“I think there’s too many taxis and they are still being clobbered by the rideshares."

Remember taxis? Those orange, yellow and, to a lesser extent, blue, white and silver automobiles that you would hail from a sidewalk or commandeer via voice call to transport you from one location to another? They were Lyft and Uber before Lyft and Uber magically took over the world of for-hire vehicles by arranging all the rides via cell phone apps and rebranding all the automobiles involved as “rideshares.”

Uber arrived in San Diego in 2012 and Lyft followed soon after in 2013. Both took the region by storm because the trips were often far cheaper than what it would cost to hire a cab. The cars were a step above the tattered, old Ford Crown Victorias that taxi fleets favored, and the rideshare drivers might even offer you bottled water or a mint as well. The experience was a bit more like a miniature road trip with a stranger, and it seemed as if it had become the new “for-hire vehicle” norm by the mid-2010s.

But then the pandemic happened, and the world went kind of wacky. So wacky in fact, that the rideshares took pricing to new extremes — extremes that suddenly made the thought of riding from point A to point B in a tattered, older Toyota Prius (minus the complimentary bottled water and mint) quite appealing.

An October discussion on Nextdoor detailing the spike in rideshare costs was particularly eye-opening. The original post detailed a four-mile ride from Lindbergh Field that would have cost the author $34 (before tip). He opted to take a taxi instead and the fare, pre-tip, was only $18. The comments dovetailed with numerous examples of recent high cost rideshare fares. The most extreme of these may have been a purported $60 fare for a ride from the airport to Mission Hills, which the commenter bypassed in favor of $20 cab fare with tip included. $60 for an Uber or Lyft from the airport to Mission Hills circa 2019 or prior seemed almost unimaginable.

Bryn Scott, who alongside his wife, Dana, owns North County’s TLC Taxi Stop Services, didn’t sound too surprised by these numbers. He has been working as a cab driver for about seven and a half years and has owned the two vehicles used for his service for about five. Though he operates two cabs, he still utilizes the rideshares occasionally.

“Two weeks ago, it said if I were to take a Lyft from Fallbrook to the Oceanside train station it would be $90, but for the Uber it would be $30,” he explained. “So, that’s triple. It was just during the day on a weekday. There was no surge or anything. For some reason Lyft seems to be higher now, at least here in North County. It’s more spread out here. It’s less city. So, it’s a whole different ballgame.”

TLC Taxi Stop business hasn’t spiked recently due to the rideshare cost increases — it has remained steady. This was the case throughout 2020 and the Covid shutdowns as well. The pool of customers requesting rides had shrunk considerably, but there weren’t nearly as many drivers competing for those rides either. Many of the rideshare drivers stopped working since they were able to collect unemployment, and Scott’s taxi service was suddenly an excessively big fish in a smaller sea.

“I think North County is doing better than San Diego as far as competition,” he said. “I think there’s too many taxis and they are still being clobbered by the rideshares because it’s the god of convenience on their phone, and the marketing is not established well enough within the private vector of Yellow Cab or any of the other cab companies as far as creating efficient phone apps or dispatch organization. I think that’s the major weakness.”

Scott also doesn’t think it’s likely that the taxis overtake the rideshares anytime soon. He feels that the Uber and Lyft driver numbers are back to full strength in North County, and that most of the customers simply prefer the overall experience (from arranging the ride to the actual transportation) that the rideshares offer. Speaking of which, even though the Nextdoor discussion was primarily centered on complaints regarding the current rideshare cost increases, past horror stories from cab rides were on full display as well. It seems clear that many riders aren’t overly enthusiastic about switching back to using cabs, even if they end up doing so to take advantage of the cost savings.

Scott feels if Uber and Lyft were to leave the state that their drivers wouldn’t be eager to join the opposing team. “If they shut them off in California, I don’t think they are gonna come running to the taxi companies and say, ‘I wanna work for you guys,’” he said. He characterized most active cab drivers as being primarily “real old-school” and that “they have a different mentality about you’ve gotta put in money to make money.” It’s a culture that is willing to pay to lease cabs daily, which differs greatly from the model that Uber and Lyft employ.

In Scott’s eyes this entire discussion will be irrelevant in 10-12 years when he estimates that driverless vehicles will take over the for-hire transportation industry. In the interim, he feels that the taxi industry will continue to lag behind the rideshares due to poor marketing.

“It’s like a piano bar. They were popular. They’re still nice places to go to. But I just don’t think they’ll make it,” he said.