Finally! UBER coming to BC

[JPvancity]

Finally!!!!

Paying almost 40 bucks to the airport from Downtown is such a ROYAL RIPOFF!!!

I took Uber in Boston for the first time and was so impressed. Local friendly people, charge dramatically less and are very helpful.

Taxi drivers . . . well you already know . . . (Some are good though so I hope they find something better).

THANK YOU UBER! Please come soon.

 

[pinky2]

there are very many unhappy uber drivers in new york city. the up and comer to really hope for in vancouver is juno. one big reason juno drivers are happy is the profit sharing plan.

 

[uncleg]

Finally!


The provincial government has unveiled a framework that could finally allow Uber into British Columbia. Ride sharing will be coming to B.C. by Dec 9th. Transportation Minister Todd Stone and TransLink Minister Peter Fassbender made the announcement at a news conference in downtown Vancouver. They are touting the change as a modernization of the taxi industry. Last week, the province confirmed it would have an answer on the ride sharing industry before the May 9 vote.

Only if the Liberals are re-elected......and the NDP have nixed this. I have nearly 30 years in the transportation industry and the Liberals are playing politics with this and have a lot of wiggle room to get out from under this.

There is the matter of the Passenger Transportation Board with approves licences.....no mention of whether or not they will continue to exist. No mention of whether or not Uber vehicles will have to get NSC numbers like we all do now. Taxi drivers have to take a the Taxihost course at the JI before they can get Chauffeurs Permits in most jurisdictions....level playing field will mean...so will Uber drivers. I wonder how many are willing to spend the time and money. The limo industry has operated without Taxihost since it's inception......it was never intended for limos....last year Vancouver decided limo drivers now all have to take the course.......including those that have been in the industry for years. The City of Vancouver and the various Municipalities all have some degree of jurisdiction as to transportation operations....age of vehicles, chauffeurs permit requirements, Burnaby is different from Vancouver which is different from North Shore..etc. What's going to be the standard ? Keep in mind the fiasco with the suburban taxi's....the PTB authorized additional taxi's from the "burbs to operate in Vancouver during peak hours.....City wouldn't give them vehicle for hire...things went to court....three years later and the suburban taxi's are still not working in Vancouver. Yes, cabs from the "burbs" do pick up in Vancouver....usually flags, but remember everytime a driver does that he/she risks a $1,500.00 fine. There's quite a ball of yarn that has to be unraveled or thrown away before Uber can hit the road.

Keep in mind where taxi's and limo's can legally operate and what they can charge is dictated and I mean DICTATED by the Provincial government. However, as they point out when they issue a licence....that licence is then subject to Municipal regulations. Keeping that in mind, do you think this government is going to come up with regulations that will keep everybody happy? Doubt it.

Previous posts mention the ethnic makeup of the Taxi Industry.....and the political influence they have. Here the Liberals took a gamble.....there are probably more voting millennials and hipsters and what have you that will vote in favour of the Uber party then there are cab owners that will vote against. The Vancouver based companies will take the biggest lose in value, the suburban companies will see an increase in value because now they have access to the golden goose..Vancouver. If all the current requirements for professional drivers are kept in place for Uber drivers then you will see a major defection of cab drivers from the city companies and the "burbs"......so even fewer cabs will be on the road. Will they balance...we'll see. They say the cars will have to meet current safety requirements....with what our vehicles go through for a safety inspection, you can't just drive part-time. There's shit private vehicle get away with, commercial vehicles can't....going to be expensive to operate.

All in all in should be fun....I'm already getting the calls..what are we going to do ?

 

[PerbMod]

I tend to stay out of these lounge threads, but I will say that lyft and uber are FAR superior to taxi services in every city I have used them in. Toronto, Montreal, Los Angeles, Miami, Vegas, they do not kill the local cab companies, it's a myth, they provide an alternative and we should have them in Vancouver. For the NDP to reject them out of hand without much of a plan is pretty stupid politics.

 

[beavereric]

Great point Mr. PerbMod.!!!

Allthough I feel for the poor cab drivers, mostly not owner/operator. They can apply to Uber. The greedy cab companies do not have my sympathy. They just kept on bidding up the taxi licences, which have a very low intrinsic value as these where issued by the various cities for nominal fees. Time do change and old fashion cabbies are going the same way as the horse and buggy.
Who is bailing me out when, for example, I buy a house at great expense and then the market collapses? You take your chances, sometime you win sometimes you lose.

