached a "saturation point" before 2006. And the NJ gov has steadily defunded it. Drivers (including citizens of NY State) already pay $11.50 - $15.00 for the torture of commuting into the city. Trucks pay far more. I used to take mass transit, but the buses and trains were always packed or simply not available Once in the city the buses and trains were always packed or unavailable. I could never get to work on time. Now midtown west is filled with black ride hail vehicles. Generallly land yachts. You really need a Toyota Land Cruiser to get from E 41rst to W 65th? 65% of the vehicles crowding midtown west seem to have TLC plates. Mostly no passengers.
1
I'm all for adding a fee and, better regulating the glut of cars with inexperienced drivers who are illegally--in Chicago--on their cell phones dialing in addresses or looking for their next ride.
4
This is a great idea. $3 per ride fee in Manhattan.
2
How does this congestion problem align with Mayor DeBlasio having recently given away thousands upon thousands of parking passes to the public teachers to win their votes?
6
I don't understand how, for every past Mayor, adding taxi medallions was always a big deal; but when de Blasio initiated a 2 million dollar study on ride hailing in 2016, he was lambasted - and the study never even foresaw this current problem, only a year and half ago, mind you. Where has common sense gone. Someone please explain it? Tax the heck out of them I say.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/16/nyregion/uber-not-to-blame-for-rise-i...
5
Uber and Lyft should pay the same fees as taxis and limos.
4
I have come to NYC for business for decades, born in Queens etc., so not a stranger. For years hailing a cab was a nightmare, let alone dealing with the serpentine routes one experienced if the driver thought you weren't a native. Now Uber comes and suddenly the taxi companies are all about Service. Between the miserable subways and third-world airports, Uber was a shining example of meeting customer needs. So no surprise the City will do its best to bring Uber down to the lowest common denominator.
60
Uber’s proudly-stated mission is to replace mass transit. An appropriate response is to charge a $2.75 fee per ride to subsidize one $2.75 subway trip each.
5
'there's almost no reliable way to get anywhere on time other than walking'
Really? Try riding a bike
9
Good luck with that bike in the snow!
3
and you will obey all traffic signals, and not ride the wrong way on one-way streets, and stay off the sidewalks, and lock your bike on a rack outside (or take it in the service entrance of your destination), and change your shirt on a hot day and take a shower if needed ...
2
It seems to me like the ride sharing business expanded so rapidly because in just about every major city the taxi business was rigged. Supply of taxi medallions was kept artificially low, driving the "value" of the medallions exorbitantly high. Meanwhile, of course, central business districts were over served while outlying areas got no service.
It IS completely annoying to be driving behind a ride share car that stops suddenly in the middle of a block, taking up a traffic lane, with no warning. At least if you see a cab you can maneuver accordingly. But there does need to be some sort of training for ride share drivers to put on their blinkers as they are approaching their destination.
In one of the photos it looks like three yellow cabs have tried to gain a few seconds advantage and wound up blocking the intersection. If you start issuing $500 tickets for blocking an intersection, you'll see that behavior drop dramatically.
I don't think it is fair to price people out of the housing market in a downtown or adjacent area and then charge them a fee to try to get into the central district to work.
Lastly, the Uber-type drivers in the black SUVs act like they are ferrying a head of state and they drive and park accordingly. That arrogance can be tamed.
5
Uber is more dependable than the dirty and inefficient subways and is reasonably priced, making it an option for the middle class. The company also gives employment options to 100,000 people in the region.
Uber isn't killing mass transit - spiraling pay is killing it. The NYT reports that the average subway worker makes $155,000 each year while subway managers make an average of $240,000 per year. The average NYC subway worker makes more than the average American lawyer.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/18/nyregion/new-york-subway-system-failu...
49
I’ve taken cabs. I’ve used Uber. No comparison. Cabs often take me out of the way or onto congested streets to drive up their fare. Cabs are dirty and the drivers unfriendly. Fewer cabs works for me.
16
Oh jeez. City income tax, property tax, high sales tax, etc. This city doesn’t need more revenue from an already over taxed population. It needs accountability on spending, not taxing another low wage industry.
28
a surcharge to taxi's/others won't solve congestion. This is not a transportation idea it is a taxation mechanism.
