San Francisco transit wonks were traced down out of guard by the ride-hailing revolution. It occupies the city with thousands of cars.
Back in 2012, when the city was planned with transportation “Major Strategic Plan,” the city planners thought that ride shares meant carpooling. The Municipal Transportation Agency raises blueprint for more bus and bike lanes and comparatively less space for cars.
The transportation agency chief Ed Reiskin said: “I don’t think anyone anticipated this would happen, including Lyft and Uber.”
The Metropolitan Transportation Commission’s Randy Rentschler said city officials might have fallen victim to their vision of how things should be instead of how they are. “Public policy often aims for a certain outcome — and as such, it can be harder to predict what you don’t want to happen, so you don’t see it.”
According to a recent survey by city Transportation Authority, now Uber and Lyft carries 283,000 people per workday in the city and makes 9 percent of the vehicle trips in San Francisco.
The Supervisor Aaron Peskin said, “The feeling (at City Hall) seems to be, ‘If you can’t beat ’em, tax ’em,’ but at this point, I’d just like them to give us more information so we can see what is going on.”