It has been six years since Uber drivers started roaming the streets of New York. From that day on, drivers of the notorious yellow cabs, an icon of Manhattan and the rest of the Big Apple for the past century, lived in constant fear of becoming obsolete.
And, as Statista's Patrick Wagner reports, Uber and other Ride-Hailing apps such as Lyft, Juno or Via are in the fast lane when it comes to the total number of pickups whilst the city’s green and yellow cabs’ share on the streets is steadily declining.
You will find more infographics at Statista
By February 2017 app-based mobility providers outstripped classic cabs in New York and by November of the same year Uber alone managed to pick up more passengers than Taxis.
In the future, the New York landscape might lack the famous yellow cabs coloring its streets.
Comments
Yellow Taxi guys I know also became Uber guys
Funny how the Internet has "obsoleted" so many previously high-cost services.
In reply to Yellow Taxi guys I know also… by pc_babe
I was at the airport the other day. There was a lineup of cabs that nobody was taking. The forlorn cabbies were watching scads of Lyft and Uber vehicles picking up all the travelers. Screw the cabs. They don't know how to compete. They are going the way of newspapers and magazines, where only the oldsters use them.
In reply to Funny how the Internet has … by wee-weed up
The general consensus is that taxi drivers...especially the foreigners.. are filthy, stinky and very rude.
I once rode a cab to work, and when we arrived on the premises i told the driver to let me out by the entrance. His reply was that he had to turn around. He made a long trip through the employee parking lot to get turned around. In that time the meter racked up another dime (that tells you how long ago it happened..early '80s). When he stopped he told me to pay the amount showing on the meter. I told him that I'd pay what was on the meter when the cab got to where i asked him to stop. He refused to accept one dime less. I paid the final amount as i told him what a stupid fuck he was because his stunt cost him a $3 tip.
In reply to I was at the airport the… by JoeJitsu
Not a long time ago they all thought they could retire rich: https://nypost.com/2013/11/17/taxi-medallion-prices-hit-record/ These idiots believed in government guaranteed monopoly, LOL.
In reply to Taxi drivers are filthy,… by Stu Elsample
Like fartbook ?
In reply to Not a long time ago they all… by Bunga Bunga
Fakebook has made real, honest to God, face to face, meaningful and loving relationships obsolete. Wow. Isn't the internet wonderful?
In reply to Like fartbook ? by YHWH is greater
You're a cheap Jew bastard to deprive the guy a $3 tip over a fucking dime. You should be ashamed to even tell that story. Not for nuthin, but that driver did not want to do the run through the parking lot for just an extra dime, he would have made about 15 times more money getting you out of the cab and dropping the meter for a new client. And he probably had to make the trip through the parking lot to avoid an illegal turn or other illegal driving move, for which the New York City cops are always on the lookout for as the cabs are prey for the cops.
In reply to Taxi drivers are filthy,… by Stu Elsample
So it's the last fare's responsibility to pay for the cabbie to get to somewhere he can pick up another fare? Pull the other one, it's got bells on.
In reply to You're a cheap Jew bastard… by Harry Lightning
I’m gonna miss riding in a smelly cab driven by a guy who doesn’t speak a word of English...Oh, wait. They’re all Uber’ing now.
In reply to Funny how the Internet has … by wee-weed up
That's what 1 star ratings are for, smartass.
In reply to I’m gonna miss riding in a… by Americano
What you mean to say is, "Funny how unvetted, unlicensed, unsupervised slave labor has arbitraged the depreciation curve and obviated the whole concept of private property in order to underbid legitimate professionals in a race to the bottom."
Yes, it's a bit of a mouthful, but it has the virtue of being accurate.
In reply to Funny how the Internet has … by wee-weed up
The internet did not do this to the cabs, the government did. The taxis had a contract with the city government to buy a taxi franchise from them on the condition that there would be a limited number of franchises ever available. Then the government changed the rules in the 1980s to allow limos and private cars to operate if they were called in advance of the ride by the client. That breakthrough has developed further when clients could order private cars by internet, which still required clients to open accounts with private car services but was easier to use than phone. This was especially cogent when a generation of young people evolved who would rather use their telephone internet access to communicate than use a telephone.