7
I arrived in New York City in 1999. Every few years, the same question arises in this: why must the taxis go off duty between 4pm and 6pm every day during the afternoon rush hour, making it impossible to find transportation, apart from the under-funded MTA? And for years, there was no answer from any of these taxi drivers or the taxi medallion owners. Now, we have car hailing services and I no longer need to stand in the rain and get soaked waiting for an on-duty taxi that never comes. The subway system has declined over the years, a fact having nothing to do with Uber or Lyft. The MTA is simply not a priority and it’s too expensive to fix, we’re told or led to believe. This matter, too, has been covered at length in these pages. Now taxi medallion owners and taxi drivers are seeing reduced revenues because they no longer offer the quality of service riders want and need and their former iron-fisted monopoly is history. The subways are beyond their capacity and well-intentioned fees would ever go to fixing the lines; the money would go into the public coffers and be used for other politically expedient priorities. Don’t believe me? The Second Avenue subway was proposed in 1919, yet partially opened January 1st, 2017, still incomplete after ninety-eight years. No—fees on car hailing services are not the answer to congestion, unless you’re an uncompetitive taxi medallion owner or an over-paid MTA bureaucrats and workers (see article NY Times of November 18th, 2017).
22
[[The subways are beyond their capacity and well-intentioned fees would ever go to fixing the lines; the money would go into the public coffers and be used for other politically expedient priorities.]]
In order to fix the subways, the MTA would have to shut lines down for several hours each night. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/15/nyregion/new-york-subway-chief-closin...
So, would commuters still have to pay a surcharge for ride shares while those lines are down?
Additionally, why is every New York governor hostile to every New York City mayor and (by extension) to New York City?
2
Missing the point?
Cuomo and company want to peel money from successful ride sharing programs to finance a crumbling and poorly financed subway system?
Wow
7
Darren, yes, you missed the point. The "successful ride sharing system" is in the process of making the streets crumbling and poorly financed. Per the article, and as anyone in any major US city can see, "an explosion of ride-hailing app services has transformed the way that people get around the city and is choking the streets".
Cause wear and tear to the infrastructure, and you need to pay for the damage.
4
high costs for personal transport can be an effective tool to encourage greater use of public transportation.
3
Congestion pricing is a good start to address the problem of dangerous pollution lewel and traffic nightmare.But it's not enough. Bike lanes must be modernised and protected. Bus lanes must be separated from the rest of the traffic and the subway must be brought to the 21st century standard.Millions of pedestrians should be the priority of Manhattan traffic planning. A car or a truck uses 25 times more space than a pedestrian....and is far more dangerous!
5
Why not have an app to hail taxis the way people hail Ubers and Lyft? It's my understanding that once one of those drivers accepts your ride, they cannot refuse you. Taxis will not pick me up because of my service dog. If there were an equivalent app for Taxis, the need for the other services might fade away, especially with surge pricing.
5
Only in NY could an easily solved problem been made unsolvable - in this instance by its Mayor, the state's governor and the state legislature. One doesn't understand, one won't understand and one doesn't care to understand.
Cities around the world have dealt successfully with this problem before. The solution is easy to design and easy to implement: Those that contribute to congestion should pay for the cost of congestion.
For starters, end the free use of the East River Bridges; failure to do so only adds to congestion. Second, implement Mayor Bloomberg's plan to charge vehicles congestion fees during peak times. Third, charge all vehicles on the roads since all vehicles contribute to congestion, not just Uber and Lyft, but also taxis, private cars, delivery trucks and other commercial vehicles. When congestion is high, the price is high; when congestion is low, the price is low. The market for transportation will in the end, ease the congestion - and perhaps raise funds for a better subway and public transit.
If NY goes about trying to fix the problem with a slate of silly, if not politically designed rules and regulations, as the Mayor is known to do, drivers will find a work around as participants in an economy will always do.
18
This is the sensible way but various interests have stood in the way.
1
Yes, there should be a surcharge. And a cap on the number of hack licenses to reduce traffic. And a toll on the East and Harlem River bridges. Living in the city has always been expensive. And we've received some remarkable infrastructure for that expense. I'll pay a little extra when I use a rideshare without complaint if it means we get a functional subway system in return.
