Last summer, when Krystal White was visiting Houston for a National Federation of the Blind convention, she claims she had to hide her guide dog named Gage in order to get an Uber from the airport.
This is a frequent problem, she explains.“I’ve had them drive right past me, and I’ve had neighbors go, ‘I think that was your Uber driver,’” White says. “And I’m like, ‘oh great.’ So I’ve missed appointments, I’ve missed my daughter’s play at school.
“It makes you feel isolated—like it’s all your fault, you’re blind. And you can’t get anywhere when you’re trying so hard to do so.”
White, from Boise in Idaho, was among the protesters who gathered on October 15 outside the San Francisco headquarters of Uber and Lyft to demand that the companies take major steps to stop discrimination against people with disabilities on their platforms—particularly against visually impaired people who use guide dogs or white canes.
Many had personal experiences in which they say Uber or Lyft drivers rejected them as soon as they pulled up. Juanita Herrera, from Southern California, was at the protest with her 4-year-old daughter. She says when she was pregnant years ago, she got off work late and didn’t want to take public transportation, so she called an Uber.
“The driver showed up, saw my dog, and started getting aggressive. He was like, ‘no dogs.’ And I’m like, ‘but it’s a service animal.’ He just kept saying ‘no dogs,’” she says. “I’m visibly pregnant at the time, right? He just kind of left me stranded. He then drove off. He wouldn’t cancel the trip until 15 minutes later.”
On another occasion in 2021, a Lyft driver refused to stop while Herrera’s young daughter was in a car seat, because of her guide dog, Jaden. The driver said she didn’t take pets. Herrera says the driver claimed no knowledge of Lyft’s policy on guide dogs and that when she still refused to take them, Herrera told the driver she would report the incident. The driver got very angry, accused Herrera of trying to get her fired, and then drove off, she says. Herrera says she filed a report and nothing came of it.
At the protest, people said that the companies need to institute a “zero-tolerance policy” for discriminatory drivers who turn away passengers with visual impairments. They also said that ride-hailing companies need to better educate their drivers on how to accommodate people with visual impairments. The protest was organized by the National Federation of the Blind and took place on White Cane Awareness Day, meant to spotlight the needs of people with visual impairments.
Uber did not respond to a request for comment. A Lyft spokesperson told WIRED that “discrimination has no place in the Lyft community.”
“We strive to provide an inclusive and accessible platform for riders, including those who rely on service animals,” the Lyft spokesperson says. “We continually update our practices to improve accessibility for riders and are proud to be working directly with advocacy organizations in the community.”
Frank Maestas, who was at the same protest, says he had a similar experience in Houston. His would-be Uber driver refused to give him a ride upon seeing his white cane. “An Uber driver told me that he cannot take me because he was afraid I’d get hurt going into his vehicle or coming out,” Maestas says. “So he refused me a ride.”
Uber and Lyft have been challenged in court and by activists for years on their alleged failure to fully cooperate with the Americans With Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination based on disability in public and commercial transportation—which could mean lack of accessible vehicles, a higher price for services, or an outright refusal of services.
Uber and Lyft are plagued by two main issues: They often have too few wheelchair-accessible vehicles, to the point where wait times for passengers are egregiously long. And in some cases, disabled passengers claim a car isn’t available at all. Uber’s wheelchair-accessible service is listed as available in some cities in the US and the UK. Neither Uber nor Lyft make the number of wheelchair-accessible vehicles public.
When WIRED journalists tried to book one with Uber in central London, they were listed as “unavailable.” (Lyft does not operate in London.) In San Francisco, there was more luck—two vehicles were available on Uber as wheelchair accessible—while Lyft does not list wheelchair-accessible vehicles available nearby, simply a message that it will be a much longer wait period.
Protesters have long claimed that drivers will decide to not pick up passengers with a visible disability, which includes people who require a wheelchair or guide dog, and do not face repercussions. Passengers say that when they report incidents like this to Uber or Lyft, they often go ignored.
A Lyft spokesman told WIRED that, “while there is a notable shortage of the types of vehicles needed on the road today, we will continue to push for solutions that make rideshare as accessible as possible for everyone.” (Lyft did not elaborate on how it plans to bridge the lack of available vehicles.)