As such, the government more than any technology is what is in the process of killing the taxi business. If the government had not allow the private car alternative to franchised taxis, there would be no Uber or Lyft or anyone else. The government reneged on a promise to maintain a fixed number of licensed livery services in New York City, and the taxi owners who paid huge amounts of money to buy their franchise suffered as a result. At the least, the city should have refunded the franchise fees it collected once it violated the conditions that the franchise sold under.
This is a typical problem facing many franchise businesses. The franchiser usually retains the right to establish new franchises in the territory originally included in a sold franchise, and the franchisee usually has no redress as it is written in the franchise agreement that the franchiser could change the territorial boundaries. That's one reason why many business owners refuse to buy into franchises unless the territory they are buying is protected. With the taxi industry, they were further punished by the problem of sovereign immunity insofar as they were not allowed to sue the city when the city violated the original franchise agreements.
In reply to Funny how the Internet has … by wee-weed up
Cabs brought this on themselves. Just look at the graph; there isn't a corresponding dip in cab rides compared to the increase in Uber rides. Uber was just filling a hole in the market left by the cabs.
In reply to Yellow Taxi guys I know also… by pc_babe
Fake ride hailing apps?
That's where this chicanery is headed.
Fuck yellow cab. Back in the day, it used to be hard as hell to catch a cab, sumbichez would even pass you up when you tried to hail them. Even made movies about how hard it was. Now they suck hind tit. I LOVE Uber and Lyft tech. Let this serve as a message to any shit for brains management and companies that think you can take customers for granted: Markets and technologies WILL find a way around your ass. EVEN if you are a monopoly, we WILL find a way. Two immutable laws of business:
1) Customer is always right, ALWAYS.
2) If customer is wrong, goto rule #1.
If you have a paying customer, love them better than family!
The shortages you encountered used to occur when the weather was inclement or during the morning and evening rush hour., And it was not the fault of the taxi companies, it was the fault of the city, which regulated how many taxi franchises would be sold so as to try limiting the traffic congestion in Manhattan. Now the congestion is worse as the city has no control over how many private car service cars are clogging the streets of the cities every day. Traffic in London and New York already is intolerable, wait until the next recession when these cities have a million more people unemployed and many of them seek to provide income during their unemployment by working for a private car service like Uber or Lyft.
The result will be that you will be fucked up the ass with a red hot poker if you need to get anywhere, because the traffic will not be able to move in downtown city areas. Imagine if your sorry ass is in the middle of a heart attack, and the ambulance that can get you to the hospital cannot get through the traffic to get you there because of all the Uber cars clogging the streets. How will you like the technology then as you slowly fade to back and die in the back of an ambulance ?
Eventually you'll wind up having to take the subway or underground, and all the private car drivers will give up on that line of work as they will not be able to earn any money sitting in traffic 10 hours a day, and then there will wind up being no livery services anymore for anyone in the cities. That nice outfit you put on in the morning to impress a prospective client won't look all too good soaked in your filthy sweat after navigating the 100+ degree subway tunnels on your way to a meeting. Remember, the subway cars have a/c, but not the platforms where you wait for a train or the tunnels that take you to the platforms. In August, it gets rather hot and sticky down there. What will your technology do for you then ?
That will be the result of this system that you love so much. You can always count on dumb people to love dumb solutions to serious problems. Technology in and of itself is not good or bad, its a tool to get to an end. If the end-game objective is senseless or poorly considered, like what has occurred in the taxi industries in the world's cities as a result of these private car services, then technology was used in a foolish and ill-conceived way, and is more of a hindrance than a benefit. Consider gun technology, very good when the gun is employed for good purposes, catastrophic when employed wrongly.
