Uber taxis

[Agent_c]

This is a new, disruptive, business model..

There's nothing new or disruptive about it. When you remove all the buzzwords and technobable, its just a private hire.

 

[miami]

There's nothing new or disruptive about it. When you remove all the buzzwords and technobable, its just a private hire.

Except it's private hire that gives you confidence, you know where the cab is rather than standing on the front porch phoning the company every 10 minutes going "where the hell is is" to get a "oh he's nearly there" response.

But yes, fundamentally very little difference (in the UK). It just highlights the poor state of the minicab and taxi industry in the UK. Interesting how the anti-ubers hate it so much when there's such little difference (but that little difference makes a massive difference to the usability)

 

[Puffing Devil]

There's nothing new or disruptive about it. When you remove all the buzzwords and technobable, its just a private hire.

Apart from being to see all available cabs in the area. Apart from tracking your cab direct to you. Apart from being able to summon the cab from your phone. Apart from keeping your destination from the driver until you're in the car and the driver being bound to delivery you. Apart from instant, cashless, online, billing with no tipping and no need for an account. Apart from an accurate journey track and receipt emailed to you. Apart from having standards for the cars to be used. Apart from the employment model.

No different at all to calling a cab office and having a radio dispatcher tying to cajole a driver of a questionable vinatge motor to come along an pick you up, when he will be "just around the corner", but not arrive for another 10-15 minutes. No difference at all!

 

[telstarbox]

The High Court have ruled in favour of Uber today. Not sure whether this affects TfL's consultation or not.

 

[DaveNewcastle]

The High Court handed down its judgement in the dispute Transport for London v Uber and other taxi Associations this morning.

It can be read here : https://www.judiciary.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/tfl_-v_uber-final_approved-2.pdf

Included in Justice Ouseley's findings are that the smartphone carried by Uber drivers does not satisfy the requirements for saying that the cars are 'equipped' with them. The smartphones and/or SatNav equipment do constitute a device for calculating fares. Any combination of technology or manual calculation could be used to determine a fare, but the question must be whether the vehicle is 'equipped' with such devices. The vehicles operated by Uber do not purport to confuse passengers by having any resemblence to black cabs.

Grant of a Declaration: "All parties also accepted that it was for the Court to decide if a declaration should be granted. There was no disagreement about the appropriateness of seeking a declaration on this issue. The Senior District Judge had adjourned criminal proceedings in the hope that the issue of statutory construction would be resolved in the civil courts and the bar to that course of action created by continued criminal proceedings has been removed with the withdrawal of those proceedings. There is a clear dispute on an issue of statutory construction which arises on facts which are agreed and sufficiently specific and detailed for the resolution of the issue. The issue is not a theoretical one as to future conduct which may or may not be undertaken. The Uber system is in use and will continue unless declared unlawful because the regulator regards it as lawful. TfL regards there as being a degree of uncertainty
Judgment Approved by the court for handing down. TfL v Uber & Others
which requires resolution; litigation is not unnecessary as it was in R (Rusbridger) v Attorney General [2003] UKHL 38, [2004] 1 AC 357. The issue is of importance because of the use by Uber of the system of fare calculation and TfL as regulator needs to know whether its view of the law, that offences are not being committed against s11 is correct, so that it should be prosecuting the owners of Uber vehicles for offences contrary to s11. This is not a case in which a declaration is being sought by the regulator that certain conduct is criminal. These are regulatory offences and although the claim is not brought by or at the suit of the Attorney General, TfL is the regulatory body with responsibility for prosecutions."

Declaration: "A taximeter, for the purposes of Section 11 of the Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998, does not include a device that receives GPS signals in the course of a journey, and forwards GPS data to a server located outside of the vehicle, which server calculates a fare that is partially or wholly determined by reference to distance travelled and time taken, and sends the fare information back to the device."

