It’s official: New York City’s cap on the number of for-hire vehicles that can operate on its streets will continue—and a new provision will, in theory, limit the amount of time FHVs can spend idling without passengers.
NYC’s Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) voted unanimously to extend the original limitation on the number of licenses that can be issued; there are around 120,000 in use currently, more than double the number of licenses that had been issued five years ago. The agency also voted to enact a new “cruising cap,” which is intended to reduce the number of vehicles that roam throughout the city without passengers. According to the TLC, 41 percent of the time FHVs are on the road is spent idling; under the new provision, app companies will need to reduce that number to 36 percent within six months, and to 31 percent within a year.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, whose administration pushed for the caps to be extended, cheered the decision in a statement issued after the vote. “We will not let big corporations walk all over hardworking New Yorkers and choke our streets with congestion,” de Blasio said. “Our caps have resulted in increased wages and families finally have some relief. I look forward to putting these new caps into effect immediately.”
When the cap was originally passed in August 2018, it was intended to be temporary while the city studied the effect that FHVs have on traffic and safety in the city. The findings of that analysis, issued in June, note that “In Manhattan, FHVs now make up nearly 30% of all traffic, confirming that reductions in FHV-related traffic could meaningfully impact overall traffic conditions.”
And just this week, a study commissioned by Uber and Lyft pointed to similar impacts on congestion in cities, albeit outside of New York. (The study looked at the effects of FHVs in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.) According to the Verge, “while they are vastly out-stripped by personal and commercial vehicles, Uber and Lyft are still responsible for significant shares of [vehicle miles traveled] in those cities.”
Uber and Lyft have argued that capping the number of licenses that can be issued ultimately hurts not only drivers who rely on their apps for income, but also New Yorkers themselves—a concern that’s echoed by the Independent Drivers’ Guild, which represents FHV drivers. That group has called on the City Council to hold hearings in the very near future to
In particular, the IDG wants the Council to “demand answers on the impact of rules thus far on driver pay, costs, and deactivations,” and wants it to compel the TLC to increase its oversight of things like due process procedures for drivers who’ve been deactivated, among other issues.
While the FHV companies themselves didn’t go that far, they expressed disappointment with the TLC’s decision. “We worry that the Mayor’s rules will hurt drivers’ ability to earn a living and hope that we can work with stakeholders to limit the consequences for riders and drivers,” says Alix Anfang, a spokesperson for Uber.
The new rules go into effect immediately.
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