I attempted to use a similar system to the one you described in vancouver where there is no ride sharing it basically failed to work at all and I had to resort to the old "call a taxi company and wait indiscriminate amount of minutes." At least their credit card systems worked which as you said is a common issue in taxis here too (I have several times had a mexican standoff with taxi drivers here until their machines magically started working).
Absolutely true. And it's worth noting that Gavin Newsom got his start in politics as SF Taxi Commissioner.
It's hard to estimate the scale of under-the-table dealings or the amount of money taxi companies skimmed from the system before Uber came in and imposed order.
Uber essentially provided oxygen in a market that had been strangled for so long by corrupt public/private deals.
As a New Yorker, what? Every Uber car over ever been in has been far far cleaner and nicer. There isn't even a close comparison.
The advertisement video loop is also a major detractor.
Typical NYC cab rides involve the driver exchanging heated language with other drivers, rude gestures, etc., and drivers frequently pretend to be naive about the best way to get from point A to point B.
Climate control systems in cabs are usually broken, and there's a thin film of human oil covering every surface.
In New York, every taxi is now hailable from a smartphone app that shows me the current locations of nearby taxis and reliably gets me one in 3-5 minutes from most places in the city.
> Nobody used to Uber will want to waste time taking out a credit card and swiping it through a dirty slot or handing it to a driver only to wait several minutes for it to finally go through.
Even if I don't hail a taxi from the app, the screen inside the car shows a code that I can use to associate my app's payment account after I get in the car. (Also, the real problem here is drivers claiming the credit card machine broke, but that's stopped happening.)
> Compared to the average Uber vehicle, most taxis are filthy and full of all sorts of odors.
You need to clarify what market you're in. Not NYC, surely.
> The taxi/livery industry is simply too used to enjoying a monopoly business to be able to fix itself.
It fixed itself in NYC, and if it can fix itself there it can fix itself anywhere.
Seriously. I do credit Uber and Lyft with making the taxi industry realize that they're doing things wrong and have an easily-eatable lunch, but they're figuring things out. I'm more curious about places (like the college town I grew up in) that have Uber service but barely any taxi service.