 

[Carntyne]

Apart from being to see all available cabs in the area. Apart from tracking your cab direct to you. Apart from being able to summon the cab from your phone. Apart from keeping your destination from the driver until you're in the car and the driver being bound to delivery you. Apart from instant, cashless, online, billing with no tipping and no need for an account. Apart from an accurate journey track and receipt emailed to you. Apart from having standards for the cars to be used. Apart from the employment model.

No different at all to calling a cab office and having a radio dispatcher tying to cajole a driver of a questionable vinatge motor to come along an pick you up, when he will be "just around the corner", but not arrive for another 10-15 minutes. No difference at all!

I can do all of these in Glasgow, private hire & hackney companies using apps already.

 

[Jonny]

Uber are also planning to go driverless (i.e. provide automated/driverless cars as taxis); their chief executive's view is that someone else is going to do it if they don't.

Source: http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-ceo-travis-kalanick-on-self-driving-cars-2015-10

I wonder how TfL would deal with that...

 

[BestWestern]

Uber are also planning to go driverless (i.e. provide automated/driverless cars as taxis); their chief executive's view is that someone else is going to do it if they don't.

Source: http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-ceo-travis-kalanick-on-self-driving-cars-2015-10

I wonder how TfL would deal with that...

That isn't going to happen. Driverless car technology is many, many years away from being ready for real-world implimentation; not even faintly close.

Unless Uber are intending to build their own road network, this is nothing more than magazine article dreaming.

 

[jon0844]

Uber can play the long game and be fine even if it takes 10 or 20 years. With the software it has developed, it will be offering all sorts of services to boost its business - like local deliveries and other logistics.

It will no doubt be valued at some ridiculous amount, and people will continue investing.

One must wonder if there's another tech bust due, like the telecoms bust around 2000 when there were other businesses massively overvalued.

 

[glbotu]

That isn't going to happen. Driverless car technology is many, many years away from being ready for real-world implimentation; not even faintly close.

Unless Uber are intending to build their own road network, this is nothing more than magazine article dreaming.

They're closer than you think. Google's driverless cars are running around on real roads wilth real pedestrians and other people's cars. While currently, they all legally require a driver, they have yet to have accidents when not in manual mode. They also have issues in the snow.

They aren't happening next year, but there's nothing to suggest they won't happen within the next 10 to a certain degree. It's really the legislative issue which is the greatest limit. (If a driverless car crashes, who's fault is it?***). The more miles they get and the better the cars do, they're going to get in higher and higher demand, especially for taxi-like implementations. Uber would probably have to own the cars though, because who would give up their driverless car so it can go get vandalised. This would be a large change in their business model, which is currently notably hands-off. I can see them doing a driverless taxi trial run in San Francisco within the next 5 years. It's the land of early adopters over there.

***Personally, I'd say whichever manufacturer caused the fault - ie: if it's a sensor issue, it's the car manufacturer's fault, if it's a software issue, Google's fault etc.

 

[Tetchytyke]

One must wonder if there's another tech bust due, like the telecoms bust around 2000 when there were other businesses massively overvalued.

I think there has to be. Uber is valued at $80bn, for an app that should be relatively straightforward to replicate, technologically if not in terms of PR reach. By comprison, Ford- who make the cars the Uber drivers actually drive- is only valued at $60bn.

As with the last bubble in the early 2000s, a lot of pension funds are going to lose a lot of money due to rank bad investment choices.

 

[jon0844]

I personally don't see driverless cars as really being possible without taking ordinary cars off the roads, and perhaps having to have roads maintained to a minimum standard. Tesla is having issues with its somewhat more basis autopilot mode, and I can't imagine how cars could cope with roads with potholes, non-painted (or faded) road markings and so on.

It's relatively easy to make a car not collide with anything, but of course not to take evasive action to avoid incidents, and I am also wondering how a car would avoid things that you or I might avoid - or take diversions when there's an incident that is too small to register on a GPS based navigation system (even with crowd sourced traffic information that TomTom and Google use, including the Waze app where you can report problems).

If you're in a driverless car and something happens in front of you, do you get to step in and set a new diversionary route or just wait? We see drivers going around an accident by perhaps driving on the wrong side of the road, but can a driverless car do that? Can the police guide vehicles around incidents? How does an officer wave on a car with no driver?

