There’s no doubt that the convenience of Uber has eroded bus travel to some degree – but how should the sector respond to that?
Uber has become the elephant in the room (Photo: Shutterstock)
Last week, I eavesdropped on some bus industry bods lamenting declining patronage levels on London buses and the challenges of reinvigorating demand across the regions.
It was a sorry discussion – a lot of naval gazing and focusing on the exact old so-called solutions. Not once was the elephant in the room, that one-time existential threat to bus that hasn’t gone away, uttered – Uber.
I made my first Uber trip in September 2018, writing about it on these pages, admitting that I’d been cautious but positively surprised. Over the following years, I have been getting in an Uber once a month, but it is a lifestyle choice for my kids, ages 18, 20, and 23. Back in 2018, I hadn’t seen it catch on, but now I realise that today’s younger generation, such as my offspring, can’t recall a life before Uber and cannot comprehend an era of bus supremacy, when getting on board a bus was integral to our lives. Those were the days when folk would deliberately choose to live on or near a bus route, where an evening out would be focused on the camaraderie of travelling back and forth, or of organising it in such a way that you’d get on at one stop, your mate would do so a few stops further down the route and by the time you arrived at the pub, everyone would be jabbering on together and in high spirits.
Last month, I was on a KonectBus in East Anglia and found it reassuringly heart-warming to be on board a bus that stopped for 10 minutes at a local school so that it could be filled to the brim with pupils and a smattering of teachers. I witnessed innocuous horseplay (not on a par with the anarchy that we used to prevail over at my school in Chislehurst in the 1980s), overheard gossiping and saw games being played on the journey, and it reminded me of the halcyon era when friendships were forged on board the bus to and from school. This may sound nostalgic, but on my many mystery shopping trips across the UK, I see less of this with every passing year. Sometimes, a bus pitches up outside the school gates at kicking out time, and you can count the number of kids getting on board with one hand.
Unlike bus drivers, you won’t see Uber drivers hanging around, displaying poor body language
In the eight years since I made my virgin Uber trip, the overall experience has got better. I’ve had family members leave their phones in Ubers and retrieved them with consummate ease, whilst I’ve never encountered a driver that hasn’t been polite, smartly attired and professional in how they navigate the roads. I love having the comfort of calling the driver directly if I’m uncertain whether I’m at the right spot to be picked up and it’s fab that they always answer immediately.
Unlike bus drivers, you won’t see Uber drivers hanging around, displaying poor body language. I’m yet to see one stick two fingers out their window and gesticulate at errant road users or utter an expletive, and when my 90-year-old father has accompanied me, they have been meticulous in helping him in and out of the car. They also share your intent to get to your destination on time – I’ve experienced Uber drivers frantically do their best to find alternative routes to get me to the game on time, or in the case of my son, calm his fears and safely show urgency to get him from Portsmouth to Southampton to search for his rucksack that he foolishly left on the railway station. So too, they display uncomplaining flexibility – last week, I mistakenly pressed my home address as a destination in my phone instead of my intended destination, yet the driver diverted, ignored the app and was happy to take up my suggestion of a modest £6 in change to take me to where I needed to be.
Uber continuously gets better. A fortnight ago, the company announced that it was introducing the opportunity for cash payments outside London. Depending on whether they wish to accept cash, drivers can opt in or out. However, regardless of how many drivers start taking cash, this policy change is fascinating as it almost feels like a rebellion against the gradual trend towards a cashless society. Indeed, as far as public transport, Uber was one of the trailblazers in creating a concept that excluded cash and, in doing so, made it unobtainable for those without digital access. In an about-turn, it is lauding its decision to make its services accessible to all.
