The most infuriating part of the state legislative preemption is that it was very obviously not necessary. Within days of the departure of Uber and Lyft there were competing services that operated just fine under the new regulations.
I won’t speak to whether the regulations were necessary or effective, but when the companies argued that there was an undue burden being imposed that would make it difficult to do business and then we witnessed the very opposite happen (smaller companies such as Fasten and nonprofits such as RideAustin were able to do just fine with the regulations), it sure made it smellier when the legislature came in and deemed it necessary to overturn the regulations.
Within days of the departure of Uber and Lyft there were competing services that operated just fine under the new regulations.
Good point, I always forget to mention those. While not without their own technical issues, I think RideATX (I forget what the other competing service that sprung up during that legislative frackas was named-was it Fasten that you mentioned?) had a lot going for it with real promise as a model cities could follow during the months Austin went without the two big names in ridesharing.
They had great customer service, too. I loved that app and was pretty sad when it closed down. They apparently paid better than Uber/Lyft, too, but I've never been able to confirm this; it's just what I heard from drivers whenever I asked.
I won’t speak to whether the regulations were necessary or effective, but when the companies argued that there was an undue burden being imposed that would make it difficult to do business and then we witnessed the very opposite happen (smaller companies such as Fasten and nonprofits such as RideAustin were able to do just fine with the regulations), it sure made it smellier when the legislature came in and deemed it necessary to overturn the regulations.