There are SO many issues to address, otherwise we'll have a reality of cars driving so cautiously as to never get anywhere. Of course, it may be considered a price to pay for increased safety, but that goes back to my first point - it can only work if all cars are driverless and have real time communication with everyone else around, so they can sort themselves out.

Introduce a real driver and it's a recipe for disaster. And I doubt we're all going to be forced to give up our cars on one fixed date sometime in the near future.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I think the main thing we get from "driverless technology" is safety features like anti-crash, auto park, lane departure warnings and similar. I suspect in the short term genuine driverless cars will perhaps only exist in a dedicated motorway lane or similar.

As for traffic information there would be a huge benefit in a genuine real time resource providing this to all drivers, and I expect we will get that pretty soon.

 

[jon0844]

Absolutely we'll get more driver aids to stop us making silly mistakes - but not to actually take over while we have a nap.

As with anything, these features will need to filter down to the point where they're standard, not luxury options that get skipped on some cars due to the extra cost.

City stop is one feature now standard on a fair few cars, but a lot of the other stuff isn't - but probably will be in a few years.

 

[Bletchleyite]

As with anything, these features will need to filter down to the point where they're standard, not luxury options that get skipped on some cars due to the extra cost.

I'd imagine the law may well deal with that by making some of them mandatory. An awful lot of it is software anyway - the difference from the cheaper model is whether it's enabled or not...

 

[glbotu]

I personally don't see driverless cars as really being possible without taking ordinary cars off the roads, and perhaps having to have roads maintained to a minimum standard. Tesla is having issues with its somewhat more basis autopilot mode, and I can't imagine how cars could cope with roads with potholes, non-painted (or faded) road markings and so on.

So, what do you think the Google cars driving around Northern California do?

They have sensors. Lots and lots of sensors They can spot people better than we can (because we can't see round corners). They have been tested to detect obstacles in the road, pedestrians, cyclists etc. The testing of the Google cars has been driving them point to point (ie: not manual drive to Motorway, turn on automation, actually sitting in the car, typing in a postcode and going).

It's relatively easy to make a car not collide with anything, but of course not to take evasive action to avoid incidents, and I am also wondering how a car would avoid things that you or I might avoid - or take diversions when there's an incident that is too small to register on a GPS based navigation system (even with crowd sourced traffic information that TomTom and Google use, including the Waze app where you can report problems).

Yup. They literally take diversions based on the information they get from sensors and Google. You underestimate how much information Google gets. In any given driving scenario, there will be enough people driving through an area with phones sending data to Google that Google has a phenomenal ability to predict how bad traffic will be there. In the event that there's an accident and traffic is slowing down, the route can just be re-plotted.

If you're in a driverless car and something happens in front of you, do you get to step in and set a new diversionary route or just wait? We see drivers going around an accident by perhaps driving on the wrong side of the road, but can a driverless car do that? Can the police guide vehicles around incidents? How does an officer wave on a car with no driver?

Sensors. This has been tested.

If there's an accident, then the car will do what it can to get to its destination, while avoiding obstacles using sensors. If this means driving the wrong side of the road, then it will do that, provided it is safe to do so (based on sensor data).

This is, I'll admit, currently the source of their snow-related problems, because heavy snow tends to annoy the sensors. In clear weather, however, they have had absolutely no problems.

There are SO many issues to address, otherwise we'll have a reality of cars driving so cautiously as to never get anywhere. Of course, it may be considered a price to pay for increased safety, but that goes back to my first point - it can only work if all cars are driverless and have real time communication with everyone else around, so they can sort themselves out.

I mean, yes, they drive cautiously, because they aren't currently allowed to be aggressive, but they can be set to be more aggressive. At the moment, they're very expensive proofs of concept.

Introduce a real driver and it's a recipe for disaster. And I doubt we're all going to be forced to give up our cars on one fixed date sometime in the near future.