Another benefit of Uber is the psychological aspect of the way that it facilitates lives. As a non-car driver, I am fiercely determined to be independent. I will never ask for a lift – yes,
I will accept graciously, but I feel feeble and my confidence is shattered if I have to. Uber is my safety net. Where I have an Uber app, I know I can always live the life I need. It’s a comfort blanket. You know that in an emergency, if the train breaks down or is delayed, or there is a strike, you can rely on Uber. Eight years ago, when I had my first Uber trip, my pedal bike was a big part of my lifestyle, facilitating my ability to go shopping, do errands or watch local non-league football games. But now, not far off 54 years old and chronically unfit, my bike trips are more onerous and unpalatable. Knowing there will always be an Uber as a back-up reassures me that I should be able to do all the things I want to do as I enter my twilight years. Dad’s in
very precarious health in his nursing home, the wife, who drives, is having a double-knee operation next week, both my bikes have punctures, and Crystal Palace are in the FA Cup final, there’s no way I can get through it without Uber as a backstop.
Talking to bus bigwigs, they rarely talk about Uber as a competitor anymore
As for the kids, I suspect mine are like yours in that bus travel doesn’t even enter their consciousness. ‘I’ll just get an Uber’ is probably one of the most used phrases in households across the UK, and it’s got to the stage where I don’t even question the cost. I believe that a few Uber trips are still cheaper for all of the family than buying a second car, them learning to drive, insurance and in any case, probably safer, given the number of youngsters who experience accidents.
Uber is going from strength to strength. Last week, globally, it reported a near 15% hike in patronage, which was impressive but still lower than they had targeted. This was amidst what financial analysts cited as uncertainty around consumer travel habits (when was this ever not the case, of course?). The bus industry would give anything for this kind of growth rather than feel downbeat.
Talking to bus bigwigs, they rarely talk about Uber as a competitor anymore. Maybe they see bus and Uber as so different that they don’t compete? Or maybe they’ve given up, perhaps thinking that bus travel doesn’t have unique and compelling differentiators? They gabble on more about car as the enemy, but I would say that taking on those who have already made the decision to forgo the car and rely on ‘public transport’ (even if it is a taxi) is an easier and addressable market to sway. Uber does have looming threats on the horizon in any case. Drivers are increasingly vexed about Uber hiking its commission fees and rendering many journeys barely profitable for drivers. Pay rates for bus drivers have increased such that you’d be better off behind the wheel of a bus than an Uber and enjoy decent employment rights, guaranteed income, a better work:life balance, and a career ladder.
The growth in fast food home deliveries, including Uber Eats, means there is an even greater quest to find drivers across a scarcer pool, and all this can cripple the business model. Meanwhile, Uber HQ staff are in uproar at being told to work in the office on ‘anchor days’ (Tuesdays to Thursdays inclusive). Pay is seen as lagging behind the market rate and management is taxing.
I do see a place for both Uber and the bus – it doesn’t have to be one or the other, and it shouldn’t be presented as this to the market, particularly among youngsters who quite often (and irrationally) view consumer or lifestyle decisions in a binary manner. Please don’t encourage them to select a favourite for anything, as the loser will always be jettisoned. There’s really no middle ground with the youth of today! An Uber is good for an impulsive trip, a late night journey home from the nightclub, party or pub, where security and speed to get back to bed quickly is of primary importance to price. So too, on trips that it will never be cost-effective to run a decent bus service. But – and we’ve been saying this for years – if the bus sector could improve in a few key areas, then it should be the provider of choice with Uber as the backstop. Awareness of the bus network – and this is where maps are still so vital – holds the key.
On this trip, I couldn’t even be bothered to monetarily check to see if I could get there by bus
As an example, this evening, I arrived on the outskirts of Stourbridge in the West Midlands for a meeting in a small industrial estate just off a main shopping street. As I disembarked my train at the small location of Lye, it did not for a nano-second, cross my mind to get on a bus. The Uber was always going to be my choice, yet in the old days, I’d have researched to see if there was a bus route and if there wasn’t then I’d travel to an alternative railway station on a different route maybe to find a route that would take me closest to my destination.
