Perspective
Uber and Lyft Should Pay for the Streets
The case for levying a road user fee on ride-hailing companies.
Like parents with different ideas for how to deal with a gifted but willful child, cities around the world continue to struggle to accommodate Uber in their midst.
London’s recent smackdown preserved, for the time being, the hegemony of the black taxicab—and emboldened other blockades of all ride-hailing services, in the Netherlands and France. In Buenos Aires, Argentina, Uber is available only for those willing to work hard to find it (and customers can’t charge rides to their credit cards). Brazil threatened to establish tough national guidelines on ride-hailing services, before softening the stance earlier this month with lighter new regulations.