 

[badbadboy]

Only if the Liberals are re-elected......and the NDP have nixed this. I have nearly 30 years in the transportation industry and the Liberals are playing politics with this and have a lot of wiggle room to get out from under this.

There is the matter of the Passenger Transportation Board with approves licences.....no mention of whether or not they will continue to exist. No mention of whether or not Uber vehicles will have to get NSC numbers like we all do now. Taxi drivers have to take a the Taxihost course at the JI before they can get Chauffeurs Permits in most jurisdictions....level playing field will mean...so will Uber drivers. I wonder how many are willing to spend the time and money. The limo industry has operated without Taxihost since it's inception......it was never intended for limos....last year Vancouver decided limo drivers now all have to take the course.......including those that have been in the industry for years. The City of Vancouver and the various Municipalities all have some degree of jurisdiction as to transportation operations....age of vehicles, chauffeurs permit requirements, Burnaby is different from Vancouver which is different from North Shore..etc. What's going to be the standard ? Keep in mind the fiasco with the suburban taxi's....the PTB authorized additional taxi's from the "burbs to operate in Vancouver during peak hours.....City wouldn't give them vehicle for hire...things went to court....three years later and the suburban taxi's are still not working in Vancouver. Yes, cabs from the "burbs" do pick up in Vancouver....usually flags, but remember everytime a driver does that he/she risks a $1,500.00 fine. There's quite a ball of yarn that has to be unraveled or thrown away before Uber can hit the road.

Keep in mind where taxi's and limo's can legally operate and what they can charge is dictated and I mean DICTATED by the Provincial government. However, as they point out when they issue a licence....that licence is then subject to Municipal regulations. Keeping that in mind, do you think this government is going to come up with regulations that will keep everybody happy? Doubt it.

Previous posts mention the ethnic makeup of the Taxi Industry.....and the political influence they have. Here the Liberals took a gamble.....there are probably more voting millennials and hipsters and what have you that will vote in favour of the Uber party then there are cab owners that will vote against. The Vancouver based companies will take the biggest lose in value, the suburban companies will see an increase in value because now they have access to the golden goose..Vancouver. If all the current requirements for professional drivers are kept in place for Uber drivers then you will see a major defection of cab drivers from the city companies and the "burbs"......so even fewer cabs will be on the road. Will they balance...we'll see. They say the cars will have to meet current safety requirements....with what our vehicles go through for a safety inspection, you can't just drive part-time. There's shit private vehicle get away with, commercial vehicles can't....going to be expensive to operate.

All in all in should be fun....I'm already getting the calls..what are we going to do ?

Thanks for posting a view from the Industry. My only hope is the end result is more "for hire" vehicles on the road which I think we are all in agreement; whether it's cabs, Ubers or Lyfts. Of course they all have to operate on an even playing field excepting those who own a $1M taxi licence. There is no way to protect that statute moving foward. Same licensing, same courses, same insurance and a proper class 4 drivers license.

Uber won't pay its fair share of Tax in BC, something to consider....

Do you think BC Govt will miss a chance to tax someone? Seems to me that if they have an Uber application, they will send that applicant a tax notice too?

I tend to stay out of these lounge threads, but I will say that lyft and uber are FAR superior to taxi services in every city I have used them in. Toronto, Montreal, Los Angeles, Miami, Vegas, they do not kill the local cab companies, it's a myth, they provide an alternative and we should have them in Vancouver. For the NDP to reject them out of hand without much of a plan is pretty stupid politics.

Same here! East Coast or West Coast USA; I've used many of the major cities. Some very economical in LA County or Newark NJ etc. SFO was priced about the same as local taxis so it didn't matter because their BART is excellent and easy to navigate.

Real life situation: Recently hailing a cab for an SP who visited a hotel I booked took 15 minutes to get a cab near Burrard and Georgia at 6 PM. We saw three cabs and one responded. Seriously? Major intersection near many hotels, restaurants etc didn't have taxis in the area? I'm not sure why the lack of transport is an issue in Vancouver?

 

[uncleg]

Real life situation: Recently hailing a cab for an SP who visited a hotel I booked took 15 minutes to get a cab near Burrard and Georgia at 6 PM. We saw three cabs and one responded. Seriously? Major intersection near many hotels, restaurants etc didn't have taxis in the area? I'm not sure why the lack of transport is an issue in Vancouver?