And if there wasn’t one, I’d either reschedule the meeting for somewhere more convenient or, ever so reluctantly, get in a private taxi. On this trip, I couldn’t even be bothered to monetarily check to see if I could get there
by bus – I couldn’t interrupt playing Chaka Khan’s Greatest Hits on my phone on the train to Lye to find out the information. However, had the bus company, by hook or crook, digitally or through a map in Birmingham Moor Street, when I boarded the train, got into my consciousness, there’s a good chance I’d have shunned the Uber. However, at £5.95, my Uber ride seemed ridiculously cheap and I feel guilty about how little my friendly driver made out of it.
In many respects, the way to avoid the population taking a binary bus v Uber perspective, is to focus intently on those core, traditional ‘golden goose’ routes, where frequency and reliability are high and where investment in providing a product that is eye-catching, high quality and strongly branded – from bus stops to the livery and on-board experience. Whether we do hold up a white flag on those rural bus routes in affluent areas and accept that we can never provide a compelling, viable proposition and an Uber is a better, generally affordable solution (maybe even as part of a dual-branded feeder to a core, golden goose route) doesn’t seem a blasphemous proposition.
Whatever the case, we should accept that folk will still want to use an Uber, but it’s essential to ensure that generations don’t grow up, never having been on a bus or seeing it as a lifestyle option in any shape or form. Even getting them to consider a bus at a certain time or situation is better than nothing and a small victory. Uber’s here to stay. It’s changed my life, and I don’t think I’m a turncoat for admitting this, but it’s not the be-all and end-all. Though it clearly has eroded the bus sector’s customer base, it hasn’t killed it. By focusing more pro-actively and determinedly on its own differentiators, even if they might not be immediately obvious, the bus industry can survive and flourish alongside Uber.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Alex Warner has over 30 years’ experience in the transport sector, having held senior roles on a multi-modal basis across the sector. He is co-founder of transport technology business Lost Group and transport consultancy AJW Experience Group (which includes Great Scenic Journeys). He is also chair of West Midlands Grand Rail Collaboration.
This story appears inside the latest issue of Passenger Transport.
Uber is here to stay – can we live with it?
by Passenger Transport on May 16, 2025 • 11:20 am No CommentsThere’s no doubt that the convenience of Uber has eroded bus travel to some degree – but how should the sector respond to that?
Last week, I eavesdropped on some bus industry bods lamenting declining patronage levels on London buses and the challenges of reinvigorating demand across the regions.
It was a sorry discussion – a lot of naval gazing and focusing on the exact old so-called solutions. Not once was the elephant in the room, that one-time existential threat to bus that hasn’t gone away, uttered – Uber.
I made my first Uber trip in September 2018, writing about it on these pages, admitting that I’d been cautious but positively surprised. Over the following years, I have been getting in an Uber once a month, but it is a lifestyle choice for my kids, ages 18, 20, and 23. Back in 2018, I hadn’t seen it catch on, but now I realise that today’s younger generation, such as my offspring, can’t recall a life before Uber and cannot comprehend an era of bus supremacy, when getting on board a bus was integral to our lives. Those were the days when folk would deliberately choose to live on or near a bus route, where an evening out would be focused on the camaraderie of travelling back and forth, or of organising it in such a way that you’d get on at one stop, your mate would do so a few stops further down the route and by the time you arrived at the pub, everyone would be jabbering on together and in high spirits.
Last month, I was on a KonectBus in East Anglia and found it reassuringly heart-warming to be on board a bus that stopped for 10 minutes at a local school so that it could be filled to the brim with pupils and a smattering of teachers. I witnessed innocuous horseplay (not on a par with the anarchy that we used to prevail over at my school in Chislehurst in the 1980s), overheard gossiping and saw games being played on the journey, and it reminded me of the halcyon era when friendships were forged on board the bus to and from school. This may sound nostalgic, but on my many mystery shopping trips across the UK, I see less of this with every passing year. Sometimes, a bus pitches up outside the school gates at kicking out time, and you can count the number of kids getting on board with one hand.