15
In my opinion, an additional fee during rush hour might be fair, but not during off times. When coming home from certain areas or less crowded streets at night, it can be hard or impossible to find a cab, making a Lyft or Uber the safe and reliable option. While they may contribute to congestion during already busy times, such rides do not create traffic when the streets are already empty. A better solution would be to invest more into infrastructure like regional transit lines, so more people from the general area who drive into manhattan can cease to do that and instead rely on these forms of transit. There are also plenty of manhattan dwellers who own a car and choose to drive... it’s shocking to me that anyone owns a car or drives in this huge city with relatively good and extensive transportation, and more often than not it is the wealthy who can afford to do that. These cars also create unnecessary congestion. NY state should tax the wealthy and their homes and incomes higher, and use that money to support updates to subways and train systems, and additionally institute a commuter-hours fee on ride sharing apps, and the problem would get better.
5
@Illya has hit the nail on the head: the problem is loitering, empty cars, surfing the streets for a ride-hail.
The problem can be fixed with tech, by defining a loitering area and a loitering fee that starts 5 minutes after passenger-drop, and stops upon the receipt of a firm ride-hail. The fee increases exponentially after 30 minutes and runs out at 60, upon which the vehicle automatically gets issued a loitering ticket, fees for which, automatically deducted. More than 3 tickets a month causes the vehicle to lose license to operate within city limits. Fees get billed direct to ride-share companies, they decide how much loitering expense make business sense, how much to pass on to riders, how much to vehicle-operators.
Everyone happy? Good. Taxi! Bah.
2
I have lived in the far reaches of Brooklyn my entire life. For years, I could not get a yellow cab to go there from Manhattan. Yes, I know that legally they were obligated to take me once I was in the cab, but I had drivers yell at me to get out of the cab or suddenly go out of service, etc. When I found out that Uber would take me to Brooklyn, I thought of it as a miracle. And since I average getting thrown off a train about once a week, Uber is now also a necessity. So if the MTA would like fewer people to use Uber, then ensure that we can make it all the way to our destinations on the subway.
128
Of course Uber et al should pay a fee to ease congestion. The article also states that Uber already pays state and city sales taxes, but not so for taxis, which pay a 50 cent surcharge instead. We should dedicate a larger portion of this sales tax revenue to fixing up our subway system, rather than going into general city revenues. More of us would use the subways if it functioned at an acceptable level. Along with congestion pricing, and possibly a small income tax surcharge (dedicated to fixing the subway) on high income individuals, we would be on the road to less congested streets and a healthier public transit system.
4
Congestion pricing with the proceeds going to public transport. This isn't rocket science.
7
Let's make medallions pick up the fee. Nothing is too good for the working class.
Guess who's riding Uber in Manhattan? More than likely, it's not someone commuting daily from the Flatlands, but someone who wouldn't deign to ride the subway, lives in a glass terrarium in Soho, Nomad, Tribeca, Sambuca or BooHoo, and pays several million for the privilege. De Blasio had the right idea with a millionaires tax to pay for subway repair but Cuomo reflexively quashed it, demonstrating once again where the never-to-be-President's true sympathies lie.
11
Throw some tolls on the East River bridges too while we're at it.
Automobiles create tons of negative externalities and direct costs for which they pay not nearly enough.
12
Absolutely!!
As someone who has to take the RFK (Triborough) all the time, please explain why everyone else gets to ride into manhattan free? Oh, cause I live in Harlem, I forgot!
2
Let's not forget the peril to the PEDESTRIANS that the onslaught of "sharing economy" taxicabs has caused. All these new vehicles with their drivers, presumably with less experience than cabs as professional drivers, are darting around corners and other modes of distracted driving. In SF, I'm cutoff regularly by uber and lyft drivers making hasty R-turns--even with a stroller!
18
Pedestrians in SF and the peninsula tend to be oblivious to their surroundings
2
The enormous amount ($20+ billion!) needed to get the subway system up to modern standards (London, Toronto, Tokyo) will never be found by begging money from Albany or the US Government.
We need to face up to this sad reality by: (1) charging tolls on the East River bridges, (2) sharply raising property taxes on luxury apartment buildings in Manhattan, (3) selling 10,000 new taxi tokens (4) and banning Uber, Lyft, and other services from Manhattan during rush hours.