Real life response: 6 pm..not a lot of street parking near Burrard and Georgia...in fact none....rush hour and all that shit. Three cabs..one responded...ever consider the two were occupied: don't no "splainin'
on the way to a dispatched trip: once a cab is dispatched to a trip they can't take a flag/hail...if they do they can find themselves off the air for 2 to 4 hours or.... that means no dispatch trips, find your own. Consider that if it is a lease driver, they don't get a reduced lease because they aren't being dispatched. Remember or learn, drivers aren't paid..they pay a lease per shift, plus gas....how many of you go to work for a 12 hour day and start it $100.00 or so in the hole.
suburban cab: not allowed to pick up in Vancouver, as pointed out $1,500.00 fine if caught. Colour of the cab doesn't mean much....lots of the suburban companies fly the same colours as the city cars just so it is easier for them to flag illegally in the city.

On another note, Fairmont Hotel has a cab stand in the breezeway, Hyatt has a cab stand in the tunnel and Sutton has a stand in the driveway...all in the hood.

 

[CanineCowboy]

My understanding is the Liberals are proposing ripping up all the regulations they have been enforcing on cab drivers to accomodate Uber in the market - no justice institute, no class 4 licence, no commercial vehicle inspection, no geographic boundaries, no set fare rates and changing the insurance requirements. It's called lowering the bar and tax payers are on the hook for a $2.5-3.5 million dollar subsidy. Also good luck collecting tax from Uber - my understanding is they don't comply in other jurisdictions, so why here?

 

[mercyshooter]

My understanding is the Liberals are proposing ripping up all the regulations they have been enforcing on cab drivers to accomodate Uber in the market - no justice institute, no class 4 licence, no commercial vehicle inspection, no geographic boundaries, no set fare rates and changing the insurance requirements. It's called lowering the bar and tax payers are on the hook for a $2.5-3.5 million dollar subsidy. Also good luck collecting tax from Uber - my understanding is they don't comply in other jurisdictions, so why here?

The bad thing is metro vancouver's living quality is higher than many places around. Without quality, everything is garbage. But yes, the catch is the old things have to be gone in order to get the new things in. That's competition. You've got to trade off. It's tough and it's reality.

 

[badbadboy]

My understanding is the Liberals are proposing ripping up all the regulations they have been enforcing on cab drivers to accomodate Uber in the market - no justice institute, no class 4 licence, no commercial vehicle inspection, no geographic boundaries, no set fare rates and changing the insurance requirements. It's called lowering the bar and tax payers are on the hook for a $2.5-3.5 million dollar subsidy. Also good luck collecting tax from Uber - my understanding is they don't comply in other jurisdictions, so why here?

Do you have a link to support what you have heard?

I'd like to read it. Thanks

 

[CanineCowboy]

Go to the Vancouver Sun, search Uber and there are a half dozen articles from this week that touch on the plan. Also CBC radio has been providing coverage and asked Jeff Meggs about the plan, I believe yesterday morning. His views of BC lowering our standards to allow Uber in are available on the CBC site.
Tonight on the National, there was another story just about their reputation, which is tanking at the moment. Such a great company: price surging during terror events; using 'gray ball' technology to evade local enforcement and operate illegally; their sexual abuse controversy; ceo's outburst; his desire to sit down with Trump cost them 200,000 users; and, their theft of technology from google could cripple or even take down the company.

Or is it just 'fake news'?

 

[badbadboy]

Or is it just 'fake news'?

Could be, right?

I'm fully invested in using this service wherever I go in the Uber/Lyft world. I've already done a lot of reading about these new app based sharing programs. They all seem to be tilted towards the existing regulated services without an acknowledgement that there may be another way of supporting what the seemingly silent majority actually want moving forward.

I was hoping you would post an article from a respected news source pseudo backing up your previous post as I want to read contrary thoughts about these services. Seems there are a lot of opinions not necessarily based upon any reality other than protecting the existing paradigms.