In the eight years since I made my virgin Uber trip, the overall experience has got better. I’ve had family members leave their phones in Ubers and retrieved them with consummate ease, whilst I’ve never encountered a driver that hasn’t been polite, smartly attired and professional in how they navigate the roads. I love having the comfort of calling the driver directly if I’m uncertain whether I’m at the right spot to be picked up and it’s fab that they always answer immediately.
Unlike bus drivers, you won’t see Uber drivers hanging around, displaying poor body language. I’m yet to see one stick two fingers out their window and gesticulate at errant road users or utter an expletive, and when my 90-year-old father has accompanied me, they have been meticulous in helping him in and out of the car. They also share your intent to get to your destination on time – I’ve experienced Uber drivers frantically do their best to find alternative routes to get me to the game on time, or in the case of my son, calm his fears and safely show urgency to get him from Portsmouth to Southampton to search for his rucksack that he foolishly left on the railway station. So too, they display uncomplaining flexibility – last week, I mistakenly pressed my home address as a destination in my phone instead of my intended destination, yet the driver diverted, ignored the app and was happy to take up my suggestion of a modest £6 in change to take me to where I needed to be.
Uber continuously gets better. A fortnight ago, the company announced that it was introducing the opportunity for cash payments outside London. Depending on whether they wish to accept cash, drivers can opt in or out. However, regardless of how many drivers start taking cash, this policy change is fascinating as it almost feels like a rebellion against the gradual trend towards a cashless society. Indeed, as far as public transport, Uber was one of the trailblazers in creating a concept that excluded cash and, in doing so, made it unobtainable for those without digital access. In an about-turn, it is lauding its decision to make its services accessible to all.
Another benefit of Uber is the psychological aspect of the way that it facilitates lives. As a non-car driver, I am fiercely determined to be independent. I will never ask for a lift – yes,
I will accept graciously, but I feel feeble and my confidence is shattered if I have to. Uber is my safety net. Where I have an Uber app, I know I can always live the life I need. It’s a comfort blanket. You know that in an emergency, if the train breaks down or is delayed, or there is a strike, you can rely on Uber. Eight years ago, when I had my first Uber trip, my pedal bike was a big part of my lifestyle, facilitating my ability to go shopping, do errands or watch local non-league football games. But now, not far off 54 years old and chronically unfit, my bike trips are more onerous and unpalatable. Knowing there will always be an Uber as a back-up reassures me that I should be able to do all the things I want to do as I enter my twilight years. Dad’s in
very precarious health in his nursing home, the wife, who drives, is having a double-knee operation next week, both my bikes have punctures, and Crystal Palace are in the FA Cup final, there’s no way I can get through it without Uber as a backstop.
As for the kids, I suspect mine are like yours in that bus travel doesn’t even enter their consciousness. ‘I’ll just get an Uber’ is probably one of the most used phrases in households across the UK, and it’s got to the stage where I don’t even question the cost. I believe that a few Uber trips are still cheaper for all of the family than buying a second car, them learning to drive, insurance and in any case, probably safer, given the number of youngsters who experience accidents.
Uber is going from strength to strength. Last week, globally, it reported a near 15% hike in patronage, which was impressive but still lower than they had targeted. This was amidst what financial analysts cited as uncertainty around consumer travel habits (when was this ever not the case, of course?). The bus industry would give anything for this kind of growth rather than feel downbeat.
Talking to bus bigwigs, they rarely talk about Uber as a competitor anymore. Maybe they see bus and Uber as so different that they don’t compete? Or maybe they’ve given up, perhaps thinking that bus travel doesn’t have unique and compelling differentiators? They gabble on more about car as the enemy, but I would say that taking on those who have already made the decision to forgo the car and rely on ‘public transport’ (even if it is a taxi) is an easier and addressable market to sway. Uber does have looming threats on the horizon in any case. Drivers are increasingly vexed about Uber hiking its commission fees and rendering many journeys barely profitable for drivers. Pay rates for bus drivers have increased such that you’d be better off behind the wheel of a bus than an Uber and enjoy decent employment rights, guaranteed income, a better work:life balance, and a career ladder.
