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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday October 18 2017, @02:55AM   Printer-friendly
from the cost-vs-convenience dept.

With Uber and other ridesharing services becoming a common transit option for some D.C. residents, we wanted to get a sense of when someone might substitute an Uber trip for a Metrorail trip. To do this, we plotted data on travel time and cost, creating a visualization that shows whether Uber or Metro is faster, and at what cost, for 114 different trips between Metro stations. By adding in the time it takes to wait for a Metro train or Uber, walk to the Metro, or sit on a delayed train, we can see how a person's decision might change depending on their circumstances.

The trips we analyzed include trips between the city and the suburbs as well as trips within the city.

[...] We found that for longer trips between the center of the city and the suburbs, Metro tends to be both more cost-effective and quicker than Uber. But for trips within the city that require a Metro transfer, Uber is often quicker than Metro, especially when Metro wait times are long, like on weekends, or when there are delays. While Uber's regular service tends to be much more expensive than Metro, Uber Pool makes some Uber trips nearly as affordable as Metro.

Did they factor in the need for a pack train, 3 days' provisions, and sherpas to get up and down the stairs in the Metro?


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  • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday October 18 2017, @02:24PM (4 children)

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Wednesday October 18 2017, @02:24PM (#583955)

    Do you honestly think people could get around Manhattan if they all suddenly switched to owning their own cars? Are you really that dense?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 18 2017, @03:19PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 18 2017, @03:19PM (#583970)

    Yes, yes he is. He even "corrects" the statement about him NOT rejecting public transit. Reading comprehension not so much, lengthy essays of bullcrap? Not a problem.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday October 18 2017, @06:42PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 18 2017, @06:42PM (#584044) Journal

      He even corrects the statement about him NOT rejecting public transit.

      And yet, I still hear noise from the peanut gallery.

  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday October 18 2017, @06:41PM (1 child)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 18 2017, @06:41PM (#584043) Journal

    Do you honestly think people could get around Manhattan if they all suddenly switched to owning their own cars?

    A lot of people already get around by car even though they don't own one (remember, the ride hailing thing!). Or they could move out and not have that problem somewhere else.

    This is the typical cognitive dissonance. Going from complaining about the lack of incentive to run an efficient subway system to complaining that the subway is essential. This is how classic rent-seeking behavior on the public side works. Make a crucial bit of infrastructure and then do the minimum to keep pulling those public funds. They have no incentive to do better because voters like you knuckle under. The subway needs to run, hence, it is allowed to run poorly.

    Now, maybe it is worthwhile to maintain Manhattan Island at current population densities and maybe the subway is necessary to make that work. But we're seeing a common failure mode of public transit systems. Namely, that they're mostly for show. Actual benefit to passengers is a lower priority.

    • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday October 18 2017, @08:02PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Wednesday October 18 2017, @08:02PM (#584102)

      >A lot of people already get around by car even though they don't own one

      That's different. When you use a cab/Uber, you don't have to worry about parking. Everyone having a car in Manhattan is already unrealistic because the streets can't handle the volume, but the other issue is parking: where the hell is everyone going to park? Your comment seemed to imply that everyone should have personally-owned cars, suburbia-style. It's simply impossible in a city as dense as Manhattan, for both reasons (parking and volume).

      As for why the subways in this country are run so poorly, I think there's more to it than that. The problem is that we as Americans simply don't know how to actually govern, and we don't know how to elect people who can govern properly. Just compare to many other countries with effective public transit: Japan, Germany, even the UK. They don't have all the problems with horribly-run public transit that we do. My opinion is that it's our culture. Just like backwards 3rd-world nations like Afghanistan or Somalia aren't going to have effective governance anytime soon because their culture is utterly dysfunctional, we have the same sort of problem here.