I was in San Francisco, the birthplace of Uber, in 2009/2010. If you wanted a ta... | Hacker News

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Kalium on Dec 20, 2017 | parent | context | favorite | on: Uber is officially a cab firm, says European court

I was in San Francisco, the birthplace of Uber, in 2009/2010. If you wanted a taxi pickup, you generally had to call two or three taxi companies and wait 30-45 minutes for a two in three chance of a taxi showing.

That doesn't happen anymore. Not after Uber.

ohsnapman on Dec 20, 2017 [–]

Whoa, taxis showed up 2 out of 3 times for you? The official study has it at 49%:

https://archives.sfmta.com/cms/rtaxi/documents/2005TaxiAvail...

I even remember when the number was lower ...

Kalium on Dec 20, 2017 | [–]

If you called three companies and waited half an hour, odds favored at least one showing up.

But, yeah. Things were pretty miserable unless you were somewhere taxis actually wanted to be.

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