The growth in fast food home deliveries, including Uber Eats, means there is an even greater quest to find drivers across a scarcer pool, and all this can cripple the business model. Meanwhile, Uber HQ staff are in uproar at being told to work in the office on ‘anchor days’ (Tuesdays to Thursdays inclusive). Pay is seen as lagging behind the market rate and management is taxing.
I do see a place for both Uber and the bus – it doesn’t have to be one or the other, and it shouldn’t be presented as this to the market, particularly among youngsters who quite often (and irrationally) view consumer or lifestyle decisions in a binary manner. Please don’t encourage them to select a favourite for anything, as the loser will always be jettisoned. There’s really no middle ground with the youth of today! An Uber is good for an impulsive trip, a late night journey home from the nightclub, party or pub, where security and speed to get back to bed quickly is of primary importance to price. So too, on trips that it will never be cost-effective to run a decent bus service. But – and we’ve been saying this for years – if the bus sector could improve in a few key areas, then it should be the provider of choice with Uber as the backstop. Awareness of the bus network – and this is where maps are still so vital – holds the key.
As an example, this evening, I arrived on the outskirts of Stourbridge in the West Midlands for a meeting in a small industrial estate just off a main shopping street. As I disembarked my train at the small location of Lye, it did not for a nano-second, cross my mind to get on a bus. The Uber was always going to be my choice, yet in the old days, I’d have researched to see if there was a bus route and if there wasn’t then I’d travel to an alternative railway station on a different route maybe to find a route that would take me closest to my destination.
And if there wasn’t one, I’d either reschedule the meeting for somewhere more convenient or, ever so reluctantly, get in a private taxi. On this trip, I couldn’t even be bothered to monetarily check to see if I could get there
by bus – I couldn’t interrupt playing Chaka Khan’s Greatest Hits on my phone on the train to Lye to find out the information. However, had the bus company, by hook or crook, digitally or through a map in Birmingham Moor Street, when I boarded the train, got into my consciousness, there’s a good chance I’d have shunned the Uber. However, at £5.95, my Uber ride seemed ridiculously cheap and I feel guilty about how little my friendly driver made out of it.
In many respects, the way to avoid the population taking a binary bus v Uber perspective, is to focus intently on those core, traditional ‘golden goose’ routes, where frequency and reliability are high and where investment in providing a product that is eye-catching, high quality and strongly branded – from bus stops to the livery and on-board experience. Whether we do hold up a white flag on those rural bus routes in affluent areas and accept that we can never provide a compelling, viable proposition and an Uber is a better, generally affordable solution (maybe even as part of a dual-branded feeder to a core, golden goose route) doesn’t seem a blasphemous proposition.
Whatever the case, we should accept that folk will still want to use an Uber, but it’s essential to ensure that generations don’t grow up, never having been on a bus or seeing it as a lifestyle option in any shape or form. Even getting them to consider a bus at a certain time or situation is better than nothing and a small victory. Uber’s here to stay. It’s changed my life, and I don’t think I’m a turncoat for admitting this, but it’s not the be-all and end-all. Though it clearly has eroded the bus sector’s customer base, it hasn’t killed it. By focusing more pro-actively and determinedly on its own differentiators, even if they might not be immediately obvious, the bus industry can survive and flourish alongside Uber.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Alex Warner has over 30 years’ experience in the transport sector, having held senior roles on a multi-modal basis across the sector. He is co-founder of transport technology business Lost Group and transport consultancy AJW Experience Group (which includes Great Scenic Journeys). He is also chair of West Midlands Grand Rail Collaboration.
This story appears inside the latest issue of Passenger Transport.
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