Isy10212 Contemporary Issues In Information Assessment Answers

Answer:

Introduction

This report aims to discuss the impact of the development of IT in transport. This topic for discussion is the technology of ride sharing in uber. The advantages and the disadvantages of ride sharing are discussed briefly in this report. The future of ride sharing is stated in this report. Lastly, this report concludes with an appropriate conclusion for this report.

ITS or Intelligent transportation system is a development in the sector of transportation that includes the embodiment of intelligence in the various modes transportation for providing developed services to the users so that the users are higher informed and the security and safety of the users is ensured (Alonso-Mora et al. 2017). The technology of ride sharing in the implementation of the prevailing and underutilised personal vehicles for providing rides. Uber is the technology company that provides ride sharing, linking of the registered riders to the river-partners in over 400 cities all across the world (Cici et al. 2014).

Discussion

The benefits of ride-sharing in uber

The users gain several advantages with the technology of ride sharing. This is possible with implementation of ICT in the field of transportation. With the help of the global survey reports that is available to the users, the cities can actually gain knowledge about the process of incorporating the technology of ride sharing into the civic infrastructure (Fagnant and Kockelman 2015). The rideshare technology can be beneficial for supplementing the stops of stations, where the situation is that the people are in need of another transport mode for reaching their final destination. The cities have implemented the technology of rideshare cars that is introduced by Uber as similar lines that are utilised by the public transport that would result in increase in the efficiency as assist in reducing the traffic, or in some extreme conditions, assist in creating dedicated rideshares lanes and lines. Another method of incorporating the technology of uber in the infrastructure of the cities is by including the service in the pass cards of the cities (Stiglic et al. 2015). Fact is, while considering the cities with lower economies, the cities can supplement services of transportation that includes rideshare (Banerjee, Johari and Riquelme 2015). Some of the benefits are:

Substitute transportation: technology has created substitute transportation accessible to the commuters. It means that the users can reach the desired destination easily and in a cost efficient method (Teubner and Flath 2015). The common people who do not possess the capital to purchase a car, or the people who have given their car to the garage for repairing and the people who have to travel by other kinds of road transportation can face the issue of higher transportation cost and increased time for reaching their destination. The technology of ride sharing provides a service that can be both cost efficient and convenient (Greenwood and Wattal 2015).

Cost effective: ride sharing technology is proving to be a cost effective solution for the people who need to reach their destination in a less time and avoid getting stuck in traffic.

Benefits to women: Even though there has been several development in the countries, the issue of gender disparities is a constant threat across the cultures, geographies, and sectors. In several countries, the distribution of benefits of transportation services is not equally executed. Ride sharing consists of the potential of lowering down the barriers for the women in all the areas by providing flexible opportunities of work to the drivers, and dependable transportation to the riders who are in need of transportation (Malhotra and Van Alstyne 2014.). The report of driving towards equality utilises aggregated and anonymised  data from Uber, which includes the survey of more than 11,000 uber app users (Bicocchi and Mamei 2014). The safety and security of the policies that are implemented by the company, uber, creates a key benefit for the women riders and drivers. The results of  surveys indicates that the ride sharing can assist women in gaining a higher sense of independency and the freedom to travel to any place that they could not have done previously (Drews and Luxen 2013).

Smart supply: Ride sharing relies on the private drivers who provide rides surrounding their pre-existing commitments. Approximately, most of the half of the uber partners drive for minimum of ten hours per week (Bimpikis, Candogan and Saban 2016). This consists of absolute discretion of the duration and location of the working framework of the drivers and this forms a strict backbone of a greater responsive model of supply. With the help of real time tracking of demands, the partners has the ability of logging-on in response to the greater demand and the logging-off with respect to the lower demand for pursuing several other activities. With the help of this method, the model of ride sharing lodges greater variable demand across days, across weeks and across years (Wallsten 2015). It has been observed that the driver-partners grow to be more productive with downtime that is significantly less and higher trips per hour. The communities are benefitted with the facility of improved services of transport that helps in scaling with the responses of the fluctuation of demand. The technology of ride sharing has the ability of accommodating variations in the demand of the transport that are associated with the seasonal tourism, activities in the midweek, weeks of parliamentary sitting and the events of sporting. This technology also improves the connectivity of transport in the centres without the addition of extra infrastructure with better utilisation of the excess capacity of the existing vehicles (Gargiulo et al. 2015).

Connected cities: The technology of ride sharing complements the public transport where the dependable services are unavailable. The substitute of public transport is not the technology of ride sharing. Rather, it is the supplement, which provides a scalable and flexible solution for several problems by connecting the riders from their door to the hub of transport. With the improvement of connectivity among the cities, ride sharing also provide support to the activities of local economy. In the environment, the technology of ride sharing assists in reducing the overall national dependency on the private vehicles (Dimitrijevic, Nedic and Dimitrieski 2013).

Disadvantages of ride-sharing

The disadvantages of the technology of ride sharing are significantly than the advantages. However, for understanding the disadvantages of ride sharing, the viewpoints of the customers, drivers and the industry needs to be considered.

