Courtesy of Forbes
Aarman Bondar’s post regarding Uber and the threat that it will bring to the already well established Canadian system of transit is interesting, however I have to disagree. Although Uber does threaten Taxi services, it is not a major threat to any other form of transit anywhere in Canada, if it were than public tranist such as busses and subway’s would be obsolete due to the already established taxi services. In addition, while the transit system is excellent in major city centres such as Vancouver, Montreal, and Toronto (to name a few), transit is subpar to say the least. For instance, transit is rather poor in places like Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and even Alberta—where the majority of people drive vehicles to and from their destinations. Many places in Canada could seriously benefit from the addition of Uber as an alternative form of transit.
As far as threatening taxi services, Uber is threatening the taxi industry as much as Tesla is threatening the combustion engine car industry. I personally do not see Uber as a threat, rather, I see it as an opportunity for taxi companies to improve their system. The current system of booking and getting a taxi is rather tasking and can only be improved by the addition of Uber. Unless the taxi industry decides not to respond to this innovation, they will end up in the exact same position as Blockbuster—irrelevant. New competition in the private transportation industry is refreshing. For so long taxi’s have had an unwavering monopoly on this specific type of transportation and that has led to the industry as a whole being stagnant.
Bring on the competition. Competition is what leads to progression.