Comment by kelnos
2 days ago
If I could be 100% certain that every Uber/Lyft driver I encounter would give me a perfect "social" experience (where "perfect" varies for me depending on the day), I'd choose it over Waymo at the same price. But of course that's unreasonable and impossible to expect. So for a comparable price and wait/drive time I'll pretty much always pick Waymo.
It does make me sad to some extent; I do enjoy interacting with people working service jobs in my neighborhood, people I see on a regular basis and who recognize me. But I don't think that's ever going to be the case for me for something like a taxi/rideshare driver.
When I take a booked private car back and forth to the airport (about an hour) I don't really have an issue. Sometimes the driver is chattier. Sometimes I'm chattier. Probably (likely) more expensive than an Uber would be but 100% reliable even at zero-dark-thirty times. Never had a real issue of any sort.
Uber Black provides a similar experience, or at least it used to (haven't used it in many years). I think it's a matter of having professional drivers, where there's an expectation that their customer/client isn't there to socialize, and their job is to drive, and that's it. It's more of a "high class" thing, for lack of a better term.
(IIRC when Uber first started, before UberX, their driver pool was essentially just this sort: people who drove for private car services.)
Shared van services got ridiculous sometimes and then I had a couple of incidents related to driving/parking at the airport (like a 10pm cold weather flat). So I just started using a car service at a new job (I think) and the company never flinched. Now--especially as I'm usually taking longer but fewer air trips even if it's usually on my own nickel these days--just keep doing so.