I think you're underestimating quite how far the driverless technology has gotten. Obviously, no-one's going to take your car away from you, but it'll make having electric cars easier (because when you aren't using it, it'll just drive to the nearest charge-point), which should bring down their cost, which will increase their prevalance as a mode of transport (because oil will just keep getting more expensive and no-one wants to replace all petrol stations with charge points).

 

[jon0844]

I know a lot about crowd sourcing data, but it's not that good, or that quick (as in it could a minute or two before an incident is detected, and lots more if there aren't many other people nearby because it's, say, 3am).

The road ahead gets blocked by a old school driver - does it wait or do a three point turn? Does it know it's just a taxi parked badly, or a lorry that's a bit stuck?

And the risk from old school drivers puts occupants at risk unless all those sensors mean it can take evasive action as effectively as you or me, rather than just stop. Likewise when kids realise they can pretend to jump in front of a car to make it stop. Does the car learn when someone is pranking and not slow?

I do think these things can be fixed to a certain degree but eventually you'd need every car to be connected. I expect if we ever want a driver to not be required to take over and be responsible for any accidents this will be mandated. So they'll either work only on certain roads (or lanes) or still require you and me to step in on those occasions and others I've not detailed.

 

[miami]

If only Google had a million miles of driving experience under their belt and adding about 300k a year, these things would have come up and be solved.

The big hurdle is legislation, if a legacy driver hits an automatic car, how do they swap insurance details?

 

[Abpj17]

If only Google had a million miles of driving experience under their belt and adding about 300k a year, these things would have come up and be solved.

The big hurdle is legislation, if a legacy driver hits an automatic car, how do they swap insurance details?

Badge on the car window?

At least you wouldn't get hit and run etc. and unlikely to get automatic car at fault accidents (for the reasons explained above)

For those who didn't get the likely sarcasm google driverless cars racked up their millioneth mile in June this year. The issue is definitely human drivers not the tech anymore.

 

[jon0844]

Yes, human drivers will be a big problem (as well as people trying to disrupt or hack things) and I wonder how safe you'll feel in a car where you can't step in and take action if you're unlucky enough to be in a situation involving one.

It's why I don't think the two can co-exist.

(Edit: Another interesting discussion point: http://www.technologyreview.com/view/542626/why-self-driving-cars-must-be-programmed-to-kill/ )

 

[miami]

Yes, human drivers will be a big problem (as well as people trying to disrupt or hack things) and I wonder how safe you'll feel in a car where you can't step in and take action if you're unlucky enough to be in a situation involving one.

You mean like a passenger? How safe do I feel as a passenger in a taxi? Not that safe. In a minicab? Very unsafe. In an uber? Safer than a taxi.

It's why I don't think the two can co-exist.

But they do co-exist. Yes there are obstacles to overcome (weather, temporary road junctions etc), and while some people may say it's going to be 5 years I think it will take longer, but it's inevitable.

http://recode.net/2015/03/17/google...f-wants-tech-on-the-market-within-five-years/

(Edit: Another interesting discussion point: http://www.technologyreview.com/view/542626/why-self-driving-cars-must-be-programmed-to-kill/ )

It's the trolley problem. If this situation were to happen with a human driver instead of a robot driver the problem remains, and as a passenger there's nothing you can do. What if you were in a taxi with a utilitarian driver who decides that your life and his life are less important than the 10 innocent children (it's always children) in the road? What if it wasn't innocent children playing hopscotch, but skinheads at an EDL rally?

http://www.philosophywalk.com/solution-trolley-problem/ is one thought on the matter.

Cars in the UK alone kill something like 2500 a year. Human drivers aren't infailable. Even when highly trained human controllers take over from a machine, they still fail, and people die.

Regulations won't stop it. There are 200+ countries and autonomous states in the world, one of them will allow it. Once one country has allowed it (and google pumps money into the economy as a centre for automated car research), more and more will.

Strikes won't stop it, taxi drivers can block up the roads all they want, they may even delay it by a couple of years.
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The road ahead gets blocked by a old school driver - does it wait or do a three point turn? Does it know it's just a taxi parked badly, or a lorry that's a bit stuck?

