alt Hacker NewsI haven't thought about this for quite some time, but I remember the local mass transit, DART, offered shuttle vans if people got together and showed enough interest in people meeting in one spot and being dropped off in one spot. DART provided the driver and van, and the users just paid whatever the fare. This allowed DART to offer service and acted as a trial run on if a full bus route was needed.
Seems like something that whatever transit authority can use as well. Uber just has a better PR department with much larger budgets than metro agencies, so to younger people this probably seems like an original idea.???
Replies
The DART program I remember was (near Seattle) King County metro's Dial A Ride Transit (DART) program which... literally worked that way. I don't know what the fee structure was offhand as at the time in my life I saw a lot of those large vans / mini busses I wasn't a target consumer.
I lived about a mile outside of the DART zone where they were trialing this, if it's the program I'm thinking of. I attempted to use it one time, but had issues with the app. I love the concept though, and hope there's an economically viable way to implement something similar.
It's not about PR budget or whatever. It's about the fact that they have an incredibly easy to use app, with millions of people actively using it, and a ton of software engineers who are really great at logistics problems like this.
Our transit authority hasn't managed to spring this up for us and I'm not confident they have the capability.
FWIW I'm not "younger people". I'm just someone who's been using mass transit to commute for the past 15 years and desperately wants something better. I don't care if it is an original idea. I just want it to exist.