 

[uncleg]

My understanding is the Liberals are proposing ripping up all the regulations they have been enforcing on cab drivers to accomodate Uber in the market - no justice institute, no class 4 licence, no commercial vehicle inspection, no geographic boundaries, no set fare rates and changing the insurance requirements. It's called lowering the bar and tax payers are on the hook for a $2.5-3.5 million dollar subsidy. Also good luck collecting tax from Uber - my understanding is they don't comply in other jurisdictions, so why here?

No sure what you read to come to your understanding of what is proposed, but the JI stays, rate regulations stay, and the offer is 1 million to develop an app for regional dispatch. Not sure why they want to do that as there are already apps out there to provide that. NSC would still be required as well as inspections. Dumping the Class 4 for taxi's and the like is no biggie....the step from 5 to 4 is not that high...mostly a matter of making sure you know how to pre-trip a vehicle properly.

The gov't has a left a way out, more consultations if re-elected so don't sign up for Uber yet. My take on this is that they should turn taxi/uber and the like regulations over to Translink..the use of Compass Cards in cabs has already been considered...so take it the whole way. Leave the limo and bus industry in the hands of the PTB and then they might just be able to take care of that properly. Currently the regulators, Provincial and Municipal do not have the manpower to properly enforce existing operations and there are a significant number of illegal operators out there. My/out position is that if the Province is serious about public safety and service in transportation, they should get out of the City/Municipal based sector.

 

[CanineCowboy]

In addition to the $1 million for the app, there is $3.5 million earmarked for crash avoidance technology.

Badboy, if you read the Sun's series of articles the plan is laid out.

 

[uncleg]

http://www.ptboard.bc.ca/documents/ia-business-as-usual.pdf


With all the players involved....you really think they can get this done by December ? CC as to crash avoidance technology....that's not a new offer from ICBC...they have had it on the table before, but with shared costs. The industry didn't see the benefit.....it's always the other guy that has the accident.

 

[badbadboy]

Badboy, if you read the Sun's series of articles the plan is laid out.

For sure the Sun has it's point of view but I don't subscribe fully to their bias. I just don't see a balance in reporting with any of the local Vancouver media paper outlets.

What I am after is cities where there has been an Uber or Lyft presence for a while and to learn about the upsides and downsides to the discussion.

 

[Warl0ck]

Bad points:

- Uber offloads risk to the drivers (try calling to complain)
- Fucks up cabbies who paid 10's of thousands for a taxi license (not a choice either).
- Little oversight of the system. I think Calgary's mayor wanted to get a bunch of criminals to apply for the job and see if they made screening. A good idea. That's proper security testing


Good:

- no more ripping off the taxi driver. You pay upfront.
- two way rating system. You can no longer be an obnoxious asshole and expect to get a ride. Same for the driver.
- efficient. Wipes away the middleman (good unless you're that middle man)
- Gives the industry the boot to it's ass to actually improve.
- creates a viable part time job that's flexible for anyone that wants to work.
- uses market demand pricing so you CAN get a ride home on New Years Eve.
- There is no longer the need to use a certain car/colour to make a living.

It's all moot anyway. Within 10 years cars will all be self driving. I can foresee a future where you'll have the option for a "private ride" home (fast, quick, expensive) or a shared ride home (cheaper, slower). A whole new world is coming.

Speaking of taxi's. Watch this, it's hiliarious. Check out at 6:10.

<div style="position:relative;height:0;padding-bottom:56.21%"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4jRq8niDfLw?ecver=2" style="position:absolute;width:100%;height:100%;left:0" width="641" height="360" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></div>

 

[CanineCowboy]

Badboy, you may have misunderstood, my points about the Liberal governments proposal to deregulations aren't the Sun editorializing - that is the Liberal Plan as set out by Stone and Fassbender which is contained in the series of articles.

The other broader issues about Uber's reputation were covered by the CBC, the Guardian and the New York Times. Google search Uber News and see what comes up. Uber is having about as positive a news cycle as Trump.

I don't think it is 'false news'.

 

[Emmy_St_Claire]

I'm probably going to stick with regular cabs, I love the anonymity of just being able to pay cash and go. No apps, no personal information, no record of where I've gone, for how long, and how many times.

*tips foil hat*

 

[Warl0ck]

I'm probably going to stick with regular cabs, I love the anonymity of just being able to pay cash and go. No apps, no personal information, no record of where I've gone, for how long, and how many times.

*tips foil hat*

Well I hope you turn off your smart phone then Emmy because it knows exactly where you go. In fact it keeps a record of it.