Michelle Barlak, public relations manager for The Seeing Eye, which provides guide dogs for people with visual impairments, tells WIRED that the organization has received “frequent and increasing reports of rideshare access denials from Seeing Eye dog handlers.” A survey by the nonprofit Guide Dogs for the Blind found 83 percent of members said they had been denied rides.
Both Uber and Lyft offer in-app options for people to specify that they’re traveling with a pet, which usually involves paying slightly more. But since guide dogs aren’t pets, people with visual impairments cannot be required to use this option.
A Lyft spokesperson tells WIRED that by 2025, the company will be launching a “service animal opt-in feature,” which it says will let passengers “disclose that they travel with a service animal when requesting a ride.”
Uber, which did not respond to a request for comment, allows passengers to specify via in-app settings if they are traveling with a service animal.
“According to the ADA, rideshare drivers cannot refuse access based on the size, weight, or breed of a dog, allergies, fear of dogs, or cultural/religious objections,” Barlak tells WIRED.
At the protest, White argues that guide dogs are not at all comparable to pets, which drivers may fear are unruly or poorly behaved. However, some drivers don’t see them any differently.
“Guide dogs are $75,000 dogs—they’re not gonna go to the bathroom in your car or get sick in your car,” White says.
Barlak says that Uber and Lyft need to make it easier for visually impaired passengers to report difficulties using their services and for the companies to better educate their drivers on the needs of blind passengers.
Michael Forzano, a protester who lives in New York and uses a guide dog, claims that on three occasions, drivers have slammed the door on him, driven away when his hands were still on the car, and almost ran over his guide dog’s paws. After reporting these incidents, he says, nothing has happened.
On one other occasion, an Uber driver in Orlando refused Forzano and his girlfriend service when they entered the car with his guide dog. He says the driver turned on loud music and verbally assaulted them until they ended the trip. “I waited over an hour for the police to arrive,” Forzano says. “The police sided with the driver, and I’m still working through the process of that.”
People who use wheelchairs also face challenges using Uber and Lyft. Joe Rappaport—communications and strategy director at Taxis for All, a nonprofit advocacy group focused on helping wheelchair users get access to accessible taxis and rideshare cars, and executive director at Brooklyn Center for Independence of the Disabled—has been central to the effort to make sure Uber and Lyft have enough wheelchair accessible cars in New York City.
Rappaport says that there are many people with mobility issues who rely on Uber and Lyft, especially since they remove the burden of flagging down a car in a place like Manhattan.
Rappaport says the companies have largely had the same accessibility issues of New York City’s yellow cab industry, which has also been scrutinized for having too few wheelchair-accessible vehicles.
“You’ve got these companies who claim to be at the edge, introducing new technology and new ways of doing things, but in the end they’re the same old bad service without a thought about accessibility,” Rappaport says.
In 2018, Uber and Lyft settled a lawsuit filed in New York in which for-hire vehicle companies were required to have a quarter of their rides be in wheelchair-accessible cars by mid-2023. Uber and Lyft claimed that the accessibility mandate was “seriously flawed” and “arbitrary.” The settlement carved out a compromise: At least 80 percent of its requests for wheelchair-accessible cars would arrive in under 10 minutes by mid-2021.
Rappaport says that this lawsuit has definitely had a positive effect on ride accessibility in New York City—but anecdotally, he says it’s still next to impossible to get accessible vehicles in places like Staten Island or the Bronx, even if it’s easier in places like Park Slope or Manhattan.
Legal efforts across the country aiming to hold the companies to account have also had mixed results. In 2020, Lyft had to settle a separate lawsuit with the Department of Justice, which charged the company with not accommodating riders with wheelchairs or walkers. Lyft made payments to affected individuals in the suit but didn’t admit to any wrongdoing. Similarly, Uber had to pay millions to settle a 2022 Department of Justice case that accused it of violating the ADA by overcharging people with disabilities.
“What’s most frustrating about it is that when these platforms work, they are a real game changer for blind people,” says Chris Danielsen, director of public relations at the National Federation of the Blind. “The reason we know this is an issue is because we use these platforms all the time. They really are a game changer for us.”
Since the October 15 rally, Herrera says that she has been denied service again. “It happens all the time,” she says. “Uber and Lyft have to take a more drastic approach. How are you letting people get away with breaking the law? That’s what I don’t understand.”
Source : Wired
