That's how it works for traditional taxi companies. Uber and Lyft, not being "traditional" taxi companies doesn't exempt them from needing to follow the same rules.
https://www.thetransportationalliance.org/news/adanotice.pdf
A reasonable accommodation could be that driver's with significant animal allergies don't need to pick up passenger's with dogs. If a significant portion of their driver fleet has significant animal allergies, such that it would significantly negatively impact the response time for passenger's that need dogs, Uber would need to find a different reasonable accommodation.
I would put the burden the other way around. Drivers that have significant animal allergies that reach the threshold of a disability should be provided an accommodation of a separator between the passenger area and the driver area with sufficient air filtration.
Thus, the driver would still be able to pick up passengers that have a service animal even with allergies that extend to the point of being a disability.
I am not a lawyer, but I don't believe that fear of dogs counts as a disability.
That would be another reasonable accommodation. Not assigning driver's to those passengers would be a number of reasonable accommodations. There can be many different reasonable accommodations that can be made for a given problematic circumstance. The burden is on the company to find and implement _a_ reasonable accommodation.
> I am not a lawyer, but I don't believe that fear of dogs counts as a disability.
I don't think a garden variety fear of dogs would could (but IANAL either, and I don't know). I could imagine a case where someone has a genuine phobia of dogs, and is able to get a doctor's genuine medical opinion that a presence in an enclosed vehicle could cause severe anxiety, to the point of causing repeated anxiety or panic attacks. That kind of scenario may well rise to the level of a disability that must be accommodated.
I'm hesitant to make any broad sweeping claims about what should "count" as a workplace disability.
https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm
> Allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. When a person who is allergic to dog dander and a person who uses a service animal must spend time in the same room or facility, for example, in a school classroom or at a homeless shelter, they both should be accommodated by assigning them, if possible, to different locations within the room or different rooms in the facility.
Being an "independent contractor" doesn't absolve someone from the ADA.