Over the summer, a representative from the ridesharing company Uber paid a visit to the AMS.
“Uber was looking to expand into the area … and they were looking for support from different groups like students,” said AMS Vice President External Jude Crasta. “They were hoping that the students … would be able to assist them in that form of advocacy to the [provincial] government.”
Uber is a ridesharing service that allows passengers submit a ride request through their smartphones, then be connected with a driver. Everything is done via an app -- the price of the ride is calculated ahead and money is transferred electronically.
Both the rider and driver must “accept” one another after viewing each other’s picture and profile. Still, the legality and safety of a ridesharing service in which drivers are not licensed operators and the vehicle is not a registered taxi has been frequently challenged.
This year, Uber went to court with the city of Toronto as the legality of the company was disputed. Just this month, Uber drivers in Toronto received 198 charges.
So what does the corporation want from the AMS? Policy that advocates for ridesharing in general, according to Crasta.
“Ridesharing as in the commercial ridesharing thing … like having a vendor,” said Crasta. “That’s what they wanted us to help advocate to the provincial government for.”
However, it is not decided yet whether the AMS will be partnering with Uber. According to Crasta, an rep from Uber approached the AMS a little over a month ago. After the representative provided the relevant data, the university and external relations committee were presented with the information and are currently reviewing it.
“What I asked the committee to do is basically come back to me with an answer to say yea or nay to go ahead with drafting a policy to then bring back to the committee, have them chew it around, [then] send it to council for consultation,” said Crasta.
The data the company presented covered different categories of benefits, the main ones being to riders and drivers.
“Some of the things they were talking about with riders was the low prices for transportation, improved efficiency, reliable, average wait times being under five minutes,” said Crasta. “For the drivers they were talking about select or income opportunities, higher income.”
Now that the transit plebiscite has failed, ridesharing is one aspect of the larger conversation about transportation in Metro Vancouver. According to Crasta, in the long term the AMS does support through policy the single solution of a rapid transit system to UBC. In the short term, smaller scale solutions are needed to deal with the issue of congestion.
However, Crasta said, “we’re undecided what direction we specifically want to focus our transportation efforts to. We did do a full comprehensive research report about transit solutions through our Transit & U-Pass Commissioner and so we’re currently looking at [many] different things.”
Regardless, depending on how the committee responds to what information Uber has provided to the university, Uber may be partnered with the AMS in the future.