Vancouver is currently the only major city in North America without ridesharing – and a Toronto woman has a warning for anyone lamenting the Uber delay.
“I think it’s necessary,” Monika Traikov told Global News.
On Nov. 19, the B.C. NDP government introduced legislation that will allow ride-hailing companies to operate by the fall of 2019 at the earliest. Under the province’s rules, all Uber, Lyft and other ridesharing service drivers will have to have a Class 4 passenger licence and undergo regular criminal checks.
“Riders their safety needs to be put first,” Traikov said.
The Toronto resident says passenger safety is worth waiting for.
Traikov’s last Uber ride ended in tragedy earlier this year in Toronto.
On March 21, she and her boyfriend, 28-year-old Nicholas Cameron, were en route to Toronto’s Pearson International Airport for their first vacation together. Their Uber driver got lost and then pulled off the highway to pick up a dropped phone he was using for GPS. When 23-year-old Abdihared Bishar-Mussa pulled back onto the Gardiner Expressway, they were hit from behind by another driver.
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“I was knocked out I think for less than a minute but I came to and yeah, Nicholas never woke up after that,” Traikov recalled.
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It was Bishar-Mussa’s second day on the job with Uber. The now former Uber driver was originally charged with criminal negligence and dangerous driving causing death, but the Crown accepted the lesser plea to careless driving resulting in Cameron’s fatal neck injury. Bishar-Mussa was fined $1,000 and sentenced to a year-long driving ban.
“It shouldn’t have happened this way,” Traikov said, who blames lax regulations for the fatal crash.
In 2016, the city of Toronto got rid of mandatory safety training for all vehicle-for-hire drivers. All you need to drive an Uber is a regular G licence, fewer than nine demerit points, and no convictions for major Highway Traffic Act offences.
“Basically anyone could drive for a taxi company or for ridesharing and that just opened the floodgates,” Traikov told Global News.
Although Traikov supports B.C.’s strict rules for ridesharing services, a coalition of ridesharing advocates says it disagrees with Class 4 licensing in B.C. because safety is a top priority of ridesharing companies.
In a statement to Global News, ‘Ridesharing Now for BC’ says the Class 4 licensing requirement “would unnecessarily keep people from driving with ridesharing services, limiting the number of drivers available to provide rides especially during nights and weekends when demand (and drinking) are the highest.”
The coalition also notes that ridesharing companies already conduct criminal and driving background checks for all drivers to help keep passengers safe.
“This shouldn’t happen to anyone else, it’s, it’s been horrible,” Traikov warned.
- With files from Catherine McDonald, Global News
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