"'We want to work with you before other people come after us,'" Huck, 34, recalls telling city officials. "We told them 'this idea won't die.'"
The impassioned speech, however, fell on deaf ears, says Huck, who instead was served with misdemeanor citations accusing Heyride of operating as an unlicensed taxi service. A few months later, Heyride was sold to San Francisco-based Sidecar, which also saw a short-lived run in Austin.
But it turns out Huck was right. Austin has, in fact, become one of the nation's top hubs for tech-based ride-hailing and delivery service providers.
A joint study this year found Austin to be the most wired city in America for transportation, according to Santa Barbara, Calif.-based Frontier Group and Austin-based TexPIRG Education Fund. It also said Austin offered at least 18 different tech-based transportation service providers, the third highest behind San Francisco at 23 and Washington, D.C. at 20.
Companies operating in Austin include national ride-hailing services Uber and Lyft, rapidly growing Austin delivery service Favor and the latest ride and delivery hybrid of the two, Dallas-based start-up Get Me, which debuted in Austin this past week.
The combination of Austin's fast-growing population, its strong technology community and a ballooning traffic congestion problem have help drive the trend, experts say.
"It's status as a tech leader should not be surprising," said the Frontier and Texas Public Interest Research Group report, issued in February. "Austin is home to a young, technologically savvy population, and its famous South by Southwest Festival… has contributed to the national dialogue around the potential of technology to transform urban transportation."
Marco McCottry, Uber's general manager in Austin, says the company's Austin driver network hit more than 10,000 in its first year in Austin.
"Austin has one of the most forward-thinking ridesharing frameworks in the nation, which allows us to keep up with growing demand," McCottry said. "Austin is known for its culture and entrepreneurial spirit, and the diverse community is reflected in our partner base. Our driver partners come from all walks of life, including artists, musicians, students, realtors and small business owners. As a result of the progressive rules, we're able to recruit more drivers than any other city in Texas, which means riders have access to more affordable and reliable transportation."
Meanwhile, the list of providers in Austin continues to grow. This past Thursday, Get Me jumped into the fray with a new network of drivers, or "Go Getters," offering on-demand rides as well as deliveries from a new range of retailers, including Nordstrom, Home Depot and Whole Foods Market.
"We always talked about the momentum we see in Austin," said Derek Dunlop, Get Me board advisor, whose company developed the app, which launched in Dallas in August. "Austin will be a star city in Texas because of the types of demographics we see there. It seemed like the next logical choice to move there next."
They'll be facing plenty of competition. On deliveries alone since 2014, Uber has launched UberEATS to deliver food downtown, Amazon Prime Now began offering one- and two-hour service and grocery delivery, and pickup service Instacart has expanded its partnerships with Whole Foods Market, H-E-B, Petco and other stores.
Regulatory fights
Despite their current successes, ridesharing services had a difficult time breaking into the Austin market. Traditional taxi services opposed the services, and city officials raised a number of safety and licensing concerns.Sidecar — after it acquired Heyride — was among the early entrants into the market, offering its first Austin rides on Feb. 15, 2013. But within a few days the company was hit with a cease and desist order from the city.
Sidecar began a Change.org petition that drew more than 3,700 signatures and filed a lawsuit against the city. It also made the last-minute decision to offer free rides during the South by Southwest festival to avert law enforcement actions that would derail their plans.
"We gave thousands of rides during the festival," said Sidecar spokeswoman Margaret Ryan. "But it was very costly to continue operations for free. We made the decision to drop the lawsuit and pull out of Austin and focus on expansion elsewhere like Boston, Washington, D.C. and Chicago."
While Sidecar retains an Austin permit, the company has no immediate plans to return, Ryan said. The company's battles, however, paved the way for Uber and Lyft to break into the Austin market last year.
Armed with larger financial assets — including funds to pay off driver's citations in some cases — Uber and Lyft eventually won temporary clearance to operate. Next month, the Austin City Council could revisit and tweak the ordinance.
"It's no surprise that one of the fastest-growing cities is one of the fastest-growing markets for Uber," McCottry said. "But we have been delighted with the way Austinites have welcomed us as more than a convenient transportation option, they adopted us into the community."
In its first year in Austin, Uber said its drivers provided 2.5 million rides and earned $27 million. And in addition to its existing Austin driver network, Uber said it's now recruiting 5,000 more from East Austin in the coming year.
Lyft hasn't released comparable stats for the Austin market, but says its business here has been strong.
"The last 16 months have been fantastic," said Katie Dally, communications manager for Lyft. "Austin has a deep need for alternate transportation options like Lyft that are reliable, affordable, and efficient for residents to use. As any city grows, so too does traffic congestion — and …services like Lyft …can help solve those problems."
More options soon
By the end of 2014, Austin was a top wired city for transportation with 11 different types of tech-enabled transportation services, followed by San Francisco and Washington D.C., each at 10, according to the report by Frontier Group and TexPIRG.The study surveyed the 50 largest cities to see if they offered mobile apps for on-demand rides, ride sharing, peer car sharing and round-trip and one-way vehicle use such as Zipcar and Car2Go. It also surveyed cities for tech-based services for taxi hailing, bikesharing, trip planning and scheduling, public transportation, virtual ticketing and aggregator transportation apps such as Austin-based RideScout.
In Austin's case, in addition to Uber, Lyft and Get Me, it now has ride sharing through Carma carpooling services and peer car sharing through FlightCar, among others. Austin also has tech-based services for taxi hailing, bikesharing such as BCycle, trip planning and scheduling such as Google Transit and Capital Metro's real-time tracking and virtual ticketing.
Joseph Kopser, CEO for RideScout, says Austin is still at the earliest stages of seeing these apps potenially improve the city's traffic flow. Having all these options is the first step and as usage grows, it could cut down traffic, he said.
"We are really excited about the growth to date," said Kopser, whose own company has seen skyrocketing growth with operations in 68 cities today. And "we still have a long way to go to seamlessly integrate those. We are still very car centric. The good news we have real room to grow quickly. This is so young that almost none of these companies or innovations existed five years ago."
And Kopser contends Austin is far from saturated with these services, comparing it to selections of restaurants in a particular community.
"I want Austin to have tons of options, because then the people can choose and let the marketplace decide who are the winners or losers," he said.
Susan Shaheen, co-director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center at the University of California at Berkeley, suggests Austin could eventually see more "niche" transportation players.
For example, Austin already has a quickly growing scene of alcohol delivery services, with at least a half-dozen options today ranging from Austin-based TopShelf and BrewDrop to Boston-based Drizly and New York-based Thirstie.
"In the future, I think we might see a growing number of services targeting niche markets," Shaheen said. "For example, apps that target specific demographic groups (serving children or the elderly or certain goods) or solve specific transportation problems… The future holds a growing number of app-based transportation services across the country with new service models and product offerings."
©2015 Austin American-Statesman, Texas Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