This is why it is important that decision-makers not be techies, because techies tend to hold the same short-sighted impulses as you. "Oh its technology, it must be good, we will find away your old school ways." Wrong. The results of a technological application are good or bad depending on the outcome of the problem that the technology was employed to solve. If that solution "sucks hind tit", to use your expression, then the technology was wasted, and in fact did more harm than good. The technology of the private car businesses is a good thing, what is bad is that it creates the setting for a total collapse of the entire industry globally as I described above, which in the end makes life horrible for all residents of the cities. That's when government will come back into the equation and remember why they limited the number of livery resources back when they sold franchises for taxis\, and they will put reasonable limits on the number of taxis and private cars that can patrol their streets.
In reply to Fuck yellow cab. Back in the… by ReturnOfDaMac
In 2013, NYC taxi medallions sold for about $1 million each. In 2017, a hedge fund bought 46 medallions for about $185,000 each. In 4 years, an 80% drop in value.
A shake down racket. Nothing more, nothing less. Good riddance.
In reply to In 2013, NYC taxi medallions… by junction
There are a couple of credit unions in New York that specialized in providing mortgages to medallion buyers. They will be in the news soon, when its revealed how much capital the US government will have to pay in deposit insurance to the depositors in those credit unions.
Here's one that already went tits up over the drop in medallion values :
https://www.cutimes.com/2017/02/10/melrose-credit-union-conserved/?slre…
In reply to In 2013, NYC taxi medallions… by junction
this graph implies that yearly "pickups" doubled to anout 300m in 5 years! wow
I saw that too. About 100 million more rides 4 years later. Really?
In reply to this graph implies that… by HUGE_Gamma
It's just pretty amazing that taxi/limo laws and regulations just seem to have evaporated.
All all that that entails.
So no more million $ medallions? Another fiat currency bites the dust.
well its too bad 40 year old Trump couldnt be President instead of the archaic diet coke and hamburger version we have now.
The central product that taxi services had to offer was not taxis, it was radio contact with taxis. The companies held a government-granted monopoly, a slice of the broadcast spectrum. That advantage has now been utterly superseded by mobile phone technology. This is why taxi companies with antennas and transmitters are obsolete.
The difficulty that they face is that because they held a government-granted monopoly, governments rightly placed stringent regulatory controls on their operations. This whole system is now outdated, but the regulations remain.
What you want a hack for, Bickle?
I can't sleep at night. I figure I might as well drive around and get paid.
They got porno theatres for that.
I know.
I like the ad blocker bar. It's cornflower blue.
Horse and buggy went extinct too. Traditional taxi service will be completely gone in 5 years. It's too convenient for people to schedule something on their phone and have that ride show up at a specific location instead of going outside and then hoping a taxi just happens to come around the corner.
Uber is the revenge of under employed Americans replaced by cheap immigrants, I hope every cab company in America goes bust and their paki driver mob goes home.
Next up for termination overpaid public employee bus drivers.
Sure, put an unlicensed, untrained immigrant from Yemen behind the wheel of a 30,000 lb. Gillig, with 25 passengers on board. That will give a new meaning to the phrase 'weapon of mass destruction'. The bus will have a great time smashing and running all the Uber/Lyft drivers off the streets. Not to mention the pedestrians. Dumb idea.
In reply to Next up for termination… by SmittyinLA
A taxi, particularly a NYC taxi is the only transportation service I have ever utilized where I knew I had a high probability of getting ripped off before I even entered the cab. From taking a circuitous route into Manhattan at 2am because "traffic", to having the driver "forget" to turn on the meter, or the time I had to get out of a cab and hail another cab in the middle of Queens because the driver didn't know how to get to JFK, I always thought there should be a better way.
I used to take the JFK express train from Grand Central, or take the #2 to Brooklyn then hire a fixed price car service, and even took the A train a few times to avoid having to take a Yellow cab, but am glad technology has finally arrived to solve the problem. I look forward to a time when technology allows us to do away with the driver and the extortion that is mandatory tipping altogether.