These situations are no doubt already solved. When they crop up (trackstand cyclists for instance), more data is gathered, the situation is solved, and the problem doesn't occur again.
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I think the main thing we get from "driverless technology" is safety features like anti-crash, auto park, lane departure warnings and similar. I suspect in the short term genuine driverless cars will perhaps only exist in a dedicated motorway lane or similar.

That stuff is already filtering down to the average micra, just like aircon, keyfobs, power steering etc have done over time.

However when driverless cars do become reality, be it in 5 years or 25 years, there won't be a "filter-down" market any more. Why bother buying a car when you can just rent one suited to your needs, which turns up within a few minutes from the local Avis? Even if you then drive it manually, being able to go "right we're off, we need a x-sized car, order it via the avis app, and 10 minutes later it's parked outside having driven there automatically from the depot while you're still trying to kind the kids' shoes.

Why bother commuting and paying for parking at stations or in town when you can simply get out and let the car go and deal with grannies going to the shops?

Within 5 years of the first automatic car hitting the roads, legacy cars will be about as popular as track-day cars or horses. People will still drive them as a hobby, but the majority of people will be happy just getting from point a to point b without the hassle.
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I think there has to be. Uber is valued at $80bn, for an app that should be relatively straightforward to replicate, technologically if not in terms of PR reach. By comprison, Ford- who make the cars the Uber drivers actually drive- is only valued at $60bn.

I believe Toyota makes the average Uber car

It's true that you could probably remake the software for under $1 million. The question is why hasn't anyone succeeded?
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Uber are also planning to go driverless (i.e. provide automated/driverless cars as taxis); their chief executive's view is that someone else is going to do it if they don't.

Source: http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-ceo-travis-kalanick-on-self-driving-cars-2015-10

I wonder how TfL would deal with that...

This is the future for all taxi drivers. Those entering the business now may just about hang on, although supply will increase and thus pay will decrease as the old barriers to entry fall. On top of that rising fuel prices will inevitably mean higher costs and more people using cheaper methods. Taxi sharing will be a way to reduce those costs, but again that just reduces demand.

Anyone leaving school and becoming a taxi driver in 10 years time will not retire as a taxi driver. The chance of taxis existing and automated cars not in 80 years time is infintessimal.
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Economic growth is still expected in mature economies but at a lower rate than in the developing world, in the long term leading to convergence.

But globalisation forces that convergence far faster. You see this in micro-economic situations, where people from poor countries are happy to live in squallor and work for peanuts and send £50 a month home which pays for a mansion back wherever home is.

A typical maid in Mumbai is available to work 24/7 and earns about £120 a month, or 25p per hour.

If they can work for £4 an hour in the UK, for 84 hours a week, that's £1400 a month. A room with 2 other maids will cost £70 a week or £100 a month each. Food another £100 a month, easily saving £1k a month to send back to india. Do that for a year and you've got £12k, enough to not work for the next 8 years.

Trouble is this lowers the average living standard in the UK towards that of India, and that's not a good thing.

 

[jopsuk]

A lot of people feel insulted personally by the idea that a machine could be a better driver than they are. A lot of people think they're far better and safer drivers than they actually are. There's a huge overlap between the two groups

 

[radamfi]

But globalisation forces that convergence far faster. You see this in micro-economic situations, where people from poor countries are happy to live in squallor and work for peanuts and send £50 a month home which pays for a mansion back wherever home is.

A typical maid in Mumbai is available to work 24/7 and earns about £120 a month, or 25p per hour.

If they can work for £4 an hour in the UK, for 84 hours a week, that's £1400 a month. A room with 2 other maids will cost £70 a week or £100 a month each. Food another £100 a month, easily saving £1k a month to send back to india. Do that for a year and you've got £12k, enough to not work for the next 8 years.

Trouble is this lowers the average living standard in the UK towards that of India, and that's not a good thing.

