I think the popularity of Uber and Lyft is a direct result of the lack of adequate city transit solutions. If big city transit was robust and at least at the level of NYC or more people would likely opt for it and the big cities could plan their real estate around it better.
Funnily enough, I am one of those people-my partner and I have one car between us (in LA), and I rely pretty heavily on Uber pool (or the Lyft equivalent) to get around on a day to day basis.
However, it feels unsustainable. I can't imagine the fares remaining this low, and because of people like me, transit ridership is declining. I don't think these rideshare companies can sustain such low prices indefinitely, and my guess is it's delaying real improvements to transit infrastructure.
Not really. In transit poor cities people own cars and drive their own cars. In transit rich cities you can feasibly live without a car and use rideshare to fill in the occasional gap. Transit and rideshare are complementary. Only rich people and businesses use rideshare as chauffeur rather than necessary transportation.
Not necessarily. When on vacation I used rideshare everywhere I went in Texas as I didnt rent a car. When I lived in Texas I had my own car because ride share isnt an option I could use regularly. In NYC I never needed ride share at all. I used it once in a blue moon. NYC grew in population but number of transit riders has remained steady or declined since 2015. Even the NYT did an article on 8/2018 linking Uber to the decline in transit usage.