Customers: Even though, hardly any downside remains for the customers who are availing the increased access to a safer, stylish, transportation, in more dependable cars with the help of an app in the smartphones, still some drawbacks needs to be considered. The issue of surge pricing or primetime pricing of uber is a controversial and severe issue for the customers (Ota et la. 2015). For explaining the concept of surge pricing, the process is a method of pricing in free market, which involves the lowering or raising of the prices and in the situation of the uber company, the number of automobile vehicles that are in supply and the demand of the passengers who want to take a ride in the cars of the company. The prices of the services of Uber depends on the intensity of the demand and then the prices are raised or lowered by a particular percentage, and in several cases the prices are doubled or tripled and the fare hikes takes effect during the period of high demand for the cars (Cao et al. 2015). Another disadvantage to the customers of uber is that with so cheap prices and easily accessible cars, the customers have a tendency of availing the cars for a short distance and the price is are added up swiftly. The issue of the cancellation of the trips by the drivers is another issue that the customers face while booking a cab for transportation. The concerns of safety has also emerged across several states and cities, where the regulations of the industry of transportation are lax and the average citizens have the easy access to the E-Hail network by pretending as service providers. even though, this can impact a positive effect by increasing the drivers supply, the motivation level of the drivers cannot be to the required extent, as the easy access in the network of E-hail for meeting the high standards of the safety and professionalism (Watanabe, Naveed and Neittaanmäki 2016).  

Drivers: The situation of significantly lower prices can influence negatively on the earning of the drivers. Even though the customers consider the applications as user-friendly, it is essential to keep in mind that the services are provided by the drivers using the name of Uber or any other franchise (Asghari et al. 2016). The drivers have to provide several cost of the cars that are utilised in by the drivers. The cost of refuelling and any kind of repairing needs to be provided by the drivers. Primarily, the drivers depend on the surged prices for making up for the lower fares and the infrequent trips. After continued recruitment of huge amount of drivers by Uber and the competitors of Uber, and the price of the competition, the average earning of the drivers is being pushed in downward direction. This leads to the longer working hours for the drivers for earning a significant amount of income, which is comparable to the amount the drivers used to earn earlier. Even though, this denotes that the supply of drivers is larger now, the longer hours on the driving seat will lead to jeopardising of the safety of both the drivers and the passengers. The conditions, combined with the trip cancelation done by the customers, that can be a  reason a driver  misses the opportunities of making money during the prominent hours and can effect negatively on the morale and the earnings of the driver ().

Industry: The competition of price is damaging for several industries, and for the one that has been already supplying a vital service and many other value added profits for the marketplace. Services of uber communicates with the consumers of the company, the least expectation of a ride experience like services of limousine in a cost efficient method. Progressively, the competitions in the ride sharing method of the companies have increased as every company aims to provide the cheapest services to the customers. This will lead to the stress of the drivers and finally, it will develop poor service in the future. Uber and other companies are directly in competition with the already existing car services and taxi services for both the drivers and the customers. This has created the fall in the prices of black car and taxi medallion. This is beneficial for the drivers but it is disadvantageous for the conventional groups of car services and taxi (Feeney 2015).

Future of ride-sharing

Even though services like uber provides several benefits to the people, but it lacks in establishing a progressing framework that will benefit both the driver and the rider. The suppy is not meeting the demands of the customers and the expectation even though technology is growing at a substantial rate. The technology of blockchain can benefit in the future of the car service. The benefits of blockchain are:

• Accountability will be introduced for the riders, the drivers, and eventually the safety of the riders will be increased. In the meantime, the companies while screening or selecting new drivers for the company.
• Ability of logging: This ability will help in the recording the activities and driving behaviour of the driver and it can prove essential when there is a need of hiring a new driver.
• Increased flexibility: The freedom of choosing the driver, which can be given to the riders can generate the ability of participating in a connected network or create a social circle of customers who they have previously provided a trip (Knigge 2013).

Conclusion

Hence, it can be concluded the introduction of information technology in the sector of transport can help in developing the industry by introducing new methods of transportation. The technology of ride sharing in the implementation of the prevailing and underutilised personal vehicles for providing rides. The users gain several advantages with the technology of ride sharing. This is possible with the implementation of ICT in the field of transportation. The cities have implemented the technology of rideshare cars that is introduced by Uber as similar lines that are utilised by the public transport that would result in increase in the efficiency as assist in reducing the traffic, or in some extreme conditions, assist in creating dedicated rideshares lanes and lines. The benefits of ride sharing are safety and security of women, smart supply, connected cities, and a cost effective solution of transportation. The disadvantages of ride sharing for the customers are the issue of surge pricing or primetime pricing of uber is a controversial and severe issue for the customers. Another disadvantage to the customers of uber is that with so cheap prices and easily accessible cars, the customers have a tendency of availing the cars for a short distance and the price is are added up swiftly. The future of ride sharing is the introduction of blockchain in the department of transportation for monitoring the activities and the behaviour of the drivers and the riders.

References

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