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And you don't have to explain the driver where you want to go. Other than being an extremely nice feature, I could see that decreasing lane blockage time as wel

And you don't have to explain the driver where you want to go. Other than being an extremely nice feature, I could see that decreasing lane blockage time as well.

kbart 9y ago
Every taxi I've ridden in probably 10 past years had a GPS, that's not Uber/Lyft invention or unique property.
- usrusr 9y ago
  GP was talking about the initial setup of a ride, the app of your uber/lyft driver will already have your destination. The conventional taxi GPS won't. The app backend takes care of the cumbersome rider to driver to GPS dataflow. Still, as a cyclist, I'd rather have lane blocking than drivers fiddling with their apps while driving.
  - kbart 9y ago
    "the app of your uber/lyft driver will already have your destination." So does modern taxis. It's strange that when topic comes to taxis vs Uber/Lyft here, it looks like taxis in US are very archaic. I live in Europe and taxis started using apps/GPS/SMS/time and price approximation etc. long before Uber, is it so different in other parts of the world?
    - andromeduck 9y ago
      I think it existed but just wasn't very good. The tipping culture and cabbie nagging here also kind of defeats most of the value from those estimates.
    - rockinghigh 9y ago
      Which country in Europe had a taxi app before Uber?
    - ergothus 9y ago
      My (US) last taxi ride was 3 years ago and it had GPS the driver didn't want to use and no price estimation. The big deal was that it now had a device where I could slide my card instead of the driver doing so. 4 years ago was the last time I called for a taxi. Took 20 minutes to get it (lyft takes 3 min in the same time of day), and the first taxi company didn't service my area (but did cover the opposite side of the street I later discovered). So yeah, archaic.
gambiting 9y ago
The only time I ever had to explain to a taxi driver where to go was in an Uber, where the road was closed and google maps had no idea about it, and the driver clearly didn't know the local roads well enough to just pick a different one.
raducu 9y ago
Also nice for the driver wanting to retire for the day that he can get fares that get him closer to his home.
- yoz-y 9y ago
  Is that a feature Uber/Lyft drivers have? I always thought they could not see the destination before picking up the client.
  - raducu 9y ago
    I recently talked with a Uber driver, they cannot see the destination of the client, but he said he can specify the rough area where he wants to (eventually?) go and fares will take him close enough to that direction.
  - cm2012 9y ago
    Yep, its fairly recent though.
  - lod723 9y ago
    Concurring with sibling comments, last week I had a Lyft driver who was using that feature because she was ending her shift.
ergothus 9y ago
So true. The last few taxi rides I took all involved the driver asking how to get to the destination. Not which way was faster, but how to get there. They used gps as a callback. So weird. Granted, my 3 taxi rides aren't statisticly significant, but it one of several factors that makes uber/lyft more comfortable.

And you don't have to explain the driver where you want to go. Other than being an extremely nice feature, I could see that decreasing lane blockage time as well.

kbart 9y ago

Every taxi I've ridden in probably 10 past years had a GPS, that's not Uber/Lyft invention or unique property.

usrusr 9y ago
GP was talking about the initial setup of a ride, the app of your uber/lyft driver will already have your destination. The conventional taxi GPS won't. The app backend takes care of the cumbersome rider to driver to GPS dataflow. Still, as a cyclist, I'd rather have lane blocking than drivers fiddling with their apps while driving.
- kbart 9y ago
  "the app of your uber/lyft driver will already have your destination." So does modern taxis. It's strange that when topic comes to taxis vs Uber/Lyft here, it looks like taxis in US are very archaic. I live in Europe and taxis started using apps/GPS/SMS/time and price approximation etc. long before Uber, is it so different in other parts of the world?
  - andromeduck 9y ago
    I think it existed but just wasn't very good. The tipping culture and cabbie nagging here also kind of defeats most of the value from those estimates.
  - rockinghigh 9y ago
    Which country in Europe had a taxi app before Uber?
  - ergothus 9y ago
    My (US) last taxi ride was 3 years ago and it had GPS the driver didn't want to use and no price estimation. The big deal was that it now had a device where I could slide my card instead of the driver doing so. 4 years ago was the last time I called for a taxi. Took 20 minutes to get it (lyft takes 3 min in the same time of day), and the first taxi company didn't service my area (but did cover the opposite side of the street I later discovered). So yeah, archaic.

gambiting 9y ago

The only time I ever had to explain to a taxi driver where to go was in an Uber, where the road was closed and google maps had no idea about it, and the driver clearly didn't know the local roads well enough to just pick a different one.

raducu 9y ago

Also nice for the driver wanting to retire for the day that he can get fares that get him closer to his home.

yoz-y 9y ago
Is that a feature Uber/Lyft drivers have? I always thought they could not see the destination before picking up the client.
- raducu 9y ago
  I recently talked with a Uber driver, they cannot see the destination of the client, but he said he can specify the rough area where he wants to (eventually?) go and fares will take him close enough to that direction.
- cm2012 9y ago
  Yep, its fairly recent though.
- lod723 9y ago
  Concurring with sibling comments, last week I had a Lyft driver who was using that feature because she was ending her shift.

ergothus 9y ago

So true. The last few taxi rides I took all involved the driver asking how to get to the destination. Not which way was faster, but how to get there. They used gps as a callback. So weird. Granted, my 3 taxi rides aren't statisticly significant, but it one of several factors that makes uber/lyft more comfortable.