OPINION:
“Have Uber app, will travel” is essentially how I look at the Uber concept at this point. My experience with the car service in Chicago, San Francisco and Northern Virginia has been so positive I wonder why cab companies are still around (“D.C. Council approves rideshare regulations as taxi drivers protest,” Web, Oct. 28).
It is rather similar to the difference between the slide rule and the hand-held pocket calculator in the early 1970s. The electronic calculator was so superior to the slide rule that engineering science students were willing to shell out $400 for one in 1974. Of course, now the price is an afterthought, and who remembers what a slide rule is anyway?
Uber drivers show up in fewer than five minutes, have already been identified, along with their always-clean vehicles, via the app. There is no cash involved, and you have a pretty good estimate of what your ride is going to cost. In fact, Uber is so innovative, they have surge pricing. What a remarkable economic phenomenon, a company that believes in markets and supply-and-demand rather than corruption. If demand is off the charts, the price goes up to bring on more drivers or triage the people who can wait.
Apparently, there are no political payoffs or kickbacks. I am sure that is what D.C. Council member Jim Graham was looking for. The dirty little secret is that traditional cab companies are the slide rules of the 21st century, and I would pay more for Uber than for a cab. In fact, if you really wanted to improve public safety, you would get rid of the cab companies, because they have become one more politically corrupt anachronism.
SAMUEL BURKEEN
Reston
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