SAN FRANCISCO — Ryan Graves, general manager and vice president of operations at Uber, an on-demand chauffeured car reservation app, announced on June 8 via the company’s blog that the service has arrived in San Diego.
Graves posits that San Diego is constrained by “the very limited transportation alternatives it is currently provided.” According to the blog post:
- 1.3 million people live in the city of San Diego; 3.1 million live in San Diego County.
- 30% of household incomes are above $100,000 a year.
- 84.7% of people drive to work.
- 600 DUIs were served in Pacific Beach alone last year.
- There are only 0.55 taxis per 1,000 people.
- Parking is a hassle at most destinations throughout the city.
Uber, Graves believes, would solve the transportation problems for San Diegans. “DUIs, terrible parking, and traffic jams…let’s make those relics of the past,” he writes.
The emergence of Uber has been controversial in the chauffeured transportation industry because the nature of the service exists somewhere between taxi service and livery service, and does not always operate in accordance to existing laws (see D.C Taxi Commissioner Explains Uber Problems).
In the May 2012 Fact Book issue of LCT Magazine, Greg Eggan, president of the Illinois Limousine Association, said, “Uber is a big concern for our industry because they aren’t playing by the same rules as the legal livery operators.”
However, legislation has been passed by a D.C. council committee that includes provisions for a new type of for-hire transportation called “sedan class vehicles,” which “shall operate exclusively through dispatch and shall not accept street hails [and] shall calculate fares exclusively using a time and distance method,” i.e. Uber.
Related: Limos.com To Avoid Uber Problems
Related: Uber Car Impounded, Driver Ticketed In City Sting
— Michael Campos, LCT associate editor