In a bid to expand its offering in the national capital, ride-hailing firm Uber has rolled out its bike-riding services with Uber BikeShare in Delhi. The service enables common riders to pick up passengers travelling the same route for an affordable service charge.
According to Uber’s app, the base fare for BikeShare has been kept at Rs 9 and the company is charging Rs 2.5 per km. However, any ride to the closest metro station will cost only about Rs 5. A quick check for a 15 km distance showed prices for the new service are one-third of what it was charging for UberGo.
The new service was introduced quite silently by Uber even as it recently announced making New Delhi as the second Asia Pacific city to have the public transport feature. “Want to do your bit for Delhi’s air? #LeaveYourCarBehind and take an Uber Moto to college. Save some change while you bring a change,” Uber India tweeted.
The tech giant had also announced in partnership with DMRC a ‘model metro station’ to showcase future smart mobility solutions and how public transport can be integrated with Uber’s multi-modal vision for urban mobility. It had announced services such as UberGO, Pool, Moto, Auto, Bikesharing, and the upcoming Uber Bus will highlight the power of Uber’s platform.
The introduction of this service is also important as Uber has been trying for years to get into two-wheeler mobility space in Delhi. Uber is yet to receive permission from the Delhi government to run bike taxis in the city and had recently approached the government to use 5,000 bike-taxis to improve first and last-mile connectivity during the third phase of odd-even scheme.
“For the third time, the New Delhi government has implemented an ‘odd-even’ scheme to keep a check on air pollution in the capital city. To play its part, on November 4, Uber launched the #LeaveYourCarBehind campaign, encouraging citizens to lend a hand in improving Delhi’s air quality by sharing mobility assets and choosing options such as ridesharing and carpooling, instead of the one-person-per-car routine,” Uber India said in a blog post on November 4.
The company, however, is not promoting the new service aggressively and is yet to give information on how to get themselves registered to offer this service and what would be the commission sharing ratio between the two entities. Queries to Uber for more details on these remained unanswered.
Permit problems
The introduction of this service is also important as Uber has been trying for years to get into two-wheeler mobility space in Delhi. Uber is yet to receive permission from the Delhi government to run bike taxis in the city