I never had a problem with taxi service. Being able to hail one at any time in Center City was convenient. The drivers are usually skilled and know the best routes. The fares were consistent. Unfortunately for me, taxis have been replaced by ride services and I’m going to use this post to explain why we need the cabs back.

First example, watching people at the airport hail Ubers is lol funny. 50 people all gather in one area with their phones out and look up and down until their ride arrives. It’s mayhem. I’m exaggerating for effect, but the line for the cabs nowadays is zero. You can jump in a cab immediately. For fairness sake, when I got in a cab in Tampa, it smelled like smoke and I wasn’t even sure the driver was a legitimate service. My point is that pedestrians have gravitated to Uber being the superior service and will use it without further thought. I will acknowledge the convenience in unknown locations, the quality app coding, and fare transparency makes Uber FAR more practical but that would go against my argument.

Second example I had was this Sunday. I get an Uber and the woman drives up and says, “what’s your pin”. I couldn’t remember even creating a PIN so I said what I use for most of my PIN’s and it wasn’t right. Now she and DaRealDerek can digitally rob the shit out of me. Unbeknownst to me, Uber now sends you a PIN to confirm your identity and that you’re in the right ride. Anyway, the woman pulls up in a 2001 Subaru that was a piece of shit. The floor was stained, seats nasty, and just a real hooptie. 5 minutes into the ride she starts coughing uncontrollably. Can’t catch her breath coughing that she acknowledges as she sips water and uses hand sanitizer. She’s looking at me in the rear view seeing if I’m going to jump out of the moving vehicle and I wanted to. She apologizes and I’m just shaking my internal head while saying, “it’s fine”.

My final gripe is the pricing. Cabs have a rate per mile. That’s the price. Uber has a rate per demand. That means that if there are more riders than drivers, pricing goes up. I paid $30 bucks a few weeks ago to go 2 miles. A cab would have been $15 tops. Then there is always the tip which is what determines how many stars the user driven rating system gives you. It’s a social class system which is more abnormal bullshit because people overly care about this. When Uber first started, pricing was a positive because the pricing was cheaper. Today that is not the case.

Taxis were predominantly made up of foreigners who were attempting to make a living. They considered it a career. They took is seriously. Uber drivers are the scoundrel’s of society who need a few dollars. Sure, a certain % take it professionally, but most are doing it part time to scrape by. To pay unqualified drivers more money is asinine. I miss the days where you got in a cab, shot the shit with an immigrant from Liberia, gave him a $20 dollar tip and made his week. Not all Uber drivers are bad, but when this woman I got into has a 5 star rating and is not 5 stars, the system is flawed. Bring back the cabs.