Bloomington and other Illinois cities should welcome ridesharing
There’s no good reason for Bloomington's government to stand between drivers who want to offer this service and would-be customers who want to take advantage of it.
Former Gov. Pat. Quinn signed a bill in January establishing statewide rules for ridesharing services such as UberX and Lyft. Those rules might not be ideal, but at least they make clear that ridesharing will be legal across the state.
Since then, Uber has expanded in Illinois, offering rides not only in Chicago and Springfield but also in Rockford, Aurora, Champaign-Urbana and Bloomington-Normal.
Things appear to be going great for ridesharing in one of the state’s biggest college towns, Champaign-Urbana, but not so well in another, Bloomington-Normal, where officials have threatened to slap anyone caught driving for Uber with a fine of $250 or more.
Bloomington officials have pointed out that the new state law doesn’t take effect until June 1 and that, in the meantime, a Bloomington ordinance prohibits anyone from offering rides for money unless they’re licensed to operate a taxi or vehicle for hire. The city says it intends to change its laws to allow ridesharing, but it’s not clear when it will do so. (Normal follows Bloomington’s lead on transportation regulation and enforces Bloomington’s rules.)
Bloomington City Council should act immediately to make ridesharing legal in the twin cities. There is nothing it needs to take time to figure out. The new state law sets rules – for example, requirements for insurance, driver background checks and nondiscrimination – that the city could quickly and easily adopt. If the city later decides it wants to fine-tune those rules to address Bloomington-specific issues, it could always do so. Besides, ridesharing services operated for years in Chicago before they were governed by any special rules at all – and that worked out fine.
There’s no good reason for Bloomington’s government to stand in the way of drivers who want to offer this service and would-be customers who want to take advantage of it.
Failing to act quickly would not only deny Bloomington-Normal residents a service that people in other Illinois cities enjoy; it could also cost lives. Early research suggests that drunk-driving rates fall when Uber enters a city, which likely lowers the rate of deaths from drunk driving. That should be especially important to officials in Bloomington, where many college students drink heavily at downtown bars on weekends and then need rides home.
Unfortunately, Bloomington doesn’t have a good track record when it comes to giving students access to safe, affordable transportation options – or when it comes to respecting the rights of innovative transportation entrepreneurs. For years, the city allowed a few vehicle-for-hire companies to use an anticompetitive city ordinance to keep out newcomers. As a result, the market was dominated by a few privileged firms that crammed drunken revelers into relatively dangerous “party buses.”
A court struck that part of Bloomington’s vehicle-for-hire ordinance down in 2013 after the Liberty Justice Center brought a lawsuit on behalf of client Julie Crowe, whom the city barred from starting a van service after other companies’ owners objected.
That court victory has led to more choices and better service in Bloomington, but students should now have the right to choose ridesharing, too.
Unfortunately, some of the same vehicle-for-hire companies that benefited from the old law that kept out new competitors are now calling for the city to restrict ridesharing, too – just as the taxi lobby tried to crush ridesharing competition in Chicago and then at the state level.
One hopes Bloomington learned its lesson from the last time it tried to restrict competition for the benefit of particular established businesses. The city – and every other city where ridesharing services expand – should resist this special-interest pressure and do what’s right by giving its people the freedom to choose.