Finally, during week-nights the subway system should be closed from one to five AM so that proper maintenance can be done.
Admittedly none of this will be east or popular.
3
How about paying for subway repairs by substantially increasing subway fares? You could even try higher fares for longer trips, as London already does.
Admittedly, neither of these options will be easy or popular.
3
Because the subways do a lot of good and a few tons of steel per person riding an Uber does not.
5
you obviously never took a nyc subway on a weeknight at, say, 2am, else you would know that many of the trains are far from empty at those times. and it's not college kids coming back from partying --no, those do normally take uber now-- but rather working people whose shifts finish late at night, and who have to commute back to the outer boros. how would you expect those people to get back home?
8
three solutions fix double parking get rid of the bike Lanes and add congestion pricing. perhaps our mayor can even use public transportation and get rid of his Entourage
6
Not one word in the article about a culprit much more nefarious than Uber etc. Anyone with eyes can see the congestion caused by bike lanes coupled with omnipresent construction. When you take one of the busiest cities in the world and just eliminate two lanes of traffic or more (bike lane, parking lane, turning lane) what do you expect is going to happen to traffic? And try driving on any east-west street in mid-Manhattan. Illegal parking coupled with construction causes endless delay. An article focusing on Uber etc. without mentioning these other causes is just a hatchet job.
45
Basically Manhattan must be rid of most private cars, and those that remain must pay whopping fees.
The necessity of this is so the Ponzi scheme of ever higher density, and hence property values, might be sustained for another generation or so.
2
Traffic in Manhattan too much for you? Fine you and your car can just stay out. Problem solved.
3
You are not stuck in traffic, you are traffic.
Do you know how many moving bicycles can fit within the footprint of a Suburban stuck in traffic, carrying one person inch by inch across Manhattan? Cycling is one of the most efficient, environmentally clean, and pleasant ways to move thousands of people from A to B. Look at Amsterdam, Portland, San Francisco. I commend NYC for stepping up their bike lanes and advocacy of CitiBike as a way to introduce a viable alternative to the subway and private cars. When I visit NY, I never take subway or private cars anymore, and stay above ground, gliding past traffic, getting to my destinations on time, with a pleasant bit of exercise to boot. You should try it. You might like it.
I was in the lobby of Uber recently, and witnessed the reception of a big-shot by the front door, he said, “Sorry we’re late, traffic was horrible: pedestrians and cyclists EVERYWHERE.” Oh, the irony.
2
ABSOLUTELY! I am astounded that people have been so willing to use these services -- just after NYC finally got the green cabs in the neighborhoods that yellow cabs didn't serve. The attraction is a sense of entitlement -- the idea that "my Uber is coming" has cachet for people. It shouldn't. Cab service in NYC should be regulated. It is very unfair to change the rules by default -- think of the people who work as full-time cab drivers.
47
If the city wants to charge for-hire vehicles a fee to help reduce congestion, then okay. For-hire companies should be able to choose whether to pass this charge onto the consumer (and then deal with the consequences of that decision) or absorb it as a cost of doing business in NYC.
But why should the passenger should have to pay the fee? We didn't decide to buy the car and put it on the road for 18-24 hours a day.
When, as a passenger, I get into an Uber (or a similar service), I have no idea how many miles that car has traveled today, or how many it plans to travel when my trip is complete, or the routes its driver takes to accumulate those miles, or how long it idles and/or circles looking for a fare. Those decisions are out of my hands.
The only decision I've made is the complicated but split-decision analysis balancing cost, time, ease and comfort of getting from point A to point B.
I'm happy to pay more taxes for better transit service (which I would hope would come with better urban planning, such as priority bus lanes) and more bike lanes but a congestion fee should be born by those who actually put the cars on the roads.
3
Hey Scott, I feel your pain as does every Uber or Lyft rider. Perhaps the only people who won't agree with your points are the politicians who want to impose this tax and the car companies themselves. Uber and Lyft and any other car service will find a way to pass that tax onto the rider even if they disguise it by calling it something else. That's the reality.
