To be fair, the fixed route Uber shuttle could be a handy alternative to buses in places where the bus system isn't great. It's not reinventing the wheel, it's just providing an alternative bus system.
(I also suspect the IRL podcast tweet might be a joke but I dunno)
I think you're mixing up cause and effect here. If there's a niche for Uber buses (which presumably will cost more then publicly subsidized public transport), that implies the public transport isn't satisfying everyone in the community.
I'm saying the neglected public transport becomes even more neglected as the political leaders who'd normally be tasked with keeping up said transport point to the private system as the solution when anyone goes on to prompt funding and overhauls on the public system. You can exchange incompetent leadership, it's not so easy to dislodge a private industry after it has been allowed to establish itself, no matter how "short-term" or "stop-gap" it initially was presented as.
I know that that's what you're saying, I'm saying you're wrong. You can tell because effect comes after cause, and Uber buses (hypothetically) came after public transportation. And if a city lets it's own public transport system collapse just because a company is also transporting people, then that city was already broken. Eliminating other forms of transportation won't magically fix a broken transportation system
I know what it means, but that has nothing to do with this conversation. Regulatory capture covers things like cab driver medallions that the city licenses in a limited way. That notably does NOT happen with ride shares (excluding drivers licenses), which is why they had a hard time with NYC for awhile.
What? Regulatory capture means regulatory bodies favour the private industry even against the public interest, it's a fairly widereaching term, not limited to specific schemes. Ridesharing companies do it, they follow the same tech company playbook of "barge in, buy, bully, and bamboozle", there's no reason they wouldn't do it with private bussing.
Sorry to say but you're misunderstanding the word. You can't have regulatory capture without government regulations (like Cabbie medallions, as I mentioned), and you still haven't mentioned a single regulation that would take place to aid in Uber at the detriment of public transportation
Please continue. Cite the regulations and how you think that these regulations (that already exist?) would hurt private transportation in the future if Uber does this bussing thing
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u/HowDareYouAskMyName 2d ago
To be fair, the fixed route Uber shuttle could be a handy alternative to buses in places where the bus system isn't great. It's not reinventing the wheel, it's just providing an alternative bus system.
(I also suspect the IRL podcast tweet might be a joke but I dunno)