That only works as long as the cost of living continues to be far higher in the current developed world. In other words, if convergence is not happening. With increased GDP per capita comes inflation and therefore the difference in the cost of living would narrow across the world.

You could actually argue that the gap between rich and poor countries has started to widen again in recent years with northern Europe, North America and Australia experiencing reasonable growth with slowing growth or stagnation in middle income countries. Places with extremely high cost of living like San Francisco, London and Switzerland are doing very well indeed. They are not yet being priced out of the market.

 

[miami]

A lot of people feel insulted personally by the idea that a machine could be a better driver than they are. A lot of people think they're far better and safer drivers than they actually are. There's a huge overlap between the two groups

http://heatherlench.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/svenson.pdf for example (an old and small survey, but I believe indicative)

In the US group 88% and in the Swedish group 77% believed themselves to be safer than the median driver.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-surrey-34617396

The sooner drivers cars come, which will allow driving licenses can get really tough (especially for the elderly) the better.

 

[dcsprior]

Uber launched in Edinburgh at yesterday. I take a taxi (minicab rather than black cab) to the airport almost every week, and was interested to see what the saving vs the £27 I currently pay on average was.

However I've looked in the app at four different times yesterday evening and this morning, and there's only once been any cars available. Based on this, it's not something I could depend on to as an alternative to booking a taxi the night before, when there's a plane to catch.

Over the next few weeks, I'll keep an eye on availability around the times I actually leave for the airport. I'll also see if any of the existing companies start to offer better deals - the best deal before this additional competition was standard meter fares minus 10%

 

[jon0844]

Interesting to see that Uber is changing things to take even more money from drivers and that they're starting to get upset now - stating an effective hourly rate way below minimum wage. I think they want to be seen and treated as employees, but I can't see that happening.

So it seems that ALL taxi drivers are suffering. But Uber is doing pretty well. It must be raking in the money at an incredible rate.

I wonder if this can continue until Uber is as rich as Apple, or drivers decide to leave. I guess Uber assumes that for every driver it loses, it can easily recruit another.

 

[Domh245]

Uber also launched in Nottingham yesterday (6th Nov) which the student scene seems pretty pleased with.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Or local taxi companies compete. Speedline in MK is better than Uber - the app is nicer to use and you can advance book.
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It has been acceptable for far too long for minicab companies to offer lousy service. Uber is giving it a long deserved kick up the backside.

 

[miami]

Or local taxi companies compete. Speedline in MK is better than Uber - the app is nicer to use and you can advance book.
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It has been acceptable for far too long for minicab companies to offer lousy service. Uber is giving it a long deserved kick up the backside.

Bang on. Ultimatly if drivers are unhappy they can work for someone else as well, or instead. Fewer drivers working for Uber, more unhappy people, more people using other services.

At least until TFL ban working for more than one company :roll:

 

[BestWestern]

Perhaps we ought to stop being reeled in by Google's plan for world domination for a moment and ponder some rather more domestic issues - what if a sizeable majority of the public don't want to live in a nightmarish world where people aren't allowed to drive cars any more? Being able to go outside, get into your chosen vehicle and head off, somewhere, anywhere, is one of the greatest freedoms we have. Being at the helm as you enjoy the open road, the combination of escapism and stimulation as you control that machine, is something being conveniently overlooked as Google continually force their business plan down everyone's throats. Contrary to their Orwellian ideas, driving is not the terrible chore that the dictators from Silicone Valley or wherever would like everybody to be forced into thinking that it is. What about the millions of people employed solely to drive assorted vehicles, will Google fund their Jobseekers Giro payments once it has them all out of a job?

And how about the trillions that would need to be spent on infrastructure to make it work? Will our government, who can't afford to fill in potholes, be funding that then? Or will Google kindly offer to pay for it all, in the process essentially taking the nation's road network into single private ownership... Do we honestly think that's what the public want?

Don't fall for the hype, for the excitable press releases and the pictures of cars overburdened with cumbersome and dubious technology.... The notion of a driverless highway will remain the stuff of sci-fi for generations to come. And thank the lord for that.