City paving way for ride sharing companies

By COLLIN GALLANT on June 4, 2020.

cgallant@medicinehatnews.com@CollinGallant

The City of Medicine Hat will introduce updates to its taxi bylaw that would allow ride-sharing companies to set up here, but also allow traditional taxi companies to bring on extra cars at times, as well as add digital hailing and price setting in order to compete.

Administrators presented outlines of the proposed “Vehicle for Hire Bylaw” to Wednesday’s meeting of the development and infrastructure committee.

It would allow the relatively new service to legally operate and be licensed in the city, but also maintain sort of a quota system for traditional cab operators.

“It’s meant to level the playing field or at least not pick a winner and loser,” said Kent Snyder, the city general manager of planning services, during Wednesday’s meeting.

If approved at city council in July, it would replace the existing Taxi Bylaw staff and be generally based on four-year-old regulations put in place by the province on operations such as Uber, Lyft and others that offer less formal transportation options.

It would also update billing procedures and licensing quotas for existing taxi companies, plus lay out and stiffen in most cases fines for non compliance by either part of the sector.

Committee chair Coun. Robert Dumanowski said he was excited the update is ready.

“The reality is that ride-sharing is a modern convention that people use, and this gives (those companies) an equal opportunity,” he said.

“We don’t want to push the traditional taxi companies into a model that doesn’t work. Hopefully this will lead them to modernize and compete.”

The changes would also allow traditional taxi and limousine services to update their equipment, and be able to temporarily expand fleets to accommodate special events, whereas bringing on new licences has been difficult in the past.

Taxis would no longer be bound to the pricing schedule outlined in the bylaw, and be able to negotiate a trip-specific fee on a digital platform for the client to accept.

Commissioner Stan Schwartzenberger said the new bylaw is a “hybrid” model that could be updated to accommodate future changes, but, as is, responds to technological change in the industry and also public demand and safety issues.

“There has been interest in the recent past for ride-sharing companies that are interested in the possibility of operating in Medicine Hat,” he told the committee. “We don’t currently have a mechanism to allow that.”

In 2016 the province created regulations around the operation of ride-sharing companies, including insurance requirements, police checks for drivers, and the requirement to hold a class 1, 2, or 4 commercial driver’s licence.

City staff say the local bylaw generally follows these minimum standards, will protect public safety while providing “equitable platform allowing for technological and market changes,” according to a background brief.

The licensing fee for a new company would be $2,250 this year. Anyone operating without a licence would be subject to an $800 fine.

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