The other reality is that car service is a luxury. And it will remain a luxury for as long as subways and buses are around to serve true working class people who can't afford the exorbitant rates charged by taxis, and other car services.
Car service will pass the higher cost onto the rider. That is inevitable and without doubt. They will stick it to riders because they know they are providing a convenience. And in New York City as elsewhere, convenience comes at a premium.
Ironically, Uber and Lyft management have argued that they provide a valuable service to metropolitan areas ostensibly because they lighten the burden placed on mass transit. If that's true, then the surest way they can prove the sincerity of their argument is to put their money where their mouth is.
Those higher fees are coming and you and I are going to pay for them because the reality is that you and I are not paying the taxes needed to upgrade mass transit.
14
"Perhaps the only people who won't agree with your points are the politicians who want to impose this tax and the car companies themselves."
Along with the taxi operators. They want to see Uber prices artificially rise as high as possible.
1
Your fares are being artificially subsidized by the ride hailing companies. That's why Uber lost over a billion last quarter. After Uber and/or Lyft destroy the completion what do you think will happen happen to your low fares?
3
I live on a Midtown crosstown block that, like many, has vehicles parked on both sides and insufficient width for passing a double-parked vehicle if one of the two is a truck.
Last week I was outside and I watched an Uber driver in a Suburban stop to pick up a passenger. Nobody could get by. He didn't care. They honked. He waited for the passenger. They honked some more. The block filled up behind him. He continued to wait. The light at the avenue behind him turned, and cars moved into the intersection but couldn't proceed onto my block - now all of 7th Avenue was halted. Still no passenger, and still the Suburban sitting there. The car and truck horns started hurting my ears, so I went inside.
City government is incompetent if they can't put a stop to this stupidity.
247
Taxis do the same thing.
3
Not like the Uber drivers blocking crosswalks - at least TLC are instructed to make way.
3
And I'll bet that he was at a fire hydrant, so that not only was he blocking all the traffic, he was also blocking the hydrant. Pull over and let the traffic pass? Never! I can't block the hydrant!
1
Of course Uber and Lyft should be regulated in similar ways as taxi cabs. I remain baffled that they are not and simply allowed to operate as they see fit clogging the roads, undercutting the regulated services in cost and underpaying the employees. Same goes for Air Bnb, none of these disrupters should be permitted to disrupt if they are not going to abide by the laws, zoning and other regulations.
208
totally. but new tech ,uber,lyft, and airbnb, are outside of the regulations. "sharing" economy= a few guys are getting rich and not sharing.
3
It's not just the unoccupied time. The whole premise of door to door delivery of people is a recipe for congestion. There is no such thing for unlimited convenience and instant gratification with no down side for other people. "Ride-sharing" is competition, not complement, to public transportation. Limiting the number of for-hire vehicles is the only way to get around it. What makes the situation even more laughable, in a way, is that the Uber/Lyft demographic is dominated by those who are single, young and affluent. Exactly those who can easily combine walking and biking with public transportation.
79
The door- to-door aspect of congestion is an important point.
Uber clogs up side streets. In the past, pre-Uber, people would typically walk to an avenue to hail a cab - but Uber goes wherever "ordered"
4
There are several aspects to the traffic problem that the article fails to discuss.
Drivers of ride hailing cars seem, overall, to be less experienced. They seem to try to be more careful but nonetheless seem to impact traffic more than other vehicles.
It stands to reason that if there are fewer lanes available for vehicles, each lane will be more crowded. There have been some independent studies of traffic in Manhattan, and I believe that all have found a close correlation between traffic speed and lane reduction -- some call it theft -- in favor largely unused bike lanes and bus lanes.
Also, if it is city policy to encourage mass transit, why do city employees get cars?
And why isn't there a special fee for parking a truck for use as an office, as many delivery companies do (UPS, FedEx)?
Also not mentioned is the number of vehicles driving around that would be parked if there were affordable parking available. Robert Wagner, the last competent mayor, sought to include parking in new buildings. Subsequent mayors have prohibited reasonable amounts of parking. Mayor de Blasio recently pushed for thousands of apartments in Far Rockaway where the typical resident has 2+ cars. But his new apartments will have 0.85 parking spaces per apartment!
Of course fewer (probably unlawful) parking placards would help. As would a practice of issuing summonses to bus drivers for stopping three feet from the curb at an empty bus stop.
12
There is a delicate balance between the number of cars in Manhattan and the ease of using those cars, which translates to cost, mobility and parking. The easier you make it to navigate the streets by car, the more cars you will have, negating that enhancement. Similarly with affordable parking. The only way to reduce traffic is by making it too expensive, both in convenience and dollars. Unfortunately, there's no simple way to do this that will not advantage the more wealthy.
7
You make a few good points, but you should read up on induced demand. Fewer lanes doesn't necessarily mean more traffic since plenty of people will opt to not drive on those smaller streets, just as more lanes does not equate to less traffic (since having more lanes simply entices more people to drive).
As to "stealing" car lanes for bikers, far more bikers can utilize a bike lane than car drivers can a car lane. Bikes are simply way more space-efficient than cars. There are also lots of other benefits to biking such as 1. it's good exercise, 2. it creates no pollution, 3. it's quiet, 4. it's cheap (and so is building the infrastructure), 5. getting hit by a biker generally won't kill you, etc. That's precisely the type of transportation that should be incentivized -- like walking!
(Disclaimer: I don't ride a bike, but I would. I don't feel that the bike infrastructure is safe enough yet.)
8
Very few people voluntarily drive into Manhattan if they don't have a special parking privilege - i.e., are exempt not only from parking enforcement, but from most traffic violation enforcement.
2
If problem is passenger-less driving, why not charge for that? This’ll encourage drivers to spend less time idling and grab fares faster.
1
Share the Congestion!
1
How about regulating them like the EU is going to do? As a transportation service... They are nothing more than a taxi service... And, don't forget the downside of the "gig" economy; independent contractors who underpaid, w/no pensions, healthcare... What a con these companies have perpetuated!!
157
“There’s almost no reliable way to get anywhere on time other than walking,”
Sounds like problem solved.
61
Except for the hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers who would have to walk over 4 or 5 miles and as much as 15 miles (each way) to get to and from work every day. Yeah sure.
4
My carshare is because I need to get from Point A to Point B, and my public transportation has been terribly maintained and scaled. It is dirty, I get harassed, it's unreliable, and now apparently, it can be mortally dangerous. Why are citizens and not the governors of our shared public infrastructures being hit with that bill?
45
seriously? with trump in power and GOP taking infrastructure money away and giving it to the 1% private coffers, what do you expect?
Cars are more dangerous.
Yes, public transportation isn't all that clean, frequently late, some riders don't smell so great, you might be bothered. Or bothersome. But, so what? The fact is that automobile travel uses much more physical space than public transportation. Where cars are restricted as the public nuisances that they are, public transportation, walking and bicycling are greatly enhanced.
It's difficult to fathom the amount of rationalization that goes into the "need" to be encased in a perfectly sterile air-conditioned bubble, picked up at one doorstep and deposited at some other door, never to suffer the indignity of being among the riffraff or experiencing one season of the year or another.
1
A great idea, but make the providers pay, then the customer has a choice.
2
Maybe if the MTA could get the Subway to run so I can depend on it that would not be an issue. I cannot count this year how many times due to the litany of excuses they have I have had to bail out of the subway halfway home or too far away from the office so I hail a UBER or Taxi. You made the problem, now you seek to penalize some who have made a remedy. Get your house in order, you are a joke of a subway system.
70
I agree fully with to you. public transit needs to be reliable to be a true alternative. that's more interested than a cheap price.
we have trains here that leave at 6:45 and then the next at 9:30 to get downtown. in winter the 6:45 gets cancelled often, and you stand in the platform in freezing weather for hours.
1
Knowing that adding a fee to uber-etc. rides would drive poorer customers back to mass transit is sheer madness; the last thing I want is to be less able to afford an uber etc. when I need one; how about lowering fees for uber etc. so more people would use them and there would be fewer empty cars? Maybe Sam Schwartz needs to know what its like to be poor so he won't keep suggesting things that make being poor in NYC even worse. Or get the parts of New York State that siphon off money from the city to pay their fair share so we don't have to run our city without the necessary funds.
Mailer and Breslin were right: NYC should have seceded long ago if all the state is gonna do is take our money, pervert our politics, and make life hard for the poor and middle class here!
10
Let's hope users are charged a high fee--so high that it would put Über out of business, or at least drive them from NYC.
22
“We already pay taxes — what more do they want from us?” said Evelyn Jimenez, 38, a dental assistant who already spends at least $15 a day on Uber.
“I love paying taxes. With them I buy civilization,” said Oliver Wendell Holmes, 176, Suprme Court justice, who would have been stunned that Uber et al were allowed to operate with almost no regulation.
119
Yes, because in the absence of an additional user tax on rideshare services, civilization would collapse and we'd be back at the stone age.
The whole "taxes are the price of civilization" argument is tired and carries no weight when it's used to attempt to legitimize literally every attempt to institute a new tax.
1
That wasnt really the point: rather it was the irony, that a person willing to spend so much per day would balk at a small fee that would help to relieve the burden her use places on everything and everyone else--ie, civilization--by invoking the specter of the taxman.
But youre totally right--it is a classic line.
6
It depends. Are you feeling good about paying taxes to a Trump-led government? He certainly won't be appointing the likes of Holmes Jr. to the Supreme court!
Every vehicle causes congestion. Let's start with private police vehicles given free parking, with real police cars that drive around in circles, with yellow cabs that do the same (instead of waiting in designated ranks) and, dare I say it, with endless miles of little used bike lanes. So do all private vehicles. Why pick on Uber? With subways at full capacity and potential bus lanes sacrificed to bicycles, Uber cars are a necessary addition to transportation, not just some annoyance. They would not be in demand if they were not needed, especially by the old and disabled.
45
Yes absolutely you should pay a fee. Uber and other ride hailing companies have created many different kinds of negative externalities in the cities where they have become so popular. This does not mean that the ride services should not exist, but the externalities need to be internalized somehow. In my own life, Uber has safes my behind more than once and has made international travel so much less stressful (no longer have to negotiate taxi fares in Hindi!). But I am also perfectly willing to pay a fee to help cities invest in infrastructure.
I also simply don’t understand how Uber continues to get away with the argument that they are a tech company and not a car service company. It defies reasonable logic to make this argument. They want to innovate new technology but not leave room for our governance institutions to innovate in parallel. Drives me crazy.
178
And what, may I ask, is wrong with having to negotiate fares in Hindi, particularly given the fact that you obviously speak it?
Imposing new fees on cabs and Ubers is a ridiculous solution.
The City has intentionally reduced traffic lanes on major avenues in what I believe was an attempt to -- and I'm grasping at straws here -- encourage people to take public transit in lieu of driving.
This is the case where I live, where 7th Ave South got one lane smaller (with no bike lane) and Hudson St. and 8th Ave each got one lane smaller (with a new dedicated bike lane).
I'm all for more bike lanes, so no complaints there, but what explains why 7th Ave South got smaller?
But this is an important part of the story that is ignored in this report.
If we want to reduce traffic, I'd suggest three things (1) let Uber drivers park somewhere--unlike cabs they don't need to constantly roam empty to be hailed, (2) get more traffic cops to avoid jams at lights that block the box and snowball into bigger jams and (3) explore a new concept of staggering turning vehicle green light vs. crossing pedestrian walk signal so that things flow more orderly.
15
Life long UES'er here.
The primary reason for gridlock is the removal of two of the five lanes of traffic on the uptown/downtown avenues. One for buses and one for bikes. It was a bad decision going back to Bloomberg.
29
There is without a doubt a penalty being paid in slower traffic due to the loss of one vehicle lane wherever there is now a bike lane. The new reduced 25 MPH speed limit cannot help either. That this article focusses on the new phone application ride services as the main culprit is spurious.
3
If the MTA worked reliably, people wouldn't need to resort to using ride-hailing apps as much in the first place, particularly at rush hour. To penalize them for doing so in order to pay for the issues that have been largely ignored for tens of years is just insult to injury.
40
Suddenly Governor Cuomo got religion about NYC's subway system.
It has something to do with him wanting to run for President in 2020.
Governor Cuomo needs to realize that he will never ever be elected President.
5
And he should not be.
Here in Portland, the downtown streets are clogged at rush hour with Uber and Lyft drivers, making congestion worse. I sit on my bike and crawl a few blocks, stuck at the same traffic light for multiple cycles—a part of my route that used to take 5 minutes. And count the Uber and Lyft stickers to pass the time.
Look at the history of taxicabs. You will see that public streets flooded with cut-rate, untrained drivers undercutting each other for fares is nothing new. If you think it’s bad now, wait until they’re all driverless...
74
Surprised that you can’t ride around traffic. Here in Chicago it’s quite easy to ride betweeen that traffic lane and the parking lane. Driving on the other hand is a bit more challenging!
you sit on your bike with auto traffic? bikes are for moving thru traffic not being part of it, time to move to NYC
1
In this case, I need the left lane on a multi-lane, one-way street for turning left onto a bridge. As does everyone else. So I take my turn, instead of passing everyone on the right and cutting in front of cars at the light to (dangerously) make my left turn.
While fewer Portlanders are polite these days, some of us still try.
2
Is there anything the City won’t tax? Uber has provided a cheaper way of getting around the city and now the City wants to raise the price to prop up the MTA. But the problem with the subways is not a lack of funding. It’s that it is grossly mismanaged.
36
How is uber cheaper than the MTA? 2.75 gets you anywhere in the city, a yellow cab is still cheaper unless you ride UberX and share with a bunch of strangers and then depending on where you need to be dropped off, you may have to go to three other destinations before arriving at your own.
Yes, they're absolutely should be a surcharge for people who use these private cars for hire. The city has turned into a playground for the rich and there is absolutely nothing out there to help the poor and the people who don't have axis to the services. In the meantime the buses and subways are falling apart. We must charge whatever we can to these Fancy services so that we can at least maintain the very basic services we have for the public.
97
Not enough money to fix subways, but enough to give the super wealthy a break. Makes sense to me.
99
Alex, are you a Russian infiltrating the comments section so that you can divide thought and lie? The wealthy that actually live in NYC have no break. The wealthy that do not live in NYC, but own property, get all the breaks, but that is the city law under Dems. The money that went to the transportation system each year (billions), was spent on union commitments, advertising, and executive pay. Talk to the local government, it's all a part of their plan.
way to miss the point Ma.
CLUE: The US looks like a third world nation compared to just about everyone else when it comes to public transit. Just look at the recent fatal train wreck in WA. But hey... MAGA! (:-0
Uber just barged in We don’t need them here.
Even a $5/ride fee in Manhattan, with all the money going to improve mass transit, seems fair, given the external cost Uber imposes.
The other boroughs can set their own fees, depending upon perceived need. Uber drivers whose passengers want to avoid the Manhattan fee can drop people off at public transit, whether in e.g. NJ or Queens
103
I'm ALL in with Lynn on this one!! Every penny goes to Mass Transit. Let's keep the subway running efficiently and ontime.?
6
As taxicabs charge $.50 charge per ride for the benefit of mass transit, it would seem that a similar charge on Uber, Lyft, etc,, would be fair. If proposed, those companies would probably generate an astro turf, rather a grass roots, response, but it would be equitable. An increase in hack stands at terminals, subway stations and hotels might also be helpful in fighting congestion as it could reduce the number of taxis cruising empty.
39
I am mobility impaired and have difficulty walking up more than one flight of stairs, walking down two flights of stairs and walking more than 5 blocks (north-south) without having to rest. I recently visited New York and used the New York subway system, Uber, Via, the yellow cabs and even a pedicab. My past preference before my illness was for the subway system. I would have used the subways more if there had been more working elevators. I had problems with Uber, Via and the yellow cabs: problems entering my destination into the apps, drivers whom did not understand my destination, drivers who incorrectly entered my destination into their GPS system, shared rides with passengers who discovered that they had left something at origination and we had to turn around.
I would be happy to pay an additional $1 for every Uber, Via and pedicab ride if it went into subway elevators. Or maybe a pre mile fee of 25 cents.
77
Elevators would be nice, but a system that is up to date would be even nicer.
2
It's a travesty of New York City that anyone physically impaired cannot get around, especially via the MTA and Port Authority, let alone Uber and TLC. I wish even Congestion Pricing could